MarkandS

Hello and a very Happy New Year to you all.

Just making preperations for our move and wondered if you are able to 'lease' cars in oz for personal use like you can in the UK.

Any help, comments greatly appreciated.

Regards

Mark

Swerv-o

Sadly, car leasing here is years behind the UK. I looked at this when I first arrived. Most leasing packages here are designed to be vehicles that allow you to purchase the car through salary tax deductions, with a balloon payment at the end of the term. This is called a novated lease.

I was after a monthly payment, drive the car around, then either hand back the keys at the end of the term, or renegotiate a new deal - more of a contract hire. I was never interested in owning the car at the end. But I couldn't find anybody that was willing to operate that sort of a scheme, not on a personal basis anyway.

Hope that helps,


S

obiwan

was wondering if any one else had any info on this? i understand how the novated lease works based on the previous post.

but is there such a thing as lets say, leasing a car for say 24 months (fixed monthly payments)...then hand it back to the car leasing company without having to pay anything else, except of course for damages made to the car?..

thanks!

NickyC

I've got a car that I lease (via Subaru Finance and called a finance lease). It's got nothing to do with any business, I lease it as an individual. At the end of the term I can either pay the residual (and own it) or return the car and get another lease on a new car.

Sounds just what you're looking for.

obiwan

cool! thats what i had in mind!

found this link http://www.subaru.com.au/buyers/financial-services/

would this be the company you are dealing with? now i just have to see if any of the japanese cars have something similar....

thanks!!

Swerv-o

That is exactly what I was after too! I searched and couldn't find anybody that would offer. The closest I came was a contract hire, but the terms and costs were really poor...

I was thinking of upgrading my motor later in the year, so I may have a look at this now.

Cheers


S

JAJ

Do you just mean a long term rental contract?

JAJ

Unless I have missed something, there is no fundamental difference between that and purchasing a car outright with borrowed funds.

Timber Floor Au

Plenty of places, do leases.

But generally, only on longer terms, such as 48 months etc.

They also tend to be the european car giants, such as Beemers and Mercs.

Ste

NickyC

There are advantages to leasing rather than borrowing money to buy a car, in some circumstances.

I claim a tax deduction for the percentage of my car used for work purposes. This includes the lease payments, rego, insurance, petrol etc - in fact every single cost relating to the car. If I was buying the car I couldn't claim any deduction for costs relating to the buying of it (ie. loan repayments) - but as it's only leased (and therefore technically I don't own it) I can.

It's far more advantageous tax-wise for me to lease rather than buy - as long as I have a good percentage of business use (which I do). It works out like an interest-free loan.

obiwan

yes that would be another way of putting it....something were there is no required balloon payment at the end of the term to own the car....

Swerv-o

I understand what you are trying to do - you want to drive the car around for maybe 2 years, paying a monthly fee for the priviledge. Then at the end of the term, you want to hand the keys back and chop the car in for a new one, instead of having to fork out a balloon payment to buy it.

Most of the leases I could find all assumed that you would eventually end up owning the car, and had the stupid balloon payment, instead of the option to chop it in for a new one.

What about maintenance and rego costs? I assume that you are looking to have them included in the package? All you will do is pay for the insurance?


S

Swerv-o

Having had a look at your leasing with Subaru, they still aren't willing to lease to an individual that isn't going to be using the car for business purposes, i.e. to lease to somebody purely for personal use.


S

jayr

Novated leases are the way to go. Many lease providers provide an option to just hand the car back without having to pay the balloon. Try Leaseplan for example.

With a novated lease there is a three way agreement between you, your employer and the finance company.

Using this gets you hefty discounts off the retail price, plus you dont have to pay GST (another 10% saving). You can also package in fuel, maintenace, rego, insurance, none of which attract FBT so you basically save your income tax rate on these items (so say 30% off petrol prices).

Having the balloon can actually be attractive. I sold a car privately at $7000 profit to the ballon payment I had to make and only paid the balloon once the sale was made and I had received funds.

I should add that with an empoyer related novated lease you can use the car entirely for personal (non business) use and get all of these benefits.

Amazulu

I used to do this in the UK. As a contractor it was 100% tax detuctible and I got a new car every year. Superb. There is nothing like this available in Australia unfortunately.