Just FYI, guys. You NEVER have to put money down on a lease and you shouldn't.
In the unlikely event the car gets in an accident/totaled, you don't get that money back. It's basically thrown away.
The only reason to really consider a down payment is if they are somehow offering you a better financing rate, which I've personally never seen (and shouldn't matter since that's not how lease financing is determined unless MAYBE it's due to poor credit).
Serious question as I never leased (maybe once back in the early 90s)....
Why do the ads say x money down and X per month?
Do they roll that "money down" into your monthly if you refuse?
Correct.
They will always ask for money down. Assuming decent credit, you can always ask to put $0 down.
A lease is pretty straight forward. It's the purchase price of the car
minus the expected value of the car at the end of the lease (called the residual)
plus financing charges.
If you negotiate and buy a car for $50000, then, let's say it's estimated to be worth $30000 at the end of the lease (i.e. 36 months later and 12K miles per year), then your lease is $20000 plus finance charges to borrow that. That gets divided into the length of the lease (36 months). Any down payment lowers the $20000 by that amount.
You could theoretically just pay the entire amount up front and have no lease payments (and save some/all of the financing, I believe). But, if the car gets totaled the next day, you get nothing. You don't get anything from your insurance or from them. You're out $20000. Or whatever you put down.
On the other hand, if put 0 down, it gets totaled the next day, you aren't out anything at all.
If you bought the car, and it gets totaled the next day, you can get that back from your insurance.