To your basic question--yup, you got taken. Dealers don't make much money on new cars, so they make it up in used cars and dealer service. They are also known to use a lease as "leverage" against the consumer. If you don't follow the dealer/manufacturer recommended maintenance schedule, AND have documentation, they'll ding you on residual value at the lease end. Same goes for warranty work--"it's not our fault, you didn't maintain it properly".
Rest of services until lease runs out at jiffy lube or pep boys.
This has been discussed in other threads, but taking your car to one of these "quiky lubes" or "in and out" service centers is a crapshoot (at best). The "techs" that do the actual work are brutally underpaid and under-trained. The managers are just there to field complaints and sell you additional overpriced services that you don't need. My buddy is a mechanic at a fairly large Honda dealership, and 90+% of all of the CVT transmissions that they replace have failed due to improper "service" at one of those places. It is so prevalent that they stock spare trannies on the shelf--rebuild is not even an option--just chuck in a new one. Of course, the improper service voids the warranty, so open your wallet and dig DEEP.
I have never heard a good ending from a car lease.
Leasing is a good option for a lot of people--especially if you use your vehicle for work and can write if off. Once you concede that you will have a car payment (of some sort) for the rest of your days, leasing kind of makes sense. You get a new vehicle every 2 or 3 years, it should still be under warranty for that period of time/mileage, and you can keep your payment about the same--you just have to keep paying--forever. Fleet customers have been doing this forever.
This is not a stretch (in terms of a concept)--people pay their cable bill, internet bill, cell-phone bill, insurance(s), utilities every month--forever. Some folks even choose to have a "perpetual mortgage"--refinancing their home every few years and pulling the equity. There is even a recent trend in, basically, long-term rental car services. You pay a flat rate every month to use a vehicle--all insurance and maintenance included in the bill. When you are done, or want to change, you just take it back and exchange it. There was even one service that I saw on the TV news that has a fleet of new and late model used vehicles with this type of service that allows you to swap vehicles (they have price brackets of selections), up to 4 times a year at no additional charge--so if you want a convertible for the summer, an SUV for the winter, or a mini-van for the family vacation, just go swap vehicles (within your bracket). You never actually own anything, but you always have a new or newish vehicle with no strings for $XXX per month.
