SHOULD I BUY A FORMALLY LEASED CAR

lookitsme

Would you buy a car that was previously owned by a leasing company? i seen a nice car on carzone and did a simple google search and found out it was previously owned by a car leasing company. i imagine there would be a good service history but IMO if you don't own the car you drive you are less likely to drive it with the respect it deserves. i would be interested to hear other peoples thoughts.

colm_mcm

Depends on whether it was a company car, a tourist rental car etc.

What details have you got, feel free to post any links you have

lookitsme

all i found out was that it was owned by leaseplan and sold by carnext which is a part of the same company. i imagine it was a company car as it has one of those bluetooth phone things on the dashboard

AltAccount

Judge the car on its merits, I've treated every company car I've ever had as well as if I had paid for it myself.

colm_mcm

That wouldn't bother me once it's been serviced and looked after.

George Dalton

Ex Lease cars are a bit of a lottery (just the same as any other secondhand car). As the poster above says some people will look after a company car as if it was their own (or in fact better than if it was their own) whereas other people will just drive the sh1te out of it and not bother bringing it in for servicing etc at all.

The good news is that any car from Leaseplan will have a printout of the details of the service history which should show every bit of service and repair work ever done to the car. So armed with that information plus looking at the general condition of the car as it stands it should be very easy to determine whether or not it was well looked after.

bazz26

If it has an aftermarket bluetooth kit then most likely it wasn't a rental, more likely it was a company leased car.

Might be worth dropping members R.O.R and Drummerboy08 a pm with the car's registration. Those lads work in the car leasing buisness and it could possibly have been on their books. If it is I'm sure they would have access to the car's history and let you know if there was anything wrong with it.

For Forks Sake

Pros:
-Usually serviced on time, every time at main dealerships.
-Depending on generosity of company that ordered the car first, might come with decent amount of kit.

Cons:
-Probably massive mileage
-May have been driven by the likes of myself.

boz13

My wifes current car was an ex lease (company car), never had a days trouble with it (touch wood) Have it nearly 2 years now it had 90+ miles on it whwn we got it which was a little high other than that car was fine

duckysauce

For Forks Sake wrote: »

Pros:
-Usually serviced on time, every time at main dealerships.
-Depending on generosity of company that ordered the car first, might come with decent amount of kit.

Cons:
-Probably massive mileage
-May have been driven by the likes of myself.

Company car

that's it mine blew it's guts today 270000 3.3 years nothing serious but would not buy the said car, it has been driven and I will bet it will be clocked next year when I return it, as it will be over 330000 then for a four year old car. Serviced every 3-4 months but hard driving and ****e roads I would not buy it , love the car but na .

Company cars etc are not treated the same, not a choice by the employee they are meant to be worked big time , there is a possitive that Barbie was driving it around Dublin, but then Barbie would have screwed Ken and the clutch :P

Wheelnut

SHOULD I BUY A FORMALLY LEASED CAR

If the main worry is that the previous owner insisted on dressing properly and doing everything in a formal way, I would be delighted to have his former car.

smileyj1987

lookitsme wrote: »

Would you buy a car that was previously owned by a leasing company? i seen a nice car on carzone and did a simple google search and found out it was previously owned by a car leasing company. i imagine there would be a good service history but IMO if you don't own the car you drive you are less likely to drive it with the respect it deserves. i would be interested to hear other peoples thoughts.

If it was owned by a leasing company i am sure you would have to look at after it because after all it is not your property . So I would say yes it would be a good place to buy a car .

joe 77

It all depends on the car and you will have to judge it on it merits, i know private owners who buy a new car every 4 years and their car never gets a service while they own it

coylemj

And I know a company car driver who handed the car back after three years and it never got as much as an oil change, let alone a service.

There's a lot of rubbish being talked in the posts here. I worked for a large company which had dozens of company cars, all on lease. Some of the cars were used by sales reps. and yes, they did an awful lot of mileage. Some of the cars were handed out as a perk of the job to senior people who did not drive as part of their job so they were only used for commuting, hence they did very little mileage and were treated well. You could see that the owners kept them clean and tidy and most of them (but not the lady mentioned above) put them in for a service when it was due.

In some cases the employee with a company car drove a banger to work and gave the company car to the wife so the car spent most of it's time doing shopping and the school run.

In short, you cannot make a blanket assumption about a car just because it was on lease. I suggest people drop the prejudice, check out the car same as any other and if it has reasonable mileage and a service record, it's probably a better buy than most privately owned models.

That said, people who are entitled to a company car and who ask for a performance car like a Golf GTI will tend to drive the bejaysus out of it so I'd definitely stay away from those models. Junior sales guys tend to ask for entry-level BMWs - avoid these unless they have low mileage which probably means they were driven (carefully) by a woman driver.

On extras: the leasing companies make the assumption that optional extras will have zero residual value so if an employee asks for expensive extras, he or she will have to pay for them via salary deduction. Directors and the like can probably get away with it but if you're talking about bog standard models, you'll probably find that apart from a phone kit, there will be very little in the way of factory-fitted extras.

Kopparberg Strawberry and Lime

I know a very popular garage in Tallaght (Dennings) use Lease plan cars,

anything ranging from a 1L Yaris / Golf TDI to a BMW 5 series !

sadly when i had my car repaired i was stuck with the Yaris and it wasnt in good shape at all and i didnt help it either !

if i had the golf or BMW i wouldve being very nice to it !

ButI remember being told about 2 years ago from a taxi driver, we were discussing his Kia sedona and where he had got it and so on and he said he got it from a guy at the airport that it was an ex rental but it had all the extras, leather seats etc. and was in perfect condition.

I suppose i could depend on the car itself rather than just the fact its a lease car ?

R.O.R

lookitsme wrote: »

all i found out was that it was owned by leaseplan and sold by carnext which is a part of the same company. i imagine it was a company car as it has one of those bluetooth phone things on the dashboard

bazz26 wrote: »

Might be worth dropping members R.O.R and Drummerboy08 a pm with the car's registration. Those lads work in the car leasing buisness and it could possibly have been on their books. If it is I'm sure they would have access to the car's history and let you know if there was anything wrong with it.

If it's Carnext/LeasePlan it's not me or Drummerboy.

The good news is that a quick google of the reg should give you the Carnext sale sheet that has the mileage on, and you can make sure it corresponds to what's on the car now. As George Dalton said, there should be a print out with the full service history of the car available (Leaseplan stick this on all the sales cars). Check that's all in order, and if you're happy it should be OK.

As some have said, there is no "normal" for leased cars. Some drivers look after them better than I do my own (had one driver got his car valeted twice a week - came back minty mint) and some just don't care (there are some cars that come back and I have to have a wash after sitting in them).