What Type Of Car Lease Is For You?
Car leasing has become a really popular way for people to purchase a car. There are so many benefits and not really any disadvantages of leasing a car but there are a few things that you should think about before you sign the papers.
The first thing to consider is what kind of lease would be best for you, there’s a choice between personal contract hire, personal contract purchase and hire purchase.
Choosing personal contract hire means that you get to drive a new car every two or three years, you make low monthly payments and pay a smaller deposit initially and you can even take out packages that will help you budget for your service and other maintenance. It also means that you don’t have to worry about how you’re going to resell the car at the end because you just have to hand it back.
When you take out a personal contract hire lease the monthly payments are fixed and are based on the difference between the price of the car when you take the lease and the value when it is returned – depreciation – as well as its age and mileage. Therefore if you choose a car that holds its value well, like a Mini or an Audi then your monthly payments will be lower because the car will be worth more at the end.
The only downside of this type of lease is that if you’ve fallen in love with the car at the end of the lease then there’s no option to buy it. The only way that you’d be able to do that would be to give the car back at the end of the contract and then to buy it separately. You can’t take out anything less that fully comprehensive insurance because the car is technically not yours and if you do more miles than you’re allowed – usually 10,000 per year, although this can be more if negotiated – then you could be faced with a hefty bill at the end.
The next option is personal contract purchase which is also pretty popular with car buyers as you are given the option to buy your car at the end of the lease. Before you take out the agreement you will pay a deposit and your monthly payments will be worked out – these are usually quite low, although it depends on the company – as well as the monthly payments that you will pay until the end of the contract you will also be faced with a balloon payment which is the amount that you’d have to pay at the end of the agreement in order to be able to buy the car. There’s no need to worry about the balloon payment though because you don’t have to make a decision until the end of your contract and if you can’t afford the payment then you just give the car back as you would if you took out a personal contract hire lease.
The downsides to this method of leasing a car is that it works out more expensive than other methods and as with all leases you need fully comprehensive insurance and you have to stick within the mileage limits unless you want to incur a large bill at the end.
John Barker has been leasing cars for years now and continues to go back to the same company, signaturecarleasing.co.uk, because of their great rates and variety of leases that are available.