JohnnyCarpets

Hi - Moving to US in a month or so, and need to look at leasing a motor. NO SS number yet, or credit history. I've found a US company that can help on the lease/finance stuff, but quit honestly, I think they are well and truly bending me over and then some. Any tips would great. Thanks...

Weeze

Hi and welcome!
We just joined Travelguard which is also called AIG. There's a lot on here about it but basically you pay $400 and they give you access to things that are difficult to get when first coming over to the US. We joined for the car insurance, but I have looked at their leaflet and they do car hire too. The quote for car insurance was $600 less than we found with other companies. Our hire car was provided by the company, but they were charged a fortune for it so I think it is pretty pricey overhere anyway. We will also be using travelguard for our renters insurance/credit card next.

ian-mstm

Great! What visa will you have?

Ian

Awesome Welles

Don't do it. Buy a clunker and start saving.

JohnnyCarpets

That was def the B plan.

JohnnyCarpets

The misses has an L1 and my son and I are over on an L2

The Horticulturalist

I'm with Awesome on this one, seriously, don't do it. A car lease is the most expensive way to drive a car, total rip off.

Do the math as they say, and you'll see it's really not worth it. buy the clunker and save up for a better one.

Hovik

I'd recommend checking with FirstTech CU if you need loan or insurance. A lot of Microsoft and other expats use them, and they're used to transfers having no credit history, etc.

MrsOwen

Hi there

I do understand where people are coming from re: a lease but we have just leased a brand new car through VW with really low monthly payments.

They have a scheme for foreigners working in the US and all you require is the following:

A copy of SSN (ours took a week to arrive and we waited 10 days before applying)
Proof of address
Copy of your visa
Letter from employer confirming length of visa (i.e. if it will be extended).

They actually prefer that you have no credit in the USA as no credit seems to be better than bad credit!

When we decided to go ahead, the paperwork took about 1.5 hours and we drove the car away the following day.

I was amazed how easy it was to be honest and now we have a fab new car!

In addition they also finance VW's under the same scheme so next month we will be buying me a car on finance, APR is only 3.5%!

Maybe we were just lucky with our local garage / experience but this has been the best way for us to get a car right now as all our spare cash went on moving and furnishing our new place!

Each to their own though and good luck!

Awesome Welles

Each to their own is a good sentiment and people's circumstances are rarely very similar - BUT - paying interest (however competitive) on a depreciating asset is kind of absurd.
I absolutely love cars and currently run one that doesn't make sense to a lot of people, so I completely understand the emotional pull that they have for a lot of buyers.
Sadly, the only thing they do with absolute reliability is lose value, so unless you can secure interest-free credit, borrowing money to buy is financially bonkers.
To my mind leasing only makes sense if it's your company that is paying, as there are some circumstances when keeping the depreciating asset off the balance sheet (which is possible with a lease, because the vehicle then becomes fixed cost rather than a shitty asset) can be advantageous.
In the case of a personal lease, you just pay over the odds to borrow the vehicle - and have precisely zero at the end of the deal (if you are lucky).
After years of foolhardy car buying, I finally came to the conclusion that unless you are stinking rich:
1) Never buy new
2) Always pay cash

At risk of sounding like a total smart-arse, the first cars I bought in the US were snotters that got me where I needed to go, without killing me financially.
During this time I saved - hard.
I then bought a fully loaded rocket-ship that was a year old and $52k new, for $24k. Granted, still a fair wedge for a car (particularly one that eats tyres and returns around 15mpg), but it's mine and aside from running it, costs me nothing.

TimNiceBut

They do for me, but I'd never lease one either. I've financed one car in the UK in the 12 years I lived there but that was one that was pretty much guaranteed to not lose value, plus I had a 60% downpayment. Otherwise it was save & scrimp time.

Depends on what you're buying but for regular transport that's very true.

Quoted for truth...

Amazingly you'll find that that's pretty much the way the stinking rich buy cars, too, especially point (2).

That's pretty much my attitude as well - I've got a 15 yo high-mileage truck that I just bought, cash, for a little over $3k that admittedly needed more work than I had hoped for (it was a bit of a gamble on it needing an intake gasket or not; with my luck it does need one and I don't have the time to fix it myself atm). I can't really drive my other car out here in winter so I needed something reasonably cheap that could double as a tow vehicle, too.

Neko128

Yes, but there's a difference between not buying new because you're buying a 2005 Ford Taurus instead of a 2010, and not buying new because you're buying a 1969 Corvette or a 1964 Mustang instead of a 2010 Jaguar...

The Horticulturalist

Are you on commission from Dave Ramsey?

I totally agree, we just got rid of all our car and student loan debt and are saving up to pay for the next car with cash. We now have a big chunk of money left over to invest in savings. We are, in effect, paying the car loan (to ourselves) ahead of time. We don't bother with a credit card either though I've had one for most of my adult life with no debt on it. Now I have money to pay someone to do my ironing, that's luxury!

Have you read the Millionaire Next Door? These people don't borrow money, I suppose that's how they got to where they are today.

Bob

Have you checked out the over mileage costs? Those things will cost you a fortune and even if you don't go anywhere, it's easy to run over 10K miles a year.

Unless you really are driving no where and/or it's a company paid expense, or you really will only be in the US for 12-24 months, then generally it is more expensive to lease just for the sake of something shiny.

Bob

Actually, point 2, even if it's a small amount, it's worth getting finance for, doubly so for new folks in the US.

If you can, get finance with out a early pay out penalty, get whatever you fancy, pay most of it off in the first payment, and then pay $10 or whatever for the next 12 months. It's paid off, you've got 12 months solid history and it's cost you pennies and it'll be a second line to the credit card which is very beneficial.