I will apologize in advance as I am not sure I am posting correctly. I have been looking at the Hyundai website and came across what I felt was a good deal.
From what I understand, I need to ask for an actual contract tomorrow and post that.
I just really feel like a fish out of water because I have never leased before. I also feel like I am jumping at the first good deal I’ve found and I’m not sure if I could actually expect better deals to come along before the end of the year. The picture I’ve added is from the website. It’s a 2024 IONIQ 5 SEL. The only other “deal” I landed on was a 2025 Kona SEL MSRP $38,630.$1919 down, $285/month 10kmiles/yr (the Kona is 65miles away, IONIQ is 180 - which doesn’t matter a lot) I drive about 8,000 miles a year as I work from home.
My main fear - am I jumping at this too fast? I want to lease a car in 2024. Should I wait a couple months? Does it seem reasonable that better deals will come this fall?
Any advice is welcome. I am continuing to read the forum, and do research. I would just like a little feedback if you all don’t mind.
Hopefully, I can help you as I just leased a 2024 Ioniq 5 LTD AWD this week after about six weeks of car shopping and one week of serious negotiating. I will post the deal to share with the community this weekend.
Here is my advice based on what I have learned on leasehackr and by going through this leasing process as I have typically purchased my cars. But given the incentives with today’s EV market, leasing makes a lot more sense financially.
First look at a few cars you are interested in rather than just trying to find a deal. Then once you figure out what cars you want/like, then go see what the best deal you can find would be for each car. For example, I was interested in the Ioniq 5, Kia EV6, and KIA EV9. We eliminated the EV9 because it was too big for my wife’s liking. Then we looked for the best deals available on the EV6 Wind and the Ioniq 5 LTD trims. Once we got a general idea on how much they would cost relative to each other, we chose the one that offered the best value to us. (For example, even though the Ioniq 5 will be a more expensive monthly lease payment, the 2 years of free charging that comes with the Ioniq 5 was worth roughly $2500 of value to us, while the 1000 kWh of free charging from Kia was worth only $530. So the Ioniq 5 is a better car and a better value for us).
To get a sense of pricing, use a website like Edmunds or Truecar. In addition, I found the Edmunds forums on leases and incentives for each car model I was interested in as an invaluable resource. Just post a question on the trim level you want, duration and mileage on the lease, and what zip code you live in and they will answer with what the current money factors residuals, and rebates are applicable for the cars your are interested in. For example, if you were looking at a Hyundai Ioniq 5 AWD last month they would provide the following:
24 month lease - 10,000 miles - Residual 62% and lease rebate $13,500 and .00231 money factor (interest rate)
33 month lease - 10,000 miles - Residual 57% and lease rebate $14,500
.00246 money factor
36 month lease - 10,000 miles - Residual 54% and lease rebate $14,000
.00253 money factor
This helped me determine that the 33 month lease was the sweet spot for getting the best monthly payments and discounts on the car. These numbers change every month so you need to know what they are before you negotiate with the dealer. In contrast, the best Kia MF and Incentives were on the 24 month lease. It is important to note that each manufacturer may offer better values at different lease terms.
As you may have already figured out all this information will give you the power to negotiate the best deal. And the deal starts with the selling price you negotiate for the car. So ask for a discount on the car before the lease incentives are factored in. Those are from the manufacturer and will be applied to whatever the selling price is that your agree to with the dealer. If you like to negotiate, don’t be afraid to start low. You never know how desperate the dealer is to want to sell the car. They may be trying to hit a sales volume incentive and will take a loss on the car to get a larger end of month bonus. Then put the price in the leasehackr calculator with the money factor and lease incentive data you got from Edmunds or other online sources and plug those in to find what your expected monthly payment should be. If this number dramatically different from the number the dealer offers you, then they are probably marking up the money factor or not giving you the full discount. Ask them to show you what these numbers are. Say you need this to compare it to other competitive offers. If they don’t want to share it with you, don’t buy from that dealership.
Get internet quotes from at least 5-10 dealerships then follow up with the ones that are most responsive and/or offer the best prices.
This is a buyers market and time is on your side if you don’t need the car immediately. The new 2025 models are coming soon and dealers want to get rid of 2024 inventory as soon as they can. Start negotiating now and push for a sale towards the end of the month. From what I can tell the money factors, residuals, and lease incentives on the Ioniq 5 did not change that much for September (residuals went down - slightly increasing lease costs, and the money factor went down - slightly decreasing lease costs, and incentives are roughly the same). Of course, you could wait until the 2025s are actually on the lots, but you do run the risk of inventory running out on your preferred trim level or color combination. So definitely be prepared to buy now if you feel like you are getting a good deal. That’s what I did.
Finally, I would highly suggest using a broker or talking to one if you are not comfortable with the leasing process or don’t like to negotiate. I talked to more than a few, but unfortunately most of them did not work in my state and the shipping costs would offset the money I would save. But definitely explore it. There is a broker I found on the Kia subbreddit that also works with Hyundai. You can look him up too if you can’t find one to help you on this site.
Keep those questions coming. This is a great community, and they collectively helped me make an informed decision on my lease.
The simplest thing to do is go to the marketplace section, find the car you want and see what deals brokers are offering. Then try to match these deals in your negotiations. That’s usually my starting point now since I know those deals are not, on their face, unreasonable.
I can usually find a dealer to match/come close to a brokers deal. If not, I use the broker.
But when I go to the Marketplace most info is for CA, I can’t find very much for IONIQ 5’s unless it’s pretty old. Should I just be looking at Hyundai?
Thank you for your great information! I am settled on a Hyundai (unless I stumble on some sort of amazing deal).
I had a Hyundai ICE for 11 years and loved it, no issues whatsoever. I was exclusively looking at a Kona until I decided to lease. Now I’m just looking for the best deal between IONIQ 5 and the Kona.
I’ve been gathering info on EVs for about 18 months, I was planning on buying last fall but that plan got pushed back and now my plan is to buy before 2025.
