First hack, thanks to this forum for all the help, knowledge, and data points. The leasehackr calculator was immensely helpful. While this isn’t a blow out, unicorn deal, I feel good about it as I wanted this particular model of RAV4 in order to run OpenPilot by comma.ai
MSRP: $36,702
Sale Price: $32,950
8 MSDs: $2,400
Payment after tax: ~$323
Leasehackr Score: 9.7 years
I think a lot of people would usually say it’s better to buy a RAV4 than lease, but I decided to lease because of the good ROI on MSDs, the fact that I got this car mostly to play around with open source semi-autonomous software that will surely be better in 2 or 3 years, and the self-employed business deductions.
I worked deals at only 4 different dealerships. I began by researching MF/Residuals through Edmunds forums then went to cargurus to find the stalest units on lots that were somewhat local to me. It helped that I was in an area that seemed to have nationally low MF rates. Got strung along for three days by a dealer who’s sales associate clearly misquoted me but wouldn’t own up to it. Ultimately, I went with the most straightforward dealer who quoted a good price and openly shared their lease sheet right away. Probably could have squeezed out another percent off MSRP but I needed to get the deal done so I settled. I mostly negotiated over email and text but took phone calls when they called me with specific deal questions.
MSDs threw basically every single dealer for a loop. When I was finally in signing my deal, the finance guy explained that they actually brought the GM in on it before quoting to make sure they got it right because they essentially hadn’t done a deal with MSDs in a year+. Multiple sales managers called to basically interrogate me about my lease proposal. Luckily I had experience from reading the forum for a few months because I had to walk them through everything.
Special shout out to @Bostoncarconcierge and @Jrouleau426 for being transparent about posting their deals which allows regular guys like me a mental benchmark to try to get something locally that is competitive. If I didn’t thoroughly enjoy the process of hunting, negotiating, and playing with numbers, it would absolutely be a waste of time to do it myself instead of simply using one of the great brokers posting deals on this site. I fully expect to use a broker at some point in the future because I can’t imagine trying to replicate some of the deals these guys post having now been through the process once.
