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21518 messages,  Last post on Dec 05, 2009 at 10:07 AM

You are in the Sedans Forum. Your Hosts are pat & karens

What is this discussion about? BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Lexus, Volvo, Porsche, Jaguar, Audi, Maserati, Maybach, Car Comparisons, Coupe, Convertible, Sedan


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#19904 of 21518
Re: Greetings from Seattle! [tagman] by ljflx
Jul 06, 2009 (8:44 am)
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Replying to: tagman (Jul 06, 2009 8:42 am)

Tag - I misread your post.
#19905 of 21518
Re: Greetings from Seattle! [tagman] by circlew
Jul 06, 2009 (8:52 am)
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Replying to: tagman (Jul 06, 2009 8:42 am)

TM,
 
Here is a chart depicting the last 12 months of avg.oil/gasoline prices in SD. I still agree with ljflx that the price will drop big time. True, the speculators are another factor in the mix but fundamentals beware! The economy is NOT headed up yet as the CNBC GreenShoot Farmers are now turning into WeedHarvestors!
 

 
Regards,
OW
#19906 of 21518
To lease or not? by cyclone4
Jul 06, 2009 (2:12 pm)
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OK you guys. I may have asked this question a long time ago, but I will ask it again. I decided to go with a "one payment lease". Would it be to my advantage to instead pay for the whole thing right now? With the one payment lease, the residual after 3 years is about $34K. One thing that swayed me toward the lease was the fact that hybrid technology will be improving a lot in the next few years.
#19907 of 21518
Re: Greetings from Seattle! [ljflx] by tagman
Jul 06, 2009 (2:50 pm)
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Replying to: ljflx (Jul 06, 2009 8:44 am)

Tag - I misread your post.
 
That's OK...
 
I know you are just waiting for the day when oil prices drop enough to tell me "I told you so". But remember... they've been high for quite a while, in spite of fundamentals... so it's a little late for that. Consider that OW's chart shows a lot of upside potential in the future (not the present). And yes, I recognize that conventional wisdon and principles would have had us with lower oil prices than we've had... so it does stand to reason that the prices will work their way down at some point. But, as I've said before, I don't expect them to stay down very low for all too long. The economy will eventually heat up and will pressure the prices right back up again. In addition, the investors will foresee the increased demand that is around the corner and start pushing the prices higher even before the actual demand increases. On top of that, big oil has an historic appetite for big profits, and they will do what is necessary to protect their interests and the interests of their shareholders.
 
That all said... what's the story on the market in your opinion? Still looking for the Dow to be above 10,000 by year-end? Or are you now leaning towards my more-conservative prediction of 9000+/-?
 
TM
#19908 of 21518
Re: To lease or not? [cyclone4] by ljflx
Jul 06, 2009 (6:49 pm)
Reply

Replying to: cyclone4 (Jul 06, 2009 2:12 pm)

Charlie,
 
First of all best of luck with the RX.
 
On the lease - depends on interest rate on the conventional lease. If it's real low why pay it off so fast? But I have a hard time even thinking about making one lease payment because it's too close to buying a vehicle outright. From my standpoint the purpose of a lease is to keep liquidity rather than tie it up in a vehicle.
 
BTW - Benz dealer near me is doing a 42 month lease on a $95K S550 4 matic with 5 grand down (that covers sales tax and a down payment) and $999 a month. If I were in the market for a car I'd have a hard time passing that up unless Lexus can do better on the 460L AWD. I love both cars and in a big sedan have no interest in anything else.
 
So far the G, LS460L and GL450 are flawless save for the LS recall which I am doing on Friday with normal service. Biggest problem I've had is on the G, if you can call the rubber around both passenger and driver side door sagging a bit and needing replacement a problem. The GL450 was the perfect SUV for my needs and I am thoroughly enjoying it. It's biggest problem so far is the man made leather stains from dark blue denim way too easily and of course the infamous brake dust.
 
The G has far and away the best phone system in that it can have 5 active phones on blue tooth and the voice system is painlessly easy to use. On the Benz and Lexus you can only have 1 phone active at once and have to go in and manually select other phones you have paired. This is one royal pain - particularly on the LS as you can't change once you are driving unless you pull over (haven't tried it yet on the Benz so it may be the same) - and it defeats luxury. Why both brands don't do what Infiniti does is beyond me and why Lexus doesn't tie the phone to the user selection is also beyond me. Then they give you all that great technology for the phone and nav and say you can't touch it once the car is rolling. I'd strangle their stupid lawyers if I could get a hand on them.
#19909 of 21518
Re: Greetings from Seattle! [tagman] by ljflx
Jul 06, 2009 (6:57 pm)
Reply

Replying to: tagman (Jul 06, 2009 2:50 pm)

I know you are just waiting for the day when oil prices drop enough to tell me "I told you so".
 
Nope - not at all. I've given up trying to figure out senserless speculation, and my POV is always tied to realism. I laugh everytime I see a bozo on CNBC saying a market is not tied to fundamentals and trades to its own beat. I hear that and I just wait for the TIMBER warning.. If you note everything I post about is fundamentals. If oil had better fundamentals I'd be with you in a second. But it doesn't and manipulation runs out of gas (no pun intended). I was'nt happy about selling Apple at $128.50 even after it fell to 118 because that 118 was fear overlooking fabulous fundamentals. I'm kicking myself for not buying it back at that point. I have an auto buy in at $130 if it falls that low. I see it at $160-$180 by early next year. My thinking is that earnings propel the stock market much higher in the 4th quarter thanks to great cost efficiencies that have now been set up but that we see very little uptick in oil demand. Mid next year I can see some fundamental support for oil but we are 6-8 years away from anything resembling demand like last year - IMO - of course.
 
Re - Dow 10,000 - I'm still there thanks to my thinking of a furious late year rally driven by increasing 3rd quarter results and rosy outlooks.
#19910 of 21518
Some photos of our RX450h by cyclone4
Jul 06, 2009 (7:31 pm)
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It is hard to tell on the photo, but the grill is quite different (more sporty and nicer looking) than that of the RX350. Here is the link.
 
http://s567.photobucket.com/albums/ss120/PatsSoxFan/
#19911 of 21518
Re: Greetings from Seattle! [tagman] by ljflx
Jul 06, 2009 (7:34 pm)
Reply

Replying to: tagman (Jul 06, 2009 2:50 pm)

Tag - i forgot to mention - in the energy sector $3.50 nat gas would have my interest a lot more than oil - LT. I can see that going up 5X in price LT as more and more industry converts away from oil. I don't see oil having any chance to do that.
 
One thing to note is that the NY times ran a story today about governments of the world starting to meet and come up with legislation against excess oil speculation. If that starts to happen than oil can really tank and speculators will have a hard time propping up prices in advance of increasing demand as per your post. One has to take into consideration this is a very real possibility. As well we can't have such vital markets being priced to speculators dreams and hopes given the monster crashes such folks have caused. Take away the speculative bubbles in oil that happened in the 70's, gulf war, 9/11 and last year and oil has been quite stable and very cheap. Governments of the world are a lot more hardened to do something about this, this time bcause of all the bail out money they've poured in. Many are quite angry about the unwarranted oil speculation of the past 4-5 months. One report I read had oil at 80% speculation - which is even higher than last year. If that unwinds too quickly it's another reason why this market could unravel and collapse in a hurry.
 
Link to times story:
 
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/06/business/06oil.html?_r=1
#19912 of 21518
Re: To lease or not? [ljflx] by cyclone4
Jul 06, 2009 (7:38 pm)
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Replying to: ljflx (Jul 06, 2009 6:49 pm)

As always, thanks for your expert insight. For better or for worse, I decided to go with the one payment lease. The ingterest rate for a conventional loan on this would have been about 5.7%. With the one payment lease, it came down to about 4.5%. From your comments I get the feeling that I should have paid for the whole shebang since this day and age, 4-5-5.7% is not really low.
 
You are so right about these phone and navigation restrictions with Lexus. Overall however, it sounds like we are both very happy with our vehicles.
#19913 of 21518
Re: To lease or not? [cyclone4] by ljflx
Jul 06, 2009 (8:05 pm)
Reply

Replying to: cyclone4 (Jul 06, 2009 7:38 pm)

Overall however, it sounds like we are both very happy with our vehicles.
 
Completely agree. The LS460L has been phenomenal and I don't think I could ever get tired of the color we both chose. I also love the ash interior and grey wood I got. Everytime I look at it i think it's granite instead of wood.

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