How did you factor the source of funds into your lease vs. buy decision?
I’m trying to decide between leasing and buying a Macan EV, and one thing surprises me about most of the discussions I read.
Most of the lease-vs-buy discussions I find seem to focus on the vehicle itself, purchase price, lease payment, residual value, depreciation, financing rates, etc. with much less discussion about the source of the funds.
Did you actually build the source of the funds into your lease-vs-buy model? If so, how?
For example:
• the opportunity cost of selling investments or withdrawing cash,
• the tax consequences of doing so (capital gains, retirement account withdrawals, IRMAA, etc.),
• and the value of preserving investment liquidity and future tax flexibility.
The more I think about it, the more it seems that a lease isn’t just financing the car. It’s also preserving financial flexibility: the flexibility to keep investments invested, manage taxes over time, walk away if depreciation is worse than expected, or buy the car if it ends up being worth more than the residual.
For those who seriously considered both leasing and buying, how much did these broader financial and tax considerations factor into your decision, compared with simply comparing the vehicle costs?