Hi friends,
I'm six months away from my car lease being up. Yes, I leased a car at the advice of my Dad when I was 20. I don't necessarily regret it either, as I've put my car through hell and back (required driving for work sometimes doing 400 miles a week, reimbursed) with very few problems so far.
My problem is that i've racked on the miles and fully expect to exceed my lease agreement of 36,000. I'm at 33,800 right now and I have the car until May.
I feel like I'm just afraid of extra work, but right now I'm leaning toward the easy choice of buying my leased car for the residual at the end of my lease. I drive a 2016 Honda Civic and I know I'll be able to drive it into the ground. Residual is expected to be around 12k.
I have several options:
1) Turn in car lease and pay extra mileage fees (probably somewhere like 3k total with other turn in fees), buy cheap car
2) Sell Civic to third party and pocket difference, use that to buy cheap car
3) Buy Civic for residual value of $12k
My problems (excuses) with these are that I have no idea what state I'll be living in or what the rules are for selling the car when my lease is up. I got the lease cosigned with my dad in Ohio and it's registered there. But I highly doubt I'll be living in Ohio when my lease is up. I can turn in my lease at any Honda location. Currently living in GA - would I even be able to sell it here or would I have to sell it in Ohio? I also work 12hr days 5 days a week, so I'd have little time to meet with buyers.
My other problem is that my job currently requires a lot of driving until I bump up. Going without a car for even a few days will require getting a rental, and I'm under 25 so these would be very expensive. I'm also worried about buying an older car--everyone else I've worked with over the past 2 years at my level has had their older cars break down and ALL have needed to buy new cars thanks to mechanical issues associated with wear and tear.
I'm also worried I'll not be able to catch potential issues with buying a cheap car and screw myself over. My dad advocates new or buying used from a Honda dealer, so I'd be spending probably 8k if I did that. I trust Honda but my friends drive older Toyotas and love them. I also kinda of want a hatchback, but an economical one, not like a CR-V.
I personally don't think 12k for this Civic is that much (a 2015 civic with 45k mileage is going for 16k in the area) but 12k will double my debt. I've already been saving up for a big down payment, but I don't think it'll be possible for me to pay 12k in cash unless I wipe my EF (roughly $6.5k but will probably be more like 4k as I'll be unemployed for a few months soon).
Right now I want to just pay the 12k (thought I want to negotiate that lower) with a big down payment. I would be able to pay off the car in under 12 months if I wanted to.
Any advice? Happy to clarify more, I know this is a word dump.