Bentley lease purchase
Defer part of the balance to a final payment. Lower monthly cost.
- If it is worth less
- Yours. You cover any shortfall at the end.
- Own it at the end
- Yes, once the final payment is made
- Monthly cost
- Lower
- Available to
- Companies and individuals
Lease purchase defers an agreed part of the balance to a single payment at the end of the term, set against what the lender expects the car to be worth by then. The monthly payment falls, often by close to a third, and the debt does not go anywhere.
On a Continental GT at £200,000 with a 20 per cent deposit and 45 per cent of the price deferred to a final payment of £90,000, the monthly figure over 48 months at an indicative nominal rate of 8.9 per cent is £2,406, against £3,974 on hire purchase. That is £1,568 a month less, and the price of it is a £90,000 payment falling due at the end.
The trade is that you carry the risk on that final figure. If the car is worth more, the difference belongs to you. If it is worth less, so does the shortfall. That single point is the whole difference between this and a personal contract purchase.
How the deferred figure is set
From the lender view of the used market for that model at that age and mileage, and from nothing else. It is an estimate rather than a promise, and it is the number worth arguing about, because it moves the monthly payment further than the rate does. Push it up and the monthly figure falls while your exposure at the end grows. Pull it down and the reverse happens. On a Continental GT or a Bentayga the lender has years of trading evidence to work from. On a low-volume car it is set conservatively and the monthly saving shrinks with it.
Where it works on a Bentley and where it does not
It works where a lender can see the market clearly, which means the Continental GT, the Flying Spur and the Bentayga, and it works best on the Bentayga because the volumes are highest. It stops working on the cars with thin used markets, where the deferred figure is set so low that the monthly saving disappears and you have taken on the risk for nothing. On the coachbuilt cars it is rarely offered at all. We will tell you which of those you are in before you commit, because it is the only part of the decision that matters.
What happens at the end
Three options and all three are ordinary. Pay the final figure from cash and keep the car. Sell it, settle the final figure out of the proceeds and keep whatever is left. Or refinance that payment across a new term, which is common and which we arrange regularly. Deciding which of the three you want in the final six months rather than the final six days is the difference between a choice and a scramble, and refinancing has to be arranged before the agreement ends rather than after.
Tell us about the car
We come back with which agreements the car supports and what each one is likely to cost. If none of them work, that is the answer you get.