Getting to the point where I can actively consider other options, so my thoughts are to either :-

1. Buy another car, say 3/4 years or so old on a straight HP deal and look for a decent warranty.
2. Look at a 3+24, or 36 month lease deal on a brand new car, which has a full manufacturers warranty.

Clearly option 2 would mean the car would never be mine, but at the end of the term, I can just hand the car back.

having never done a lease deal before, and not being VAT registered, I wonder what the potential pitfalls could be? Got - 2017 SDV8 Autobiography in Loire Blue
Had- 2008 TDV8 Vogue SE in Java black
Had - 2007 S/C in Stornoway Grey

Leasing works fine if you are happy about just being the keeper & not the owner. A few things to make sure of when leasing:

Get an adequate mileage allowance as going over the allowed miles can be expensive.
Get a copy of the leasing company's vehicle condition terms and make sure they are realistic regarding actual normal wear and tear for the length of and mileage allowed by the lease. If they detect excess damage e.g. stone chips, scratches etc they will charge a premium to repair these.
If you do incur excessive damage, get this repaired privately prior to the vehicle going off lease, it will be the cheaper option.
Make sure the vehicle is clean inside & out when handing it back.
Take many hi quality photos of the vehicle at the end of the lease, so as you are well placed to argue your case, should they claim excess wear & tear.
I personally think the full maintenance, including no quibble tyre replacement option, is good if you do 15k miles or more a year.
If you get those things to your satisfaction then leasing is pretty well hassle free. You don't even have to worry about road fund licence renewal as it is all done for you  Should've been old enough to know better...doh!
Current 2010 5.0 SC Autobiography
Previous 2006 TD6 Vogue SE
Previous 1998 P38 4.6 Vogue Autobiography 50 (No 10)

Having never leased a car and having never taken HP, my thoughts have always been these for the private purchaser:

A. If you can afford the monthly repayments, then why select HP if you can get an unsecured personal loan with a good APR (whatever you have purchased you are building up an 'equity stake' in the purchase as the loan term progresses as opposed to an HP company owning the product until you have completed the term)?

B. If it is your personal money, is leasing not dead money on the basis that you pay out thousands of pounds for a car you will never have a proprietary interest in and will have to give back at the end of the term?

As a couple of quick approximate examples:

1. You can lease a brand new RRS HSE over a 4 year period if you pay 'a deposit' of £8200 followed by 48 monthly payments of £841/month (these figures incl VAT). Before admin and any other hidden extras that might be included, over 4 years you would pay the lease company approx £48,500 for a car they advertise as having a Manufacturer's Price of £49,500.

2. You can get a £50,000 car loan over a 5 year period at 4.9% APR for approx £938/month. After 5 years you will have paid back the original £50k plus approx £6,330 in interest. You will own the car and not have to hand it back. At the 4 year point of the same loan period you will have paid back £45,028 and will 'only' owe the bank just over £11k, therefore at that point in time, if you had to sell the car you would get (have equity for) whatever it's worth, less the £11k owed to the bank.

I'm sure there are many ways to consider these type options and different ways will suit different people for all manner of reasons but if a private lease, I would find it difficult to give a leasing company £48.5k over 4 years at the end of which I would own nothing as opposed to paying a loan which all the time was building an 'equity stake' in the same product.

Just some thoughts. An interesting debate though when you consider that forum member crookedm paid approx £25k for a 2007 L322 18 months ago and on top of whatever lump sump or payments that were required to 'own the car' his maintenance experience in the first 12 months, based on his post of yesterday, appears to have cost him an average of yet another £208/month on top of all that.

I see your point(s) Ryan, but taking a car on an HP agreement affords the luxury of doing what's known as a "voluntary termination" at the point where you've paid 50% of the total borrowed, including interest. An unsecured personal load has no such facility.

My other thoughts are that, once you've bought the car, it's no longer an (appreciating) asset, quite the opposite in fact, so assuming that depreciation takes it's toll, the only difference is that you have "something" at the end for trading in purposes. That "something" could be pretty minimal.

Also, leasing affords the protection of the manufacturers warranty, and can also include maintenance, so I guess you're paying for "stress free" driving........ Got - 2017 SDV8 Autobiography in Loire Blue
Had- 2008 TDV8 Vogue SE in Java black
Had - 2007 S/C in Stornoway Grey

And the LR UK website has new shape 63 plate RRS HSE advertised for approx £64k as a starting figure so you're at least 12 months down on the warranty and would need up to £15k to put to a £50k loan

I suppose another thought provocation would be that if 'one ' went down the HP/ Loan/ Buying Approved Used with their own 'savings' route, then 'one' might 'only' have to factor in approx £1400/year for a further 12 months fully "Approved" LR warranty (if said car was LR) which, if a 12 month old car for example, might achieve the "and it has a 3 year warranty" further cost free motoring illusion.

Or 'one' could try and negotiate an extra 12 - 18 month warranty to be included in any deal to purchase a sub 3 year old car.

leasing can work really well as long as you go for the cars that the manufacturers are looking to shift . Never seems to stack up with LR products. We've leased / CH our company vehicles for the past 20 years

eg, Merc C63's , BMW M5's , BMW 730d's etc have had some amazing deals recently at around £500 / month for 24 month period

Mate bought a new M5 & lost about £20K in 18 months .. could have leased for a 6 +23 at around £500 = £14500 for 2 years ... in this situation he'd have been better leasing

I'm currently looking for a new company car for the wife & we will lease / contract hire as when doing 20K miles a year they do stack up . Seem to be some good deals out there on Audi's & 5 series BMW's currently

Look at it as funding the depreciation ... all new cars cost £x / month in depreciation


Saying that ... this time I've bought the Range Rover to see if over the next 3 year period it works out cheaper than leasing a nice big brand new BMW ... I reckon a 2010 full fat will depreciate around £5K per year over the next 3 year s?? then I need to factor in the warranty cost , road fund ... not sure its going to work out any cheaper really

£500/month for C63, M5 seems appealing.

I think this depends on a number of factors, I have a number of colleagues who swear by the lease route, they pay a fixed price every month and thats that, invariably new top spec cars. They all treat it as 'just a rental'. then at the end they 'rent' another vehicle.

Example; 2014 BMW M3 Convertible - £600 pm over 2 years then hand back. Running costs. fuel and any accidents, like kerbing your alloy in a petrol forecourt the day you picked it up (maybe something in that for our readers) are on top.[

So he spends £14,400 over 2 years then starts again. To me that is ridiculous. I personally can't manmath it.

IMHO i would rather have something I own and can play with that a 'rental'

http://www.freedomcontracts.com/Mercedes-C...Lease/1190

I paid cash for mine and lost £10k over 2 years when i sold it. That's about £420 a month just on depreciation alone and that was for a 4 year old FF at tine of purchase.

£420 per month would get you a damn good lease car over 2 years without servicing/MOT costs to worry about.....and no hassle related to selling on either....

I've spent more than a few hours looking at car financing and to be honest cars that retain high residuals are worth PCP with balloon payment and cars that drop huge £ in depreciation are better leased. HP rarely makes sense, as mentioned previously unsecure personal loans are better value and the car is always yours.. '08 Audi S6 Avant 5.2 V10 with Milltek non-resonated. Vrrrrrrmmmmmph
'59 Ford Kuga Diesel (boring but AWD and 40mpg...)
2007 (07) Subaru Forester XTen 2.5 Turbo. (Roundabouts are fun again!)
2007 (07) 4.4 V8 Vogue (gone)

if your a business owner then lease(contract hire) is a good thing as can be written off against tax where as if you buy the car for the business it can only be depreciated at the rates set by government

Sadly I'm not a business user in the VAT sense, so it would be a personal contact hire. Got - 2017 SDV8 Autobiography in Loire Blue
Had- 2008 TDV8 Vogue SE in Java black
Had - 2007 S/C in Stornoway Grey

ah ok, shame

Some additional thoughts on the Lease; or HP; or Unsecured Loan debate, having regard to a 4 year/ 10k miles per year personal leasing contract or a 5 year loan or HP contract with no mileage restrictions.

I appreciate that this thread was not necessarily started with a view to buying a Range Rover and obviously there might well be more accurate valuation guides, so it is only a broad brush guide for the purposes of this debate:

What Car used car valuations shows that a 5 year old, 50,000 mile RRS 2.7 Diesel HSE cost £47720 when new and that to buy one today you might expect to pay approx £24,700 privately or £25,700 at a franchised dealer.

Therefore it does indicate to the private buyer - and I'm assuming that the new shape RRS will hold its value comparatively well in its first 5 or 6 years - that you would indeed be left with a decent chunk of equity in such a car at the end of a 5 year loan (or HP period) as opposed to 'losing' £48,500 if privately leasing over 4 years (unless the end of the lease also has some form of final payment option allowing the car to be 'bought although from what I've read previously, on high value cars, these final option payments can be sizeable 5 figure sums).

But your argument doesn't take account of the much higher monthly payments of HP vs leasing...so the equity you build over time is offset by your higher monthly costs...

Leasing tends to make sense over purchase if you change your car regularly and tend to buy newer high spec models that are subject to heavy depreciation. Purchase makes sense if buying 3-4 year old though... '08 Audi S6 Avant 5.2 V10 with Milltek non-resonated. Vrrrrrrmmmmmph
'59 Ford Kuga Diesel (boring but AWD and 40mpg...)
2007 (07) Subaru Forester XTen 2.5 Turbo. (Roundabouts are fun again!)
2007 (07) 4.4 V8 Vogue (gone)