And that’s unfortunate. A 63k car should never be leased for 900 or even 800 a month - I don’t care how rich purchaser is - what happened to principle.
1 Like
And that’s crazy. I don’t care how rich those 20 people behind me are. What happened to principle?
1 Like
What principle are you talking about? I really don’t see the problem here. If the market isn’t supporting aggressive discounts, then don’t lease the vehicle if you’re trying to get an aggressive deal. People take this way too personally.
11 Likes
I’m paying less than half of it (not counting only first month DAS) for my XC90 loaner with almost the same MSRP. But it is not a Mercedes, sure 
p.s. 2019 data is irrelevant 
5 Likes
Yeah looks like ill finish out the last 3 mos on my lease and go with an xc90 or a defender, or x5, or f pace, or xt6, … I guess We just made a point
Ive leased nine mercedes in 12 years. Msrp discount has always been 12-20%. I know today is different than yesteryear, but prior deals shape a consumer’s expectations. 900 a month is a 5% discount, which is what an amoeba can accomplish by walking Into a dealership. I get it there are people in the world who treat 900 like i treat 500. But that nonsense drives up least]e payments.
3 Likes
Residual and MF on 36 mos 10k miles is 56 / .00142. A 12% msrp discount on a 63k car gets you to around 2k drive off and low 700s a month including tax (which is an absurd 10.25%) in my city. Ive leased 9 bemz in 12 years. Discount has always been around 12-20% so I dont think im being unreasonable. But, if there are rich and/or ignorant people willing to pay 900/month then looks like I have to turn to the other makers.
20% off pre-inventive discount on a new Benz? Care to share more details?
2 Likes
While I’m not buying the “20% off pre-incentive is the norm” line, no one is walking into a dealership and getting 5% off at buy rate on a new gle right now as an opening offer.
3 Likes
It’s amazing how a lot of people do not understand basic economic principles like supply and demand…
14 Likes
who are you to say the car isn’t worth 900 or 800/mo? A car is worth what someone is willing to pay for it. If they aren’t having trouble leasing, or dare I say financing, there’s no issue with pricing at the moment.
Customers hit dealerships with crazy lowball offers and dealerships hit customers with ridiculous pounder deals.
1 Like
A Volvo dealer 
But seriously, it was a one-off deal, at least for me.
Exactly. The rich have gotten richer during Covid, and have less things (like travel) to spend their money on. The poor were not getting a Mercedes anyway, so demand is up while supply is down.
I’ve given up on Mercedes for now. Been working with the same dealer for years and the pricing I’m getting now is terrible – 6% discount on a loaner (C43). I’ve been watching S450 inventory and they finding buyers for cars with 2019 build dates at these discount levels. Even a GLA250 is selling at 6% off where I got my 2020 near 20%. It’s not just specific to the GLE.
4 Likes
There were some nice c43 loaner deals just a month ago. Things seemed to have changed quickly
Years ago I was amazed at the 50k mark up on an z8. Then someone I worked with bought 3 (1 in Germany 2 in the US). It is indeed supply and demand.
In my opinion, most people on this forum care more for the deal than the car, while most people outside of this forum care more for the car than the deal.
Some people want a certain car, for whatever reason that is, and are happy paying a premium to get it, if they have to.
3 Likes
It’s worth noting that mediocre discounts make for a horrific lease payment, but don’t have quite the same effect on a purchase deal. You’re eating all of the higher price over 36-months and off a lower baseline, the % increase is painful - which isn’t the same for a 60 or 72 month finance deal. Heck, those coming in to purchase may be satisified with a 5% discount from MSRP even if that makes a pretty unattractive lease payment. There may also be a pullback (or at least no increase) in residual value subvention or money factor subvention - something which the dealer has no control over.
In these cases where the dealer isn’t discounting like they used to, it’s likely there’ll be a drop off in lease mix.
4 Likes
These people willing to accept the 5% discount from MSRP aren’t necessarily going to lease as per my previous post. For a 72-month loan, those folks may be financing at around $900/mo. Which isn’t unreasonable for a $63k vehicle. If a nameplate is low on inventory, the first thing to cut back is the deeply discounted + highly incentivized lease offers/deals.