A-Class Lease - How badly did I get hosed?

Ask the Hackrs
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1

Hi guys,

I’m new here… and really wishing I had known about this forum before I leased my A-Class. Can you tell me how badly I got screwed with this deal, and maybe explain to me what I can do in the future to get a better deal? I didn’t really negotiate :\ Also, if I wanted to do a lease transfer to try to get out of this, how much incentive would I be looking at offering up for it to be a good deal to someone else? Thanks so much!

The car has the premium and multimedia packages, the AMG Night Package, black/titanium leather, the interior lighting option, Burmeister sound system.

Lease doc pics:

lease
lease2416×2932 1.76 MB

lease2
lease22584×2982 1.6 MB

Also a pic of the car:

IMG_0264
IMG_02643024×4032 3.14 MB

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Let’s just say, I hope the dealer took you to dinner first.

What matters is if you can afford it and if you like the car. If that’s the case, don’t sweat it and you’ll do better on your next lease. If you really want to get out of it, post on swapalease.

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Ha, noted.

I can afford it, but it was definitely impulsive and I’d rather be in something else if possible. I just want to know what kind of incentive would make it appealing on LT or Swapalease.

4

I think $450/mo is pushing it for someone to take over, so that means you will probably need ~$8500 incentive. Hope you really enjoy this car.

5

This car goes for $400 down, $400 a month (base). And that is still too much for that basic car.

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Would appreciate some more constructive advice going forward. What exactly did I do wrong? Did I just not negotiate a low enough price?

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It’s really not a bad car. There is definitely a premium for the interior tech and the engine is underwhelming at highway speeds compared to anything but a base C-class but it’s a fun car nonetheless. It does still feel like a Benz to me, though others may disagree.

8

What was MSRP on the car?

What’s the $1850 lease end charge?

Are there no rebates or incentives on the car?

What was your mf? What should the mf had been?

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MSRP was $44200
I don’t know what the lease end charge is. No rebates or incentives were available, I did ask… but I assume they can just lie? What’s an MF?

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MF is money factor; basically the interest rate.

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Ah yes, I don’t know. How would I find that out?

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Looks like .00139 based in your $3796 rent charge and the other numbers, which looks like buy rate so at least they didn’t screw you over more there.

in the future, you’d want to find out what the rate is (usually through the forums on edmunds.com) and compare that with the rate the dealer is trying to charge you during negotiations to make sure they aren’t marking it up.

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Did you trade in another lease or something when getting this?

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No, I didn’t have a car for 5 years as I was in NYC previously.

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I can’t quite tell, but did you get anything off of MSRP at all?

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Doesn’t seem as if I did :man_facepalming:t2: Is there a general rule for how much I should try to negotiate down from MSRP?

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Basically you paid full sticker plus some $1850 lease end fee which doesn’t seem to be tied to anything. Did you pay for excess wear and tear? Or any other add one separate from the prepaid maintenance?

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I do remember them saying something about extra maintenance stuff, possibly excess wear and tear.

19

Ok, sounds like the $1850 is the Mercedes first class lease protection thing then. You also paid $1520 in prepaid maintenance.

In the future, in addition to negotiating down the price, I’d highly recommend you take the time to understand every charge on the lease.

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Not from what I can tell. It depends on the individual model, how well that model might be selling, your geographic area, and factors that that might be unique to the individual dealerships you’re contacting (including, honestly, what mood the sales manager is in).

The A-Class is still pretty new, so early adapters of anything generally pay more.

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