So you're considering leasing a new Rivian?

You're not alone.

Most data reports that over 50% of new EVs are financed through leasing due to manufacturer incentives and rapid depreciation seen in most EVs... especially luxury EVs.

But how do you know if you're actually getting a good deal on that lease overall? What even makes an lease a good deal?

Thankfully - Rivian is more transparent than most automakers, so with the handy calculator on this page we can get a definitive answer on the quality of that lease deal.

Choosing the right model and powertrain can make all the difference in two key ways.

First, the amount of depreciation your vehicle will deal with has to do with how popular and easy it is to resell down the line.

Generally speaking, the R1S will handle depreciation better far better than the R1T, for example.

And then you have to account for the fact that higher options tend to depreciate faster than purely higher trims.

Everything over the base model will suffer from more depreciation though when compared to the entry price point.

Second, the referral incentives often differ by model and/or powertrain. You're likely to get better referral bonuses for more expensive vehicles.

For both the R1S and R1T, my recommended sweet spots are:

Dual-Standard with Premium Audio Upgrade

or

Tri-Max

Optioning up to the Dual-Large or Dual-Max can cost considerably more than Dual-Standard with more limited upside and greater depreciation. 

Not to mention the big difference in default driving dynamics the auto-suspension and full-time AWD drive mode at "key up" that Tri and Quad models provide.

We've spent over a year with a Gen2 R1S and Gen2 R1T, both in the Dual-Max variant. And while they've been great vehicles, if we were buying today, we would choose Tri-Max for the driving dynamics difference alone, even if they offered no additional power or a faster 0-60.

Be sure to check out my 1-year Gen2 R1S review.

See my 1 year review of our Dual-Max R1S 👇

For this example I went and found beautiful Rivian Blue R1S Tri Max in the R1 Shop which we will use for the example calculation.

Note: Often the best Rivian offers apply to vehicles that are already built and ready to deliver in the shop!

No matter if you are custom configuring, or choosing from the shop, Rivian will list the "order price" which constitutes the MSRP you will need for the calculator.

In this example, we're looking at an extremely well equipped build that has an MSRP of $110,490

Here's an example of that in your first field. 👇

As mentioned in step 3, your mileage and term length impact your residual to try to accurately choose the miles you expect to put on the vehicle.

As for the term length, depending on how often you want to switch up your vehicle can impact if you choose 24 or 36 months, but know that going with 36 months is often ideal.

This is primarily due to the front loading of depreciation. Choosing 24 months can often increase your monthly payment by hundreds of dollars per month.

Warning! This one is not as obvious as it sounds.

You'll need to know all three of these values at the same time because they often influence each other.

Throughout this example, we were seeing a monthly payment of $1,317 per month.

However, this was with the defaults that Rivian uses, and there was an active Lease Bonus applied to their base math.

You almost needs to work backwards in order to generate a realistic monthly payment with the most favorable terms.

Down Payment: You almost always want to do a $0 down lease whenever possible. As if your vehicle gets totaled or stolen, that money down is often unrecoverable.

Going $0 down mitigated your risk considerably. In our example here, Rivian had been assuming you'd put an extra $1,500 down, but lets set that to $0 for an optimal lease deal.

Lease Bonus: This is essentially just a straight discount from the automaker to move metal. In the example we've been using, Rivian was running a $5,000 lease bonus on this particular trim, which is a direct capitalized cost reduction for you.

A lease bonus is essentially "free money" to lower your payment.

This is why being savvy about the current offers helps you choose currently incentivized models and powertrains.

Resulting Monthly Payment: This is generated by the two factors above. When we set the downpayment to $0 and we take advantage of the example $5,000 lease bonus, the monthly payment goes up from $1,317 to $1,360.

Now that you've found all the variable inputs needed to properly analyze your potential lease deal, it's time to get some results.

Hit the "Analyze deal" button to generate the report.

Thanks to Rivian being transparent with residual values now, we have everything we need to make an educated decision.

Estimated Money Factor

Probably the weirdest thing for folks who are leasing for the first time is that lease costs are calculated as a "money factor", which sets how "expensive" it is for Rivian to finance the deal.

Money factors have been used for a long time, but making sense of them is like being in America and understanding the metric system or vice versa.

It's not "wrong", it just doesn't offer the context you're used to.

Estimated Effective APR

Thankfully, there is a math equation to convert money factors into APRs, which most of us normal people are more used to comparing.

Since we understand how much other debt (such as credit cards or mortgages) tend to cost, we can more directly compare this, as well as compare the interest rate to any purchase incentives.

Deal Quality Rating

The deal quality rating is purely based on the interest rate, and how expensive Rivian is making it to finance the deal.

For example, when there was an EV tax credit that applied to lease deals, the deal ratings for a Dual-Standard were actually quite poor because the "cost" of the deal was being consumed by Rivian making the financing expensive.

Estimated Adjusted Capitalized Cost

This shows your expected true "price" of the vehicle being financed in the lease deal after things like down payments and lease bonuses.

Summary Images

Once you've generated this report, you can either download or directly share a summary image to share with a partner or joint decision maker who just wants a summary of the deal.

I'm very thankful that Rivian has opted towards more transparent lease information by providing the residual values up-front.

Unfortunately, this still obscures the true cost of a lease deal in terms of the interest and rent charge.

But it gave me a good excuse to build this calculator and guide to help walk you through the process so you can have the power of making an educated decision. 🙌

I truly hope this guide and calculator help you feel informed and choose a fun vehicle that best suits your needs.

My biggest takeaway is that depreciation is the #1 obstacle to these vehicles for the foreseeable future... but leasing is still the best choice for MOST people who want a brand new Rivian.

Leasing gives you a "stop loss" through the residual value calculation, which is immensely powerful.

If the vehicle is worth MORE than the residual at the end, you can buy it out and net the difference.

If the vehicle is worth LESS than the residual at the end, you can walk away and Rivian eats the difference.

Any time I can help the consumer get a more favorable deal on the thing they want, I'll do it 10 out of 10 times.

Stay Curious! ✌️

Sincerely,

Travis Ketchum