[aboss3]

Hello everyone! I'm new on this forum, and need an advise. I've leased the '15 MDX almost 3 years ago, and my lease is coming to an end. So I need to decide if I should buy it out (and finance for 48 months), or lease a TLX. My MDX has the SH-AWD and Tech packages, and is still in good shape. It has 50k miles on it, as my commute was horrible 30 miles one way in the past. We recently moved to North California, and I'm now only 6 miles away from work. We have 2 toddlers, so they used to fit in perfectly in the car seats.

The reason why I was looking to return it was because we leased a Lexus GX 460 for my wife. So the Lexus will essentially become the "kids-mobile". :wink:

I was looking for something fun to drive, and hopefully to buy and keep for 10+ years. The 2018 TLX V4 Base caught my eye, as it's fun to drive, and should be reliable enough to last for over 10 years. I found a deal for it for $29.5k at one of my local dealers. My current buyout for MDX is $27k, but by that time it'll have 60k miles. My lease was for 36 months and 60k miles because of my commute, so the mileage was all paid for. The warranty had just expired obviously.

I do love my MDX, and haven't had a single issue with it. It's still in pristine shape.

Decisions. Decisions. Decisions. :grin:

 

[skirmich]

It all depends on what you want...
If roads aren´t nasty and you probably never intend to go off road with the MDX? perhaps it might be right to trade it in..
Considering gas prices the TLX should save you up good money in the long run...

If this was my decision I would weight in the Cons and Pros and end up keeping the MDX, but that is just my case.

 

[Wanderlust]

If you don't want it, can I have it? I hate the push-button shifter in more recent Honda/Acura vehicles, and I barely tolerate the 9-speed transmission. We will probably hang onto my wife's 2014 MDX until the wheels fall off.

 

[mdxstang]

I think you should strongly rethink your decisions to keep leasing vehicles. It's the most costly way to have a vehicle. Do some math on it yourself rather than taking the word of others, especially salespeople, who don't care at all about your financial health - only their own.

Buying a vehicle and keeping it for an extended period of time is much more cost efficient. Even more cost efficient would be to buy a used vehicle (ex: 2-3 years old) where the steepest part of the depreciation curve is behind it.

Even better - don't buy a vehicle you can't readily pay cash for rather than taking out a loan to buy a vehicle, which can tend to make one 'up-buy' and get themselves further in debt.

But finances aside - it really comes down to what you need/want. If you don't need the bigger MDX and you prefer a smaller vehicle due to its better handling/sportiness, fuel mileage, or any other reason, then just go with what you want but you really should consider the financial aspects. Okay - I didn't put the finances aside. If it's bothering you at all that you just paid all this money to lease the MDX only to just turn it in with nothing to show for it and starting over again with the brand new 2018 TLX, keep in mind you could always get a 2-3 year old TLX for substantially less cost and still keep it to a ten year (or whatever) life and have fun with it.

Unless you're stuck on Acura for some reason, if you're considering a 4 door sedan like the TLX, there are many other options open as well since every manufacturer makes sedans - most of them multiple models of sedans. It would pay to see what other vehicle models and prices are available out there. It's worth cross-shopping.

 

[aboss3]

On the same note, what's the average life of the MDX?

 

[awilliams848]

Keep your MDX! I just bought a 2014 3 months ago and I'm going to keep it for about 10 years as well. The MDX is a very nice machine.

Sent from my Z983 using Tapatalk

 

[aboss3]

Keep your MDX! I just bought a 2014 3 months ago and I'm going to keep it for about 10 years as well. The MDX is a very nice machine.

Sent from my Z983 using Tapatalk

How many miles were on yours if you don't mind? My only problem is that I'm out of warranty at this point. I've spent probably 4 hours in the car for the past almost 3 years, but now my work is close by. So I put up 50k miles on it very quickly. There's an extended warranty available for $2,300 that would cover it for the next 4 years or 120k miles total that I was looking at. The deductible is only $100.

 

[awilliams848]

Well I purchased mine with 38k. Got the dealer down to 30k due to a couple of scratches and I had to clean up the interior a little but it's just like new. Drove it on a family vacation to NYC via Washington DC. Had no problems and great fuel efficiency.

Sent from my Z983 using Tapatalk

 

[skirmich]

On the same note, what's the average life of the MDX?

Nobody can answer that... It can be high +10years or it can be short +5 years it all really comes down to Maintenance.
If you are concerned about engine life dont be, With good maintenance these engines can go +500K Miles which is longer than 10 years.
Transmission though is bound to crap out faster due to clutch pack wear even with maintenance.

 

[Wanderlust]

Avoid third-party warranties, and $2300 is crazy talk. Look into purchasing AcuraCare online or go bare. That is the downside of hanging onto cars past warranty, but keep in mind drivetrain warranty goes longer than bumper-to-bumper. One way to look at it is even if you end up having to put money into a major repair at some point, you're probably no worse off financially than if you had been paying for the steep part of the depreciation curve for a new vehicle. And that steep depreciation is what you pay for on a lease as well. But that potential repair expense is unpredictable, and if you manage your finances "leveraged to the max" with no savings, like far too many Americans, then you could end up with a cash flow problem if lightning strikes. But a 6-speed MDX is a pretty solid bet for reliability. Just keep up with maintenance.

Look at Consumer Reports and other sources for reliability ratings on vehicles. Think about insurance cost as well. MDX isn't the cheapest car to insure, but a lot of sporty cars may be worse.

And most importantly, do you like the car? If you do, why change? If you don't, why live with it unless you have too?

 

[mdxstang]

On the same note, what's the average life of the MDX?

It's whatever you want it to be unless it's totaled in a wreck or flood or something. I just donated my 19 y/o Durango that had around 230K miles on it and was still usable. My daily driver car is over 50 years old.

My 2014 MDX (built June 2013) is now just over 4 years old and has 41K miles on it. The bumper to bumper warranty has expired but I still have miles and years left on the power train warranty. I will 'not' buy an extended warranty for it and have never purchased one for any vehicle. They're designed to make money for the company and salespeople selling them and on average it'll cost you more money to have the warranty than the repairs covered under the warranty would have cost. Read the fine print of any extended warranty - they exclude almost any maintenance costs that you'll actually do such as brakes, hoses, timing belt, accessory belts, battery, fluid changes, cosmetic issues like some a panel falling loose, and many other things.

There will always be some anecdotes from some people about how they came out ahead due to the extended warranty, and odds say 'some' people will come out ahead but the vast majority will not or else the insurance company (extended warranty is just insurance) would go out of business in no time.

Beware of scams in this area - there have been cases where extended warranty companies were in business for a few years, raked in the dough in the early years when they have little to no exposure due to the car being fairly new and often still covered under the factory warranty (it's silly to pay for an extended warranty while the vehicle's already covered by a factory warranty), and then went out of business before the time there'd be much in the way of claims payouts. If I were to get an extended warranty, which I definitely won't do, I'd only go with the one offered by the manufacturer - Acura in this case.

As you can see, I generally keep my vehicles a long time and plan to with the MDX as well. Mine's had 'no' problems and my expectation is that it'll be fine for many more years and many more tens of thousands of miles. If I was in the market for a used MDX I'd readily buy mine. It still feels like a new car to me (although you can see my context in the age of vehicles I have) and drives and runs great and is trouble free (so far). If I was in the market for a non-base type SUV I'd certainly consider the MDX, assuming the cost wasn't much of a factor for me.

 

[aboss3]

Thanks for all advises. At this point I'm leaning towards keeping it. 27k is not a bad price to keep it, especially since I've owned it since new, and am very happy with it. It does need a set of new tires at this point, and I'll have to replace the OEM break pads as well in the near future. So after a $1k investment, it becomes a 28k MDX.

 

[MDteX]

Old Timers Thread

On the same note, what's the average life of the MDX?

Here is some info about MDX life from us "old-timers". http://www.mdxers.org/forums/23-general-off-topic/16123-old-timers-checking-thread.html