Hi Hackrs, I’m looking for some advice. Due to a number of personal reasons, I’ve gotten myself within weeks of lease-end on my 2022 Alfa Romeo Stelvio Veloce and am not sure what the best move is.
I was finally able to call Ally bank and get details on a possible lease extension, but they only offer 3 months maximum, with a (possible) approval for another 3 months afterwards. The monthly payment stays the same but unfortunately they don’t revise the buyout amount any further. This doesn’t make sense to me but I guess that’s the penalty for trying to extend.
Current buyout is $26xxx plus WA tax for a grand total of around $29,000. Checking on Carvana and CarMax for their quotes to “sell my car”, and I get $24.8k from Carvana and a range of 21-27k from CarMax.
Stelvio currently has 14k miles, so very low from the 36mo/10k lease parameters. It’s in really great shape other than rash on the upgraded factory wheels.
I like this car, but is buying it out a bad move? Am I effectively “instantly losing” thousands of dollars in “value”?
Should I extend the lease in order to buy time to find another lease? With just weeks to go in Sept, I don’t know if it’s realistic to do so.
For reference, I still want an AWD SUV (or SUV-ish) vehicle. I like the looks, driving and fun factor of the Stelvio a lot. Open to other ideas!
Any advice, questions or criticisms are welcome. Thanks!
This is a tough one. I haven’t seen a lot of good lease deals on ICE SUVs this month. If you like the Stelvio, the nice thing is that you know the car and most of the quirks, if any, have likely already been worked out. You are coming towards the end of the warranty period, though. So that might give me pause.
If you’re up to leasing an EV, you could probably still score a good deal on a Lyriq or maybe even a Tonale as a PHEV, but I don’t think either would drive as fun as the Stelvio Q4 Veloce.
That being said, I would look at the $25K offer from Carvana against the $26K buyout, so you’re essentially losing $1K in value. Sure the tax is still cash flow, but if you went to go buy something you’d still owe the tax, and at least now you have some tax basis for your next purchase.
Hey thanks for this feedback. I ran the offers to “sell” as if I owned the vehicle, not selecting it as a lease. Sounds like I need to re-run it to see what happens.
Warranty is 4yr/50k (I think! Better double check, lol). So you’re right, I would have 1 year left on it. I’ve seen some other forum posts talking about buying an extended warranty for a Stelvio at lease end, so that’s something I could consider as well.
Part of what bums me out is that if I buy it, I take full ownership of the wheel rash. I haven’t done lease-end inspection yet but my off-the-cuff assessment is that I’d still get by within the damage allowance.
I’m biased because I’m a huge EV fan, but with that kind of budget there are a lot of options open to you. I would check out the Signed areas (subdomain and forum) filtered to EVs to see what’s possible. Check out the Marketplace, too, to see the broker deals being offered to help understand what’s out there.
Do you anticipate that your driving will remain this “low?” If so, I feel like leasing another car is paying for lot of miles you won’t use (unless you lease from a brand that allows for very low mileage).
If the Stelvio isn’t a nightmare to maintain per /reddit or any Alfa-Romeo forums and since you really like the car, I actually think a buyout isn’t a horrible idea, TBH.
all you need is about 1 or 2 days to get into a new lease. this is the last month for the $7500 EV federal incentive, so everyone has a deal to offer. get a new lease and return the alfa romeo on time.
Your buyout seems to be right about what dealers are asking for used 2022s. I guess you need to decide if it is worth owning a 3 year old AR Stelio. It will cost about $600 a month to finance the buyout, so you payment will be a little lower than current.
Thanks - yes I’ve been checking the Private Sellers section and the Marketplace. Have worked with a broker once before from LH and it went well (actually that’s where the Stelvio came from). Didn’t try turning on EV filter, will do so!
Yes, I will continue to put only about 4-5k miles per year on a car so I can handle any 7.5k lease etc.
Your perspective is valid, I could likely keep it for a few years and not have to worry about too much since it would still be less than 30k miles after 3 more years!
valid point. I am trying to figure this out around a busy work and home life schedule, so I can’t dedicate the same amount of time many Hackrs would. I don’t need a unicorn, I just want a decent deal, unlike signing for 2 cars back late 2022!
Yes maybe for a 48 month or longer payment, true. It’s the owning part that I haven’t done since before 2019 so having trouble figuring out if that’s smart in this particular case.
