Why wouldn’t a dealer let a potential lessee have the full dealer lease incentives & EV tax credit if the lessee is not negotiating at all on the asking price?
E.g., $100K asking on a car (assuming no rebates apply) = $100K is what it takes to buy the car outright, but if that same car has $20K in lease incentives, why wouldn’t the dealer just let the car lease for $80K with no markup on MF?
Those first couple paragraphs are a lot of words that would benefit from some editing if you want better responses. What I think I pulled from there was a question you didn’t ask about early buyout fee which you should confirm your mbfs lease won’t have one.
If you’re in FL, PA, or states that require the buyout to happen at the dealer, you’re paying the dealer doc fee a second time when you buyout the lease.
Some states will tax you on the lease and the purchase.
Just to say that almost nobody nets 100% on the EV tax credit when they lease to buy.
What I think was your main question
Because they want to make more (some?) profit, so they’re offering a marked-up MF and most buyers don’t understand that is a thing.
WRT EV lease credits, many of those models aren’t eligible for the tax credit on a purchase but they are on a lease. Buyer is incentivized to lease and dealer is going to ask for margin everywhere they can get it.
This also feels like a “dealer psychology” question to which the answer is always “move on to another dealer”.
So if a dealer is willing to let a potential lessee walk away because the dealer doesn’t want to offer the full lease incentives that are available. By that logic, the dealer should also be willing to let someone who walks in to buy that car at asking price walk away…in that case I suppose they won’t be walking away because they are willing to pay asking price…so the dealer will likely put lots of extra fees on top to dissuade the buyer?
(Just edited the original post, thanks your advice)
If/when that “100k” advertised price includes rebates that only apply to purchases.
Thanks, I edited the original post to assume no rebates apply.
Is this a real situation you’ve encountered or just hypothetical?
There’s no reason to make that assumption nor is there a reason to reinvent the wheel. Look up all the posts on how to make offers and learn to make offers.
So, what is the actual question here? What is OP trying to do?
This is a real situation. The vehicle has no purchase rebates (it’s an EQS sedan), but does have lease incentives. Dealer is willing to offer the lease incentives, but only with a significant markup on the MF.
I made my offer: “$700/mo incl. tax (state of TN) with $0 DAS.”
Dealer came back at $740…but if the MF wasn’t marked up, dealer could go down as low as $550! In other words, dealer could offer this at $550/mo incl. tax with $0 DAS if they wanted to keep the same profit as if they had sold it to a cash buyer at asking price!
That doesn’t seem logical to me, why would a dealer let a potential lessee walk away on a deal that is definitely more profitable for the dealer vs. simply selling the car to a cash buyer at asking price? That’s why I’m asking the original question.
Honestly, it doesn’t matter because they are looking at their bottom line. That bottom line may be ‘xxx’ and as long as it fits the criteria, they won’t care. Look at the marketplace, see relevant information and swing for the fences 
outside of that, it doesn’t matter what the dealer does or doesn’t do.
You’re going to be far more precise in what you’re trying to suggest they do here.
I believe the real answer to your question is that you have a misunderstanding of the math/deal.
Thanks for your response.
Given you’re suggesting it’s my math, would it be safe to say that, in general, it is very unlikely that a dealer would say NO to a lease deal that would bring them MORE profit than a purchase at asking price would? And, if it ever looks like that’s the case, it could just be that someone is doing the math wrong?
Please give the specifics of the deal you are trying to achieve. Seems like this thread is just going in circles with a bunch of “what ifs”
A dealer isn’t going to say no to a lease deal that makes them more money than a purchase deal they would say yes to.
2024 EQS 450 4Matic w/ 3K miles (loaner)
$115,195 MSRP
$87,998 Asking Price
$63,998 Selling Price (the entire $24K discount comes from this month’s $16.5K dealer lease incentive and $7.5K EV lease incentive)
$1,095 Acq Fee
$775 Dealer Fees
My ask for a 24 mo. / 12K miles lease:
$700/mo. incl. taxes (7% on monthly pmt. for state of TN) with $0 DAS
Dealer came back at $741/mo.
I plugged all this into the LeaseHackr calculator and, at the subvented lease MF of 0.00084, the dealer should be able to go down to $550/mo. without changing anything else.
You should ask for that deal in the first place. Send another email using ur spouse/brother etc for the deal u want.
So, tell them your offer is still $700/month w/ 0 DAS. If they won’t do it, then walk away from this car.
The dealer is discounting the car a bunch (almost 24%) then adding the incentives. This does not appear to be the scenario you described in the OP, where the dealer would walk from a deal with the only discount coming from incentives.
How does a 24% pre-incentive discount compare to similar EQS deals you’ve seen in the Marketplace and in Signed deals?
Yes, I’m walking away. But I’m walking away puzzled as to why the dealer is willing to sell the car to someone outright for $88K, yet won’t sell it to me for MORE, with the only difference being that I’m leasing and utilizing the lease incentives.
Note, the dealer could go as low as $550/mo and it would be as if they sold it to someone outright for $88K + $775 Dealer Fees + TTL. Yet I’m offering $150/mo more than that, so $3,600 more over the 24 mo. lease and they’re still saying no.
I still don’t think a dealer would ever say no to making more money than asking price, so my assumption is that either someone else is also looking at the same car and the dealer is expecting to make more from them or the dealer has high expectations of being able to sell it to someone more profitably (via lease) before someone walks in and wants to buy it outright.