God you take pedantry to a whole new level! - In basic terms what I am saying is that my lease deal is a far cheaper alternative method of driving this car rather than buying this car new and I do not need to look at any of those sites to know this is true because I would never and I mean never have got £6K+ off the RRP and still would not today. Also how are you supposed to arrive at a residual value calculation and obtain the dealers mark-up figure ffs - your calculation process is a nonsense on a brand new vehicle where X is just unknown! Please do not respond to this.

Not sure what point you are really making either and also highly unlikely that you would have got £3K off the list price but what do I know? However for the sake of your argument, haggled brand new car purchased @ £15,000 can now be bought second hand @ £8.5K = depreciation of £6500 over the 18 months. Hope that helps versus my lease figure over that period.

Hope this helps - Ignore SB as his comments are personal and based solely on his motoring requirements which do not represent all views! - If you ultimately want to own a vehicle and run it until you have wrung the value out of it it will take you many years, not everyone wants to do this and/or pass the vehicle to family & friends as a 'trainer'. I frankly feel that is extremely dangerous to put a young driver in an older vehicle with possibly outdated safety, brakes etc. but that's just me. If you want to own and cannot afford the money in one hit pcp will do but you pay for the pleasure and depreciation will be a large factor.

If you want to lease this is what I do;-

My example of my own personal lease deal is as follows and shows how it should be looked @ & set up;-

1) You need to arrange Motor Insurance it is not included.
2) You will need 'personal lease' GAP Insurance (be careful here as there are several styles of GAP cover) unless you can get a muppet from an Insurance Co. to PUT IN WRITING that the Policy would provide a new vehicle if written off or stolen and is less than 12 months old, even then you need to factor in GAP cover after this 12 month period so may as well do it in the first place. I am insured with DL and their wording is specific i.e. YOU must be the first registered keeper. With personal leasing the owner & keeper are noted as the leasing firm (who are probably the makers in most cases) and not YOU, you will not get any ownership documents - Also If you do not make the ownership and registered keeper clear to your Insurer you could give them wriggle room in the event of a claim and why would you want that kind of grief?.
3) Breakdown Cover - This is normally included but check - It is a handy saving if included and does what you need it to do - Note they rarely if ever include overseas cover i.e. holiday trips to Europe .
4) Vehicle Tax - Is included for the duration of the lease period, this could be viewed as a handy saving in view of the new charges effective 01/04/2017 however in reality it will be factored into the lease cost.
5) Mileage - Choose carefully, go over the chosen/specified number and an excess charge per mile will apply however to be obtuse sometimes this can work in your favour! - Some deals limit the amount of extras miles you can do - check the T&C's carefully.
6) Maintenance is rarely included on a personal lease quotation but is normally available as an optional extra - Do the maths based on your mileage/servicing costs/tyre requirements etc. If you opt not to take Maintenance Cover factor in the cost of each Annual Service as these are always more than you think for a new car as you have to use a main dealer & not the garage next door! - My previous Citroen cost the best part of £200 for its annual service. Also note that with a new vehicle you are likely to get several recalls throughout the year for software upgrades/crap build bit replacements - They are free but can be a pain timewise if you get several throughout the year but you could argue the same applies to any car no matter what it's age. - I personally choose not to take maintenance as the costs are always factored in on the high side by the lease firms for obvious reasons and take the view that if I owned the vehicle I would have to have it serviced anyway and the warranty rules for a new vehicle state you must use an approved dealer.
7) At the end of the lease period the vehicle is returned, you do not own it. Some will ask if you wish to buy. Don’t, would be my advice, as the offer is always higher than you can go buy a similar vehicle of a similar age & mileage elsewhere. Upon return there will be a whole host of things to go through i.e. scratches, dents, scraped alloys etc. You will be charged to rectify these – GET A LIST OF THE RETURN RULES before you ever Lease so you know where you stand and can factor in cleaning/repairing etc. prior to the return of the vehicle. Do buy door handle protectors they are cheap to purchase and save key scratches – we all do it no matter how careful we think we will be!

After all of the above why lease? It’s a matter of personal reasons end of! – I do it because I like the increased safety, fuel efficiency, don’t want the depreciation but like most (I say that carefully!) like a new car every so often and don't want to bomb £20K.

My current deal would have cost me £5K+ more in depreciation over an 18 month period if I had bought new @ that’s just on a crappy Citroen C4 Cactus – yep £5K+ more. RRP £18K to buy new, now available 2nd hand to buy @ £8.5K, to lease has cost me £3100 plus servicing & GAP.

New deal arriving shortly is Hyundai Ioniq (base model) over 18 months.
Deposit £1015.20 then 17 payments @ £112.80 – Total £2932.80 which Includes road Tax worth £195 - got lucky as they have honoured their quote re this element - effectively brings lease cost down to £2738!. Includes UK Breakdown Cover (? value). GAP Cover which also includes Deposit Cover is approx. £135 for 2 years (can extend to include scratches, alloys etc. but that gets expensive!). – Seems pretty good to me for a brand new car worth £20/21K that in 18 months time will be worth £? certainly not £17K that's for sure.

Absolutely, which is why you buy from reputable dealers and get the full service and MOT history with it. It's very hit and miss and some things you just can't account for but you can try and cover yourself as much as possible with regular servicing and generally looking after your motor.

I'm not sure paying £185 to tax a good car for an entire year is worth dropping £5k for an entirely new car that you have to give back in 24 months time, but there are numerous factors to consider - where you live and park, if the car is likely to get damaged than you will end up paying a fortune and still give it back and how many miles you do in a year. I think the UK national average is between 6 and 7k so if you're using that diesel more than the average driver you'll get battered on mileage charges too.
I'd consider your options and if you aren't using that diesel as much as you should would even recommend switching to Petrol with the introduction of the new Diesel tax laws being imminent.

What MPG are you hoping to get? There are cars out there that get 60+ in reality.

Don't forget that due to safety etc. cars are much heavier these days, as an example, a Mk1 Golf was in the region of half a tonne lighter than a current model.

Well the catch is that the car never belongs to you, so really you're paying £5026 to rent a car for 2 years. About the same price you could spend to buy a 2nd hand one in good condition. Will never understand people who get lease cars.

Care to share? I would be surprised but am happy to be proved wrong.

Interested in where you could get a Golf GTI for less than £4500!

let us know!

still awaiting details. thanks

So?
I'd rather have the Focus.

Ahhhh but that's the point, this ain't a Golf so hot from me.

You'd be lucky to get that much. Quick look online and £8.5k for a 64 plate which is 2.5 years. Maybe £8k for a 3 yr old. Therefore depreciation is £5k which is the same as this lease deal if you up the mileage to 15k a year. Rather have brand new without the need for new tyres after a year and *possibly* brakes before the end of the 2nd year.

I think they're more likely to hold their value until the time, which is not so far away if not happening already, where manufacturers opt away from diesel completely and stick to petrol and/or hybrid. Unless you will be doing at least 15,000 miles a year, or need to tow something big, or need a lot of seats, or need a van or a truck, then due to the high costs of maintaining diesel emissions equipment you'll be better off with a petrol engine. Tax on diesel can't or won'r rise because everything you eat and use comes on a diesel truck.

New ones will be Euro6 and relatively clean, so not caught up in the initial waves of 'emissions tax' in London and elsewhere. It's the older diesel cars (and trucks and buses and trains) we should be getting rid of asap.