<prompt> Human: A friend and I were discussing this topic the other day and wanted to see what the general PF sentiment is towards leasing to buy a car that you know you would like to purchase at lease end. The general thought process is that if you know you would like to buy a 35,000.00 car but you are younger for examples sake 27 and want to avoid the higher down payment and monthly costs, you could simply lease a car for 3 years, allowing you to move up in the work force, save additional money, etc, etc, while at the same time plan on purchasing that car. Hypothetically at lease end, you could simply purchase the car at the depreciated value, lowering what your monthly cost would have been compared to buying it outright with 1020 down. This is obviously assuming that A. You can afford a 35,000.00 car from the start, however it would be more advantageous to avoid the higher monthly cost and down payment, and B. No major event occurs that would require a drastic change in strategy. While potentially sounding possible, we both researched information on the internet and not a single article was found on a strategy to lease-to-buy. We are simply looking for information on why or why-not this strategy would be either foolish or ingenious! I hope I have articulated our thought process effectively. Thank you in advance for the insight!  <response>: It ends up costing more . You pay stuff like finance charge on the lease and stuff. One shouldnt be buying a 35000 car if they cant afford the down payment or monthly payments. 