Residual Value

different lenders have their own residuals. The manufacture's sometimes offer special rates

According to these guys, the CLK has the highest residuals in its class:

Could you give a more precise URL? I visited

Thanks, Bob

Look under "NADA Guides". It has used vehicle wholesale & retail listings by vehicle category and model year. The NADA, Kelley Blue Book & similar sites give you a very good idea of what nearly any car or truck is actually worth. Use it to find out your car/truck's trade in value, or what you or a dealer are likely going to be able to ask for it if sold retail.

"Residual value" just means "what the car is worth at 'x' point in time", and is the same as the vehicles "trade-in value", i.e., it's wholesale value of the car. It's a leasing term that represents a forecast of what a car will be worth at the end of a lease, but it isn't necessarily an accurate figure. You may get to the end of the lease and find out (as most buyers do) that the residual was set way too high, and that if you buy the car at that point you will pay more for it than if you just went out on the market and found a similar make, model and year car/truck. My personal 2000 E430 Sport has a residual thousands higher than the actual street value of the car at this point in time.

Manufacturers use double-speak nonsense like "residual value" on leasing contracts and use other terms like "capitalized cost" instead of "Retail price", "money factor" instead of "interest rate divided by 24", etc. In simple terms, it's all business bullshit intended to confuse the consumer.

Thanks Jerry but I am still confused. Wouldn't residual values give me the value 3 years from now, i.e. in late 2006, for a given 2004 make/model? I don't think that NADA, Kelly, etc. are going to do that.

Thanks, Bob

Sorry for the further post but I've thought of a much better way to express my confusion. Residual values, as I understand it, predict the future. NADA, Kelly and the like, in my experience, do not. Right? Wrong?

Thanks, Bob

You're correct, the only way to get EXACTLY what you're looking for is through Automotive Lease Guides (ALG) who basically control all the residuals. They charge a fee (around $75 USD) for a guidebook, and they have an on-line calculator, which is around $20 USD. Try

You can get very close by just using the free NADA site and overlaying a particular three year old car/truck vs. its original retail cost, figure the residual percentage and then multiply it against the new car's retail price. You'll be within a few percentage points one way or the other. The only thing that might affect this would be is a major problem or bit of good news that affects a brand's overall street value. I.E., the Audi "runaway" scare of the '80's has killed residuals for that brand for years, and the latest bad quality news has hurt MB's once strong residual forecasts. BMW, too.