You guys haven't seen crazy high until you've seen the crappy terms Lexus offers. Despite the alleged high resale value of Lexus vehicles, they seem to purposely make it much more expensive to lease than to buy. With a 55% residual after a 24 month lease, you'd almost be stupid not to buy the car. This is why a $45K Lexus cost over $700+/month to lease whereas a $45K BMW cost about $500/month on a lease.

According to as post over on clublexus, here are the current lease rates for a GS350:

2007 Lexus GS350 Sedan
24 Month – Residual 55% of MSRP – .00175 Base Rate
36 Month – Residual 49% of MSRP – .00175 Base Rate
48 Month – Residual 40% of MSRP – .00175 Base Rate
60 Month – Residual 32% of MSRP – .00255 Base Rate

Residuals posted are for 15K miles/year. Add 2% to Residual for 12k mi/yr and 3% for 10k mi/yr on all terms

 

I got a 36mo lease, 12k/year, G35S with premium, navi and tech packages for $580/month with I believe it was $3k down. We traded in an Acura TL which still had 13 months left on the lease. I think it was an OK deal.
Jay

 

Holy crap, those are some ugly numbers... , Do they really expect G350 to be selling around 27~30k two years down the road?

 

But for longer terms? the Infiniti have better deal, especially the M/F, 5.7 vs 7.68.

 

I am looking to potentially lease a 07 Sedan. I see on the website they are running a special 24 mo lease w/ like 2500 down for $399/month for 12k miles/year. I want to get an 07 sedan loaded minus maybe navi (unless its not that much different) for 2 years and maybe put down 3k. I am hoping to get it for $400 or less/month and put down no more than 3k and try to get 15k miles/year...

 

HUH? you actually want the residual to be as high as possible, so your monthly payment would be lower and at end of lease? you simply return it so whether it worth more or less at end of lease? isn't an factor.

 

You can get a 2005 GS300 for that much (GS350 is the '07 update)

 

No, *I* want the residual to be lower. I have leased one other car and I thought it was the worst thing you could do with a car. We actually got rid of the car before the lease was up. When you do that you have to pay the residual plus whatever payments are left to buy out the lease. Well, that made the lease buyout WAY more than the car was worth. The only reason I will consider a lease is to get a lower payment. The only way that is worth it to me is if I can come out better in the end. My goal is to buy the car at the end of the lease. I understand that things may change by then but that is my intent.

Like I said before, it's all about what you are looking for. If you are just looking for a cheap payment then go for the lease. If you HAVE to have a cheap payment then you should probably be looking at another car. I have a multiple option "plan" if you will that fits what I need.

 

Go see what the '05 G's are going for. That should give you an idea of how well the car holds its value. If Infiniti makes the HR a one year motor then you can bet that value is going to go in the toilet. I'm just gambling on them *not* screwing the '07 owners like BMW did.

 

If someone want to keep the car after the lease? they should not lease began with. But whatever the intend was? one still wants residual as high as it can be, in your situation? if you had lower residual than you had? you will have higher monthly payment but you will be paying less when you want to buy it out early, but if you had higher residual? you would be paying more when you want/need to buy it out early but you will had lower monthly payment, so it will end up to be same no matter what % residual was. But most of ppl who leased? arent looking to purchase it after or before the term is up so higher residual would be much more beneficial than lower ones.

 

I meant to say "GS350" not G35, which is going for around 50k, so they expect it to be 30k or less in two years?

 

I think I know a thing or two about leasing, and agree 100%

If you find yourself needing to exit a lease early, you have made a serious mistake ever having gotten into the lease, in the first place.

And keeping the car after the lease is over is the second biggest mistake you could have made

 

do you mind elaborating?

 

Sure.

7 out of 10 times, the buyout amount is more than the market value of the vehicle.

Which is to say buying the same model year car used off of a lot is usually cheaper.

For the other 3 out of 10 times, that the buyout amount is less than the used car price, it would have been cheaper (by total payment amount) if you had just financed your purchase outright at inception.

It is very rare to make out on buying a leased vehicle at termination.

 

In some instances, it makes sense to lease even if you have an inkling that you may purchase afterwards. I've run some numbers on a potential volvo purchase for a friend, and teh difference between financing and leasing/buying was $1,000. That was a small amount of money for the luxury of knowing he could return the car if he wasn't crazy about it after 3 years or if he wanted a change.