VinFast, a small automaker from Vietnam, faces an uphill battle to establish a foothold in the American car market. An unknown name with less-than-stellar product reviews and a reputation for putting critics in jail doesn’t bode well for sales. By offering what is now “the cheapest lease on the market” Vinfast seems to finally understand their only real chance to compete against more recognizable brands.
VinFast started as a direct sales model similar to Tesla, Rivian, and Lucid. The automaker has decided to branch out and open a series of franchised dealerships. One store in Cary, North Carolina, is advertising a bonkers deal on a model that retails for around $50,000.
According to the advertisement you can lease a VF 8 Eco with an MSRP of $47,325 for $249 per month with $0 down or a VF8 Plus with an MSRP of $53,125 for $299 per month with $0 down. Naturally, the fine print says that taxes and fees are not included. There is a $695 “acquisition tax” and a $698 administrative/documentation fee due at signing in addition to any tax and registration fees. This is for a 36-month lease, with an allocated total mileage of 30,000.
It’s important to put these numbers into perspective, if I go to Tesla’s website to get an estimate on a $36,000 Model 3, the website says that leases “start at $329” per month, however, when I alter the calculator to $0 down that payment jumps to $474 per month.
For another benchmark, let’s look at an “affordable” model like a Honda Civic LX with an MSRP that is almost half the price of the VF 8 depending on the configuration.
Honda is advertising a special of $249 per month with $3,799 due at signing. If we were to recalculate this into a $0 down lease that would be about $355 per month.
Folks on leasing forums who love to get into the minute details of leasing are always targeting what they call the “one percent rule,” meaning if you managed to negotiate a payment that was one percent of the MSRP, assuming zero down before tax, you got an amazing deal. Using the VF8 Plus example at $299 per month, if we rolled in the almost $,1400 in acquisition fees into the payment we are at $339 per month on a car with a retail price of $53,125 this works out to a payment to MSRP ratio of 0.6 percent. Given the context these payments almost seem too good to be true.
According to CarsDirect.com, this special is the cheapest lease deal in America, as Vinfast is combining the $7,500 Federal tax credit that applies to EV leasing with over $15,000 in additional lease cash for a total discount of about $22,000. According to the article, VinFast has steadily increased its rebates over the past few months.
I’ve been in the car shopping game a long time, and the one thing that is always consistent when it comes to leasing is that often advertised “specials” and actual quotes can tell different stories. I contacted VinFast of Cary directly for them to provide a full breakdown. I explained that I was a journalist doing a story on this lease deal, and the salesperson excitedly said, “Our marketing director just arrived, I will connect you.”
After I was put on hold for about 20 minutes I reached out to the dealership via their online lead system, as there was an option to send a text directly to a manager. Immediately, I got a call back from a sales manager who told me that a salesperson would be reaching out to provide pricing. Despite an additional follow-up, I never got that official quote.
Assuming a potential customer was actually able to get a real quote from the dealership, the numbers would likely be way more competitive than anything else in the EV space right now. However, it still begs the question—how cheap does an objectively bad car have to be for people to consider it? I don’t know of too many people even considering this lease deal even at this bargain-basement price.
From a business perspective, throwing $15,000 in rebates at your units to move them off the lot is probably not good for profit, and it sends the message to the consumers that your cars aren’t really “worth” their supposed MSRPs. Vinfast is an automaker that the average consumer doesn’t even know exists, and the brand has already entered what some would consider a death spiral of discounts to find customers.
Tom McParland is a contributing writer for Jalopnik and runs AutomatchConsulting.com. He takes the hassle out of buying or leasing a car. Got a car buying question? Send it to [email protected]