Deal Check: 2021 AWD Honda Pilot Black Edition in

(Local Deal in Denver, Colorado)

Hi everyone,

First time on here. I’m missing something that I’m doing in our calculations. We would like to get the leasehackr calculator score to reflect 20 years on this deal :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

Our local Honda dealership presented us with this offer to lease a 2021 AWD Honda Pilot Black Edition. I have attached their offer to this offer. I was trying to make this short, but important info needs to be shared in order to understand our fees.

This would be our first ever Honda lease. We have done several Toyota leases on the Highlander and had received positive equity when selling our old Highlander to local dealers. Our lease is up on our 2018 Toyota Highlander. They payoff is $29,900 and the market value at local dealerships is $31,700. We are not adding the $1,800 equity as a down payment. We are wondering if leasing this 2021 Honda Pilot is a smart move. We looked at leasing another Toyota Highlander Platinum AWD, but the payment is $100 higher than our previous Highlander Platinum AWD. The body style change and features are not much different that the 2018, so we are asking ourselves if it is worth paying $100 more to drive a similar vehicle this time around. Would you do it?

We live near this dealership, so shipping is not needed. Our registration and DMV fees are handled separately at our local government office. We pay these fees when we pick up our license plates.

Our dealer has a strange base payment with a range of $559-568 without tax added to it. It’s under the zero down column. This is confusing. I wonder if it’s for the finance department’s benefit to give them some leg to sell us products?

Our sales tax of 7.960%, which should be added to our base payment, is specific to our address in Colorado. We only want to put our first payment down at the time of signing. What else should we pay up front?

Should their mandatory $599 dealer handling fee and $595 acquisition fee be reflected in the cap cost? Or does this not make a difference in the calculations?

We also see an unpleasant fee of $888 for accessories in this quote. How can we get them to remove their unnecessary fees?

I have verified the local incentives, but we do not see the available $750 incentive from Honda. The residual and the MF match what’s in the Edmond’s forum.

Here’s what I have so far but I’m missing the mark some how in our Leasehackr calculator. We want to get the highest Leasehackr score possible, and hopefully it will reflect 20 years in the end ha ha.

MSRP is $51,435

Cap Cost shows $44,331

36 month lease @ 15k

Only 1st payment down.

7.960% tax rate to 80004.

We own a 2018 Toyota Highlander so qualify for the incentive. No trade in.

.00110 Money Factor

57% Residual for 15k miles

  • $750 incentive
  • $1000 conquest incentive

Please let us know what we’re doing wrong.

Best Regards

Here’s what I have so far in the calculations, but I’m missing the mark some how? What can we change?

This is closer, they gave you a good discount but then added all these dealer add ons almost $1000 worth and what’s the handling fee? Shipping? I don’t see govt fees? Is this with tags?

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Dc2 - Thanks for looking at our quote and helping us. I realize that I left out some information so I edited my OP for clarification.

We live in Colorado and shipping is not needed for this local deal. Our Registration and DMV fees are paid separately at the local county government office within 90 days of taking delivery. You are absolutely correct about the fees being thrown back in after the discount. It’s confusing

I would like to get the leasehackr calculator score to reflect 20 years on this deal lol.

@Jeff_BeachCitiesAuto

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You got a pre-incentive dealer discount of 12.4% which is great. Remove the shipping and $800 dealer add ons and you have a solid deal for a 21. Just tell them you dont want it. I’ll take it that you dont qualify for any other rebates. If you can get by with 12k a year that will raise your RV 2%. You could try looking at US Bank but I dont see it getting much better. A lot of people here will tell you the leasehackr score is useless. Theres no way you’re hitting 20 years with this.

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Deal you are getting doesnt have much meat left on the bone, I wouldn’t expect anything drastically better than this

The $750 incentive is a dealer incentive, its already part of the selling price and is not something any dealer will disclose

Like others have said, if you don’t want the dealer add ons just tell them, a lot of Honda dealers require them to offset the loss on negative deals like this one

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Hi Jeff. I appreciate you for looking at this offer. I added some considerations to my original post above. We currently lease a 2018 Toyota Highlander Platinum AWD at $518 per month with tax. The Honda Pilot peeked her curiosity so we are wondering if this Honda lease is a smart move or not. We had received positive equity checks from dealerships when we sold them our Toyota leases a month or two before our lease ended. It was nice receiving those checks for $1500 to $2000 because we used that money to pay for our license plates on the new lease. Does this happen with Honda leases too?

In terms of equity everything will be a case by case scenario but almost all of my customers who try to get out of their Honda leases early or sell it at the end have positive equity in it. Honda sets their residuals fairly low and they don’t load them up with a lot of rebates so Hondas have some of the best resale values out there

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I have another question. Some people say to only put the first payment down. Is there anything else that we should pay upfront with our first payment? Acquisition fee and dealer handling fee? I changed the leasehackr calculator to reflect upfront costs. Is this the way we should do our new deal without the $888 accessories? Should the government fees be out of this calculator since we pay for our registration and license plates at our local DMV government office 90 days later?

Here’s the new calculations. Are these correct?

it’s up to you if you want to finance the acquisition fee and dealer handling fee or pay it up front to get a lower monthly. I would compare the total lease cost of rolling it into the lease where you only pay your first months at delivery vs paying 1st month + acquisition fee + handling fee. It’s probably a negligible amount because the rate is pretty low.

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Dc2 - Thank you. I’m see a feature from leasehackr calculator with a box that I can click under the $599 and $595 fees. Are the upfront government fees in the calculator for our DMV license plate fees and registration fees for our state? In Colorado, this is usually a separate transaction. I have the following payment with tax if I’m doing the calculator correctly.

Government fees are usually registration/tags and also taxes on your taxed incentives, cap cost reduction

Thanks so much for your guidance Dc2.

We received a competitors quote, there is no way that we are paying $600 for a Honda Pilot. You have to see this crazy quote.

I’m attaching it here. 2021 Honda Pilot “Black Edition” in black color. No $395 paint upgrade.

The other dealer claims this deal beats all offers lol. There’s a suspicious line that has a lump sum of $3,622.21 for sales tax (estimate).

Man, $600+/mo is a lot of money for a pilot.

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I agree lol. If we could get to $576 with tax then we know we have a great deal. On the other hand, we have quotes for a 2021 AWD Toyota Highlander with the Platinum trim that are in the $608 payment range. The family wants a midsize AWD suv with a roomy 3rd row seat and a heated steering wheel in the upgraded trim levels. We shopped Acura, Honda, Toyota, and Kia Telluride so far…

If the Highlander back seat is big enough, have you considered the xc90?

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Why not get touring model instead? I don’t think price difference justifies feature content and you should be much lower on payments.

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You mean elite?

Black edition =pure cosmetic upcharge

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Anhelenuk1 - I wish I could convince her to give up the heated steering option that she loves and settle for your suggestion lol.

I’m sure you can install heated steering wheel for under $1k and save a ton of money

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