Don’t forget about property tax. Even if you get a $45K BMW for $300/mo, you will get sticker shock come October.
I don’t know man, I think what people are trying to say is for someone who claims to have done 100+ hours of research you’re talking like you just stumbled in here with zero knowledge.
I would definitely hone in on a model you want and start from there. If you do the proper research on here - you should have shown up with some models that can get you that payment you want.
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Has @Ursus noted, VA has annual personal property taxes on cars. If you budget all in is 300 a month in VA, buy used or buy something to keep for a long time. Keeping any new luxury car lease under 300 for the first year or two is pretty much impossible in NoVa.
An illustration - on a car with a selling price of 40k, the 4.15% sales tax is $46.11 a month if residualized over 36 months - before factoring in interest. Then the annual car tax average about 4% of NADA valuation (which I’ll say is 75% of selling price since NADA runs very conservative) depending on what county you live in. So that’s another 100 bucks a month. So for the first year if your all in budget is 300, half of that will have to go to cover taxes.
Not sure you have really thought out all your costs. Also, have you factored in insurance increase or the increased cost of premium gas?
Thanks for the input and point taken
For those of us who are a little “wet behind the ears”, we have the 1% rule.
If the payment is above 1% MSRP, run away and don’t even show anybody else that lease sheet or ad.
Otherwise, under 1% give us the details to evaluate.
And at under 0.6%, you will have envious people.
Now I hope it’s clear…
Consider going to a MD dealership instead of a NoVA dealership. Why? Because MD has a doc fee cap of $300, whereas VA doesn’t have one (with fees typically around $695).
Case in point, my last BMW lease was through BMW of Catonsville, and I live in NoVA. And $400/36 is at least $10-15 off on the payment (plus the Baltimore market seems to bargain better than the DC market).
Keep in mind, however, that VA (and MD for that matter) both charge sales tax on the entire purchase cost, not just the lease payment, so payments will always be inflated compared to another state that only taxes the lease payment. And then on top of that, VA does have car property tax, so be prepared for that as well. Luckily, Arlington is one of the few places that still provides additional tax relief for hybrid/electric, so that can save you a few bucks.
Thank you very much for the heads up. Leasing in NoVA has several disadvantages (taxes) that I didn’t pay too much attention too. I’ve just mainly been looking at vehicle components when I should’ve paid more attention to VA specific terms.
Could I ask what you leased and is $400 including tax?
The $400 divided by 36 mo I quoted is the doc fee difference getting thrown into the lease making the effective cost $10-15/mo higher.
I was able to get the 2017 i3 Rex fully loaded with Deka trim for low $400s when it first came out. That coupled with some property tax savings and free charging for 2 years made it an interesting value proposition. That plus many of the places I hang out at have free/cheap charging. I know Catonsville had a bunch of i3 loaners that still qualified for lease support with low miles but I’m not sure if that’s still the case.
Message me if you want me to give you my sales guy info.
My lease info - How'd I do? 2017 BMW i3 Rex deal (VA taxes)
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