Thanks for all of the help over the years. About 3 years ago, I was able to land a great lease deal after doing hours of reading on this site. I’m in the market for a new Acura MDX w/ Tech. The dealer is in Virginia and his offer through email didn’t include a breakdown but was as follows:
$52,525 MSRP, $13,900 “discount” and $1,500 conquest, for “selling price” of $37,125 (I know that selling price is not the proper term there). I have asked him for a breakdown but based on those numbers he quoted me $560/month for a 36 month/12k miles per year lease. Having read many posts, I know it is difficult to judge these numbers without seeing the breakdown; however, I went on Edmonds forum and got the Residual/MF. When I plug the figures into the calculator with only first month due at signing and 6% Maryland sale tax I get a payment around $418.
Here’s the breakdown:
MSRP: $52,525
Selling Price: $38,625 (this is based on the $13,900 “discount”)
Taxed Incentives: $1,500 (conquest)
Residual: 51%
MF: .00042 (per Edmonds)
Acquisition Fee: $595
Government Fees : $200 (Estimated)
Dealer Fees: $200 (Estimated)
Monthly w/ Tax: $418
Even if I’m wrong on the dealer fees/government fees, what am I missing that could cause such a large delta between the LH calculator and the $560 I was quoted? I want to be prepared for when the sale guy respond. Thanks!
Acura typically offers two different lease programs; a subvened MF with a smaller direct to dealer incentive and a base rate MF with a larger direct to dealer incentive. I suspect what’s happened here is Edmunds has quoted you the subvened rate and the dealer has provided a selling price that included the large direct to dealer incentive
You need to start by finding out what the actual deal you have in front of you is. Ask the dealer what mf they’re charging. Ask Edmunds for the mf/incentives for the higher MF.
When you say buy it for $37k do you mean instead of leasing or just using buy colloquially?
I mean just buy it (finance). But open to being told I’m an idiot in how I’m thinking about it. From what I’ve seen, $37k is a stellar price for that car.
So typically the mdx has much smaller purchase incentives, making a purchase at that number next to impossible. You can, however, lease it at the higher MF rate, using the larger incentive to reduce the cap cost, and then buy out the lease, effectively purchasing it for much cheaper. You’ll need to figure out what the larger lease incentive is to determine what the appropriate target price would be.
That’s a great idea. And, if I don’t want to have to cough up the cash, line up financing from my bank at a lower MF than the marked up one.
In an email with the guy, I asked if the $37,125 number was to purchase and he said to purchase would be $3,000 more. Still, that was the initial number out the gate so there may be room there as well. The dealer has at least 100 MDXs right now and another poster on here mentioned a relative who snagged one (purchased) for $39,999 from the same dealer last month.
So what he is really telling you there is that the purchase incentive is $3000 less than the lease incentive, so by the time you factor in acquisition fees, you’ll be able to save about $2400 by leasing the vehicle and then buying out the lease than by just buying it, assuming you’re in a state with a favorable tax situation.
The reason the payment is high is because I had a Lexus RX350 that I was ready to get rid of. Had 4 payments left for a total of $2,000 ($500/month). Plus, the car had one major scratch on the side (wife hit a pole in parking lot) that I figured I’d get dinged at least $1,000 for. Doing the trade-in reduced the MD 6% sales tax from around $2400 down to $594, plus I figured I saved the Lexus disposition fee since we planned to move on from Lexus. Capitalized about $2,962 from the old car (payoff was $31,462 and we were offered $28,500) which effectively bumped the sales price back up to around $40k.
As always, I left feeling “ok” but wife is happy with the car. Thanks again to everyone.
Final question, based on the numbers, is it worth exploring an attempt to buy the lease (and the car) assuming my bank will give me around 2-2.25% on a 5 year auto loan?
Did you check first what the car was worth? Too late now but you may have left money on the table. They may have purchased it vs paying your remaining payments.
I had gone to a few dealerships over the last couple months and none came close to offering anywhere near 28,500. One last month valued it at 26k and some change. I wasn’t sure that I could do the online ones (vroom etc) with the damaged door.
Its a VA dealer. If its the metro DC area their dealer fee can be upwards of 800-1000 dollars. Look through there advertised web prices, and it will say what the advertised dealer processing fee is.
Landed a great deal on Acura MDX SH-AWD base model
Great advice and insights learned from this forum, thank you all for posting.
I snagged a 2020 Acura MDX SH-AWD on a 36 month lease, 15k miles per year and got the dealer to throw in “Flex Cash” along with finding the Acura MF and having him run the numbers with that.
What I discovered is there are 2 offers in MF and incentive combinations. The Higher MF is equal to 6% at 0.00225 and can be paired with $7,500 of incentives. The Lower MF is equal to 1% at 0.00042 and is paired with a $3,650 incentive. Neither of these include the “Flex Cash” which they say is given to the dealer to optimize and help out at their discretion.
Here is the deal I signed:
MSRP: 47525
Selling Price: 40463
36 months
15K miles PY
51% Residual
MF 0.00042
@$900 Dealer Fees
Tax, Tag, Title
WI 5.5%
Plus $1000.00 Flex Cash and
Drive Fees of $1000
Monthly payment $504.15
Hope this helps anyone looking to strike a deal on one of these vehicles.
Congrats, however, for the base model your target monthly should be under $450/month. If you look at the selling price on the AWD w/tech I leased last month it was about $37,000. You should’ve aimed for a selling price closer for $32,000-35,000.
The $504.15 includes the tax so we are at $478.43 as a base fee. Either way I am comfortable with this as it will be here for the next 3 years. Just out of curiosity, do you feel pricing and specials are regionally based?
