How to find the cheapest car lease

thomas_c_3

Thinking of leasing a car? There’s lots of options - 2 year deals, 4 year deals, 3 month deposits, 9 month deposits, admin fees. Here’s my way to find the cheapest deal and compare one lease against another.

Warning - it does involve a spreadsheet (and a bit of time). But don’t be scared, it’s really simple. You could just use a pen and paper if you like!

Use your spreadsheet to make the following headings;

Hire Company, Car, Mileage Allowance, Term, Deposit, Repayment months, Monthly Rent, Other Costs.

Next, the leg work (aka “the hunt”). Just trawl the internet for car leasing companies, when you find a car you like the look of, input the various pieces of information into your spreadsheet and we have the necessary building blocks to compare one against the other. Repeat this many times over, for the same car, different cars, different websites, different mileages - what ever you like!

Remember to check whether the price displayed on the website is inclusive or exclusive of VAT. If it says “£129+VAT”, you need to multiply £129 by 1.2 = £154.80.

Check whether it’s a personal lease or a business lease. You’ll probably need a personal one.

Remember, the first month you only pay the deposit amount, so your “Repayment Months” is the “Term” (the length of the lease) minus one month. So if it’s £129+VAT per month for a two year lease (24 months). You’ll pay a “Deposit” and 23 (24-1) payments of £154.80.

Once you’ve inputted all the cost, add them all together and you can create a new column - a “Total Cost” column. This figure represents the total amount you’ll have paid by the end of the lease. Make sure your spreadsheet is adding up correctly, so you “Monthly Rent” has been multiplied by the “Repayment Months”, then add your “Deposit” and “Other Costs” (like admin fees) on top of that.

Now we have the “Total Cost” you’ll have paid across the term of the lease, we can create a final column - the “Real Monthly Cost” column. This is what allows you to compare different length deals against one another. All you do here is divide the “Total Cost” by the length of the lease. You’re all done! You’re now looking at the average monthly cost of the lease with everything taken into account. Now you can trawl the internet for as many deals, on as many cars as you like and compare the relative costs against one another clearly, like for like.

Remember only to compare deals against each other if they are for the same mileage allowance. Other-wise you'll be comparing apples with pears!

bigjl

I would just phone Lings Cars.

thomas_c_3

well having looked at 10 different cars across 6 websites, Ling cars was never the cheapest option...

loskie

but dont always rely on the headline figures. Your local main dealer may match or better what specific lease cos offer.

Hintza

Where are the columns to compare the other methods of ownership? Cash. PCP, HP etc until you add them in to the equation you don't know whether it is a good deal or not.