SW17LS

I still would really question whether or not you will ever realize any fuel savings benefit. For one, you are refinancing negative equity from your lease, meaning you're paying interest twice. When you factor in the cost of doing that, coupled with the loss on your wheels and tires you bought, I bet if you did the math this move cost you money.

Generally mixed, semi-conservative driving will get you about 18-19 MPG in the GS, thats what its gotten me in 36,000 miles of driving it and mine is AWD. I know a several people with the ESh, you're not going to get 40MPG combined, more like 35-37. Now, all in all the ESh will be about half as expensive to fuel, saving you about $1,500 a year in fuel costs according to fueleconomy.gov...translating into a fuel savings of $125 a month.

Issue is...essentially you are still paying for your GS lease and paying for this certified ESh since you rolled the negative equity (which is essentially the entire lease at this point) into the financed cost of this ESh, its costing you $110 more per month, so right now you're saving only $15 per month. Now the X factor is the huge mileage penalty you would have owed at the end of the GS lease because you drive so much.

What we have here are several poor decisions that are going to cost you a lot of money from the perspective of total cost of ownership over the next 5-6 years.

1. You never should have selected the GS as a commuter car with good fuel economy.
2. Given the mileage you drive, you never should have leased.
3. Taking a huge bath to get out of your GS lease so early negated any fuel savings you may have achieved with the ESh, and by the time the ESh is paid off and is saving you money, it will be old and very high mileage because of the miles you drive coupled with the miles already on it.

In hindsight, more research was warranted, and you should have bought an ESh from the onset.

I always shake my head when people do things like this to "save money" and it saves them no money. For instance I have a guy that leases and he is going to be way over his mileage. He was telling me he was considering leasing another cheap car (like a $100 a month lease) to save miles on his car. Well...lets do the math here. 2 years left on the lease, lease on the cheap car costs $100 a month, plus probably $50 a month for insurance. So, over 24 months thats a cost of $3,600. At .20 a mile thats 18,000 miles penalty. Are you going to go over by that many? And remember, at the end you can sell or trade it, and the sales tax benefit of trading it will mitigate that cost...whereas if you lease another car you have to drive that crappy car while you pay lease payments on the nice one and it just sits there, and it will definitely cost you $3,600 over 24 months. People just don't think these things through.

Allen K

iTrader: (4)

Congrats on the new car! I actually think the new ES's look pretty slick. I'm a fan of their tail lights

StillLine

Welcome to the Lexus hybrid ownership experience. Pay no attention to those who can't be decent enough to simply congratulate you on your new car. Congratulations! Enjoy your new ride, especially since you'll only be using half the fuel. :-)
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SW17LS

I wished him the best of luck with it. Lets just say when somebody doesn't hesitate to make value judgements on what others do, people then don't hesitate to make assessments of what they do...as Im2bz2p345 illustrated above.

sick21

Cut SW13GS some slack. He's not sleeping well Besides, he pretty much just said everything I was thinking. Can't blame him. But op was ready for a change, I've been there. I took a bath on my CC when I broke the lease to get the GS but it was worth it.

ItzFilyO

I just picked up a CT 200h base with only back up cam on Friday, so far I'm getting 38 MPG. I still have my GS though, the CTh replaced my 2014 Accord. Big difference in build quality and cabin quietness.

PirelliRC

Dont really know where you get your facts from, I did think things through and its simple math. I rolled only $5,500 neg equity into the loan, not the whole lease. Thats just dumb thinking i would roll the whole lease into a loan. Yes, it would have been wiser to get the ES 300 H from the get go but its easy to look back in retrospect and say that. We all make mistakes. However, my payment went up $110 w/ gap insurance, im saving $150-$160 a month on fuel and my insurance will go down $40. So ill be saving about $200 a month AND the car is mine, not a lease. Its a win win situation. Im baffled as to your justification.
The money coming out of my pocket every month is less and it will be an asset. I would have paid $17,860 if i continued and finished the lease, now at least that money is going towards my own property.

PirelliRC

Even if i get 37 mpg ill be happy. Thats a 20 mpg increase than what i was getting with the GS. However, i drove the car about 70 miles now, and im averaging 42.1 mpg with mixed driving. And the majority of the people in the 300 h forum are averaging over 40 mpg. So im happy.

PirelliRC

Thanks

Mike728

Congrats! I never understood the value of leasing, since I don't own a business. Owning gives you so much more flexibility.

Feel free to join us over in the ES forum.

Im2bz2p345

Dude, nothing but congrats PirelliGS! (maybe you should have your name to changed to PirelliESh now - https://www.clublexus.com/forums/sit...name-here.html). There really is no need to justify your purchase to others - trust me, it seems like everytime that I post about my GS450h here.. I always get people jumping on the hybrid (CVT transmission, weight, fuel savings worth it?, $$ premium paid, etc etc). The post that I linked of yours is a small example. People enjoy various things in the cars of they choose and nobody should have to justify their purchase (or lease). I hope that as you start post in the ES forum, the members there don't single you out just because you own a hybrid.

Sorry if my initial post came off the wrong way. Of course I'm glad to have another member part of the hybrid family.. but I was just perplexed/shocked that you barely leased your GS350 and now are thinking about fuel economy being a large factor in your car. With the amount of miles you commute everyday, a hybrid would have been my first choice (whether you want the CTh, ESh, GSh, LSh, or RXh is a personal decision.. and whether you can afford/want to lease vs buy is another personal choice). But at least that you realized all of this now than when your GS lease was up.

I like that fact that SW13GS is similar to me in that he thinks from a financial standpoint (since that's my background, but I also throw in overall value into the equation), but obviously there were assumptions he took into account in this instance.

Anyway, I'm so glad to hear that you're going to eventually OWN the car. I have nothing against those who decide to lease their car, but with the amount of miles that you'll be putting on, it's a much better idea to own/keep the car long term as a daily drive/commuter.

Your other cars provide more than enough excitement for when you want to get some chills down your spine You're fortunate to own so many fine vehicles sir.

Once again, didn't mean to come across the wrong way!

~ Im2bz2p345

PirelliRC

no offense taken my friend, me and my family are happy, all that matters.

SlangBlade

Congrats man, drive it in good health! Sometimes getting a car with a lot of options and comfort outweigh the fun factor, especially when you already have it in other cars and spend all your time on the freeway anyway.

jjscsix

There are variables to what makes leasing or buying better. But I don't think some people really think through the comment you made. If you want to sell your car after some amount of time shorter than a lease, do you really think it will cost you less than getting out of a lease? Think it through. It's a pay me now or pay me later scenario.

SW17LS

LOL

If you're ready for a change, sure. Want more tech, sure...but its not to save money.

$5,500 negative equity was what was rolled in, was that all the negative equity there was in the lease? As for it being an asset, a car isn't an asset, it depreciates every month. You're going to pay out the same $17,860 you would have paid for your GS, you're just now loosing it in payment cost, depreciation, etc. Leasing is just financing without the equity build. Yeah now you have equity build...but its costing you $110 a month more.

You're ready for a change and thats fine, my point just is overall you're probably not really saving any money here.