I think the goal is not quite clear here. Is the priority looking for lowest total cost, are you just looking for a new SUV in the same class for a certainly monthly payment when using all of the equity?
Yes, your equity may disappear in the future, but that would presumably also mean that the new-car transaction prices have decreased, as well. And using your equity for something other than an Audi would presumably result in losing some of that equity for taxes (as another poster mentioned).
At any rate, if it’s the latter option, I agree that contacting a broker and looking at the marketplace would be the first step. Unless you’re looking at a highly-optioned X3, I would imagine you should be able to find something close to your desired monthly.
going to piggyback off this thread since I am in a similar situation with our Q7. my lease comes due in January 2023 and I plan to buy the car out and keep it until the 4-year/ 50k warranty runs out. at that point, I’ll reassess the market and decide if we need to keep the Q7 longer and look into extended warranties.
does it make sense to payoff the lease early or should I just wait until I reach lease end? any pro’s to buying out now aside from a lower rate on the loan interest if I act now?
I paid off our Tiguan about 7-mo early. A few advantages:
since you can’t sell it to anyone but VW/Audi dealers without your equity being wiped out due to the higher price they charge 3rd parties, you almost have to do this if you want to sell it anyway (depends on the vehicle - in my case the few VW dealers I tried lowballed vs Carvana offer), but it takes time, about 4-weeks or so for payoff, re-title, etc in my case.
You are likely sitting on anywhere from 7k to 11k equity and if that is the case, strong chance that it will be taken by the captive in case of a total loss (low chance of a total loss, but still). So the sooner you buy it out, the less chance of losing your equity in case it’s totalled
If you’re reasonably certain you’re going to buy out the car anyway, it’s probably worth doing it sooner rather than later.
The current environment is one where ordering cars is usually the best price.
That means you’ll need to pick something that you’re also comfortable financing in case the RV/MF isn’t favorable at delivery. At least your selling price will be agreed to in advance.
After a bunch of dealers told me there was no room on the lease numbers (which I knew was bullsh**), I finally got something pretty good…or so I think (for this market at least). I came up with a deal that I would be comfortable with by utilizing the leasehackr calculator as well as edmunds. I contacted as many dealerships as possible (literally like 30+) until I found one willing to take my deal.
Vehicle is a 2022 Audi Q3 P+ with MSRP of $47,325
With just my equity from my current lease (just need to hand them back my car) and 12,000 miles per year (36 month lease)
$525/month
That includes Audi Care and everything…I don’t think I’ll be able to do much better!
What’s the discount like. Base MF? Can you post a sheet detailing your offer? Some brokers are doing up to 9% off in NJ, I think @aronchi posted some recently.
Why would you take thousands in positive equity and dump it into a bad lease on a CUV? The ugly truth is Audi’s lease like dogs and in this market, it’s even worse. For context, I had an $63K SQ5 and now I drive a Nissan Frontier with cloth seats. Find a car that works for your needs and gets you through this bad market, save the money and bank it. Or, just extend your lease and try to find a better deal around the holidays.
in normal times, 99% of lease returns were worthless. if one is lucky enough to have a lease return w equity, they should absolutely plow it into a new lease. granted, new leases are expensive, but that equity is found money, anyway - it wouldn’t exist if not for these market conditions. i’m not sure many people think like you do. call me crazy, but life is too short to go from an sq5 to a frontier.
Yes found money should not be used in pursuit of bad deals/ bad value. I think there are plenty of people who are reacting to the market in ways that are advantageous to their circumstances. For some that is flipping and for others it’s charging money for the names of dealerships that are doing decent deals. For me it’s a cheap short term lease to pass the time. A $47k loaded Q3 at something like $700 a month before paying down the balance with equity is a bad deal and bad value.
Not when the equity is effectively house money that would not otherwise be there. That said, if the q3 is missing certain things, then you’re right. Some of them are missing blind spot and keyless entry.
I don’t know about the Frontier specifically, but, given what MFs are like nowadays, isn’t there a slight advantage to using the equity as cap cost reduction?
