There are several factors that determine whether a car lease is good, just average, or bad. One is the price that the lease is based on. Another is the residual value. And finally it depends on the money factor (lease finance rate). It’s the combination of all these factors that produces the monthly payment and the value of the deal.

The best and easiest way to evaluate any car lease deal is with the Lease Inspector in our Lease Kit. Simply plug in the numbers from your lease contract and get your answer immediately — Excellent, Good, Average, or Poor.

The best place to find online car prices is Edmunds.com. There you can find MSRP “sticker” prices, dealer invoice prices, and learn what other people are actually paying for the cars you are interested in. You can also get guaranteed price quotes that include any incentives being offered by the car manufacturer, and are better than most deals you could negotiate on your own. Local dealers will honor the quotes that you receive from these web sites.

The best time to lease is when car manufacturers are sponsoring (subventing) promotional deals (see Best Car Deals). These special leases usually have a short time period in which they are available, and are generally very good deals. You’ll see the deals advertised on TV, in local newspapers, and on car company web sites. The reason these are better deals than a dealer alone can offer is that the manufacturer can manipulate ALL factors in the lease, price (rebates), money factor, term, and residual value — whereas a dealer can only manipulate price (discounts). The very best deals are those in which you get price discounts, or “contribution,” from BOTH the manufacturer AND the dealer. If there are no manufacturer subvented deals at the time, your best chance (repeat, chance) of a discounted dealer price is at day-end, month-end, quarter-end, or model-year end.

The Lease Inspector in our Lease Kit was designed just for that purpose. Simply plug in the numbers directly from your lease deal and you’ll get your answer immediately.

If you simply need a quick evaluation of a proposed or advertised lease deal, you can use our new Lease Deal Calculator .

Yes. Those with the highest lease-end residual values make better leases. For two cars of the same price, one with a high residual value and the other with a low residual value, the one with high residual value will have lower monthly payments and therefore be a better lease deal. See our Lease Kit which contains  Lease Ratings of all vehicle makes and models, based on residual value.

We provide an updated list of lease ratings for all vehicle makes and models in our Lease Kit. The list rates each vehicle as Above Average (best deals), Average, or Below Average (worst deals). Car manufacturers sometimes offer special limited-time lease deals on certain models that temporarily improve ratings.