I count the acquisition fee as part of the fees of buying regardless. I've never been able to worm my way out of it, at least in my part of the country, on a new, never titled vehicle.
There are wife parameters involved here, also.
The Outlander was her daily and we had it for 6 years. She wanted a new car, and she doesn't like used cars. I'm pretty much always going to have a car payment because my wife wants a new car often.
It was only due to the pandemic and not driving very much that I was able to get her to keep the Outlander for 6 years. It has been a very reliable vehicle and the lowest cost option would have been to keep it another 3 or 4 years but she was getting grumbly about it. The interior HVAC fan is starting to make noise, and it will need new brakes all the way around pretty soon. And we've been having TPMS issues with it since replacing the OEM tires, even after installing 4 brand new OEM TPMS sensors (expensive!). For my part, I don't trust the CVT long term, and it makes the car as enjoyable to drive from an acceleration standpoint as a warm stick of butter. So we got to the point that we both decided it was time to trade it in.
Another requirement my wife has is a power liftgate. She also likes the fancy sunroofs on all the EVs, which are acceptable to me as they don't seem to take up the same headroom space as the traditional opening sunroofs. So that eliminates most base model vehicles, in addition to the above parameters. She also wants dark leather, which maybe I could get her to live with black cloth, but it would be a struggle.
Happy wife, happy life. I set the budget at $600 per month max for a lease or outright purchase. We looked at leases and outright purchases on several competitive EV makes.
The closest on a lease was Tesla, on a Model Y RWD with zero options. But the wife wanted the fancy sunroof, so that's more. I didn't care for the unconventional controls on the Tesla, nor the fact that there were rattles coming from the back on a brand new car. And you have to order it, and it takes 5 weeks, I am accustomed to be able to drive it off the lot. I started a thread on here a while ago about the things that I didn't like about Tesla. I suppose that I could learn to live with the unconventional controls and lack of Android Auto and my music app. But the rattles really spoke to a lack of quality, at least in my mind, and on top of costing me more out of pocket for a lease, that kind of killed it.
I liked the Chevrolet Blazer, but the power liftgate is an "available" option on the LT trim, that the available LT vehicles on 3 different dealer lots didn't have. The RS trim makes it more expensive. It has really good range in the base model, but I wasn't going to spend the additional coin for the RS that I needed to get the features we wanted.
Wife wasn't willing to consider the ID.4 because my parents have one and we see them several times a week. Plus on the ID.4, if you want the bigger battery and the power liftgate, you have to get the Pro.S, which again is more. You can get the S model with the power liftgate with the standard battery, but the standard battery on the ID.4 is only 60 kWh and 206 miles to start with. The Pro has the bigger battery but not the liftgate. Could have leased a 23 Pro for $530/mo with nothing out of pocket after talking to the VW dealer, but, you have the liftgate issue again.
Didn't consider the Polestar, or the Vinfast which they don't sell here in Texas anyway, to my knowledge.
So we get to the Mach-E. Besides the fact that the '23s have big markdowns, there are also compelling lease bonuses to take the place of not having the tax credit, in fact it's $3000 more than the tax credit on a lease. The one that we leased has all the goodies. The standard battery is 70kWh, which is more acceptable that the 60kWh on the ID.4. I really didn't want the AWD, but as I said before, this was the least expensive Mach-E premium available for purchase or lease within 100 miles. So I accepted the AWD. The dealer also made the best trade in value we have seen from anyone on the Outlander. Wife is happy, I'm happy, let's take it home.
We can talk about the acquisition fees, or other fees, or taxes in my jurisdiction, etc, but the bottom line is the total capitialized cost with the lease rebate was less than other competitive makes base models. And we got more for our trade than at other B&M dealerships or the online places that I shopped on like KBB Instant Offer, Carmax, etc, etc. I also added in the $800 option to basically give it back in any condition, so that's another something that's in the monthly payment. Should I have paid for that up front? Maybe, but there are other issues in play here in that I'm not going to get into on a public forum. I've already given you guys way too much information anyway.
If the range figures for EVs are much better in 3 years for less money on a new unit, we will probably throw it back and get another. If we like it and want to keep it, the residual buyout is very reasonable, as in, you could not get close to buying a 3 year old Mach-E or Tesla unit today with similar options for what the buyout is at the end of the lease. Yes, that figured into the decision to accept the offer on this vehicle.
FWIW, I charged it to 100% overnight after getting it up to over 90% at a public charging station, and it has 230 miles range on the dash. I would have preferred the 250 mile range with the 70kWh battery with the RWD, but, I've looked at probably 10 possible long distance trips we could do with the car and it's all possible without using the Tesla supercharging network. I suppose another option for the AWD is that we could possibly take it to a cold weather destination like NM in the wintertime if we were very conservative about watching the charging, i.e., charge after arriving at the destination and before going to the hotel.
I ordered the Tesla Supercharging adapter for it the first day we had it home, but of course it's on back order. Apparently Tesla is manufacturing them for Ford, is what I gathered from the Mach-E forum that I joined.
