Buying 2011 or 2012 used leaf

I am considering buying a used 2011 or 2012 Leaf. These cars seem to be in the 20k to 30 k mileage range. It appears that Leaf owners are selling these cars as the 6 year warranty expires. Fewer 2013's, and almost no 2014's are on the market. Am I seeing this correctly ?


Can anyone give advise about buying a Leaf nearing the end of the 6 year warranty ?

I live in CO. so I can get a good tax incentive on an out of state car, but it this a can of worms I should not open ?

Can you update your location info via your user name in the upper right > User Control Panel > Profile tab? That way, we don't need to ask in future posts/threads or do sleuthing to deduce it.

What are your daily driving needs in terms of miles? How much city vs. highway? Will you have the ability to charge at your work/destinations?

I don't know what 6 year warranty you're talking about. Basic warranty is 3 years/36K miles (whichever comes first). Powertrain + EV components are 5 years/60K. There are a few others. You can d/l the warranty booklet at https://owners.nissanusa.com/nowners/navigation/manualsGuide. There's also http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?t=13192.

jtrinkle said:

Fewer 2013's, and almost no 2014's are on the market. Am I seeing this correctly ?

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There are probably very few 14s on the market but I don't think you're right about '13s. You should start seeing more cars of a given year once 2 or 3 year leases run out. I had a 2 year lease. The used Leaf I bought to replace the one I returned was previously a 2 year lease.

I wouldn't buy an '11 or '12. See http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=435921#p435921 and my responses further in that thread.

Lots of enhancements w/the '13 model year (some optional): http://sfbayleafs.org/news/2013/01/2013-nissan-leaf-product-highlights/ and http://sfbayleafs.org/news/2013/01/2013-nissan-leaf-product-highlights/.

Re: my saga in buying a used '13: see http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=429492#p429492 and my posts after it. http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=430825#p430825 was on what I finally got. At that time, the auctions every 2 weeks would have about 80 Leafs at each (Manheim) SF Bay Area auction. I believe they were mostly '12s and '13s. However, the last time I contacted the used car dealer I worked with on this (a few months ago), the supply was drying up. IIRC, only about 1/2 (or less?) as many Leafs were present.

One guy was posting some Manheim auction results like these.
http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=20608
http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=20660

Manheim and NMAC apparently have a deal: http://press.manheim.com/2010-07-27-Manheim-partners-with-nissan-motor-acceptance-corp-And-infiniti-financial-services-to-create-a-better-faster-way-to-turn-off-lease-inventory-into-sales.

I want this car for running around, maybe 30 miles per day. I can charge overnight in my garage. Can I expect to get several years of use and battery life and few maintenance problems with a car of this vintage ?

The warranty I mentioned, that I think is triggering the sales is the 5 year one. It seems like people are getting rid of these cars at about 5 or 6 years.

I have a back up car for using when the weather is not great. A leaf for me would be just for driving on nice days and short trips.

jtrinkle said:

I want this car for running around, maybe 30 miles per day. I can charge overnight in my garage. Can I expect to get several years of use and battery life and few maintenance problems with a car of this vintage ?

The warranty I mentioned, that I think is triggering the sales is the 5 year one. It seems like people are getting rid of these cars at about 5 or 6 years.

I have a back up car for using when the weather is not great. A leaf for me would be just for driving on nice days and short trips.

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If you hold tight a few months, I predict around Feb that the influx of off-lease '13s and even '14s will pick up.

jtrinkle said:

The warranty I mentioned, that I think is triggering the sales is the 5 year one.

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I don't think the 5-year powertrain warranty would cause anyone to ditch their Leaf. There isn't a huge risk of powertrain failure and most of the early adopters leased. The real concern is the battery. A lot of people are playing a game right now of "can i run my battery down enough to qualify for warranty replacement." Most of the used Leafs you see are off-lease and those are largely cyclical and tend to align with product updates. The earliest adopters got the 2011 Leafs in Dec '10 - Feb. '11.

jtrinkle said:

The warranty I mentioned, that I think is triggering the sales is the 5 year one. It seems like people are getting rid of these cars at about 5 or 6 years.

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New 2012's were still being sold into early 2013, so the 2012's you're seeing are likely just coming off 3 year leases. Early leases were quite expensive so it's conceivable that some of these early cars had 4 year leases to keep the payments down. It was late in 2012 before Nissan started offering the cheap Leaf leases that are pretty much expected today. Such an offer is what finally got me into a Leaf and my own 3year lease is expiring in a few weeks.

The earliest 2011's were only delivered in December 2010, so relatively few have an expired 5 year/60k powertrain warranty as of today.

A big reason you are seeing a lot of these cars in used car auctions is because the residuals are far higher than their actual values. Plus there are more and better alternatives out there now that weren't available in 2011 or even 2012. Some previous Leafers have gone partially back to fossil fuel in the form of PHEVs like the Volt and the Ford Energi series.

Jefe said:

jtrinkle said:

The warranty I mentioned, that I think is triggering the sales is the 5 year one.

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I don't think the 5-year powertrain warranty would cause anyone to ditch their Leaf. There isn't a huge risk of powertrain failure and most of the early adopters leased. The real concern is the battery. A lot of people are playing a game right now of "can i run my battery down enough to qualify for warranty replacement." Most of the used Leafs you see are off-lease and those are largely cyclical and tend to align with product updates. The earliest adopters got the 2011 Leafs in Dec '10 - Feb. '11.

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Oh der. It just occurred to me that the (extended) capacity warranty is the same as the powertrain warranty. Now the capacity warranty might have people bailing if they thought they were going to get a new battery and it didn't degrade as quickly as they thought. Or maybe they played that game really hard and abused their battery but still don't feel like they are going to drop that 4th bar.

But I think it's definitely the lease cycle.

RonDawg said:

A big reason you are seeing a lot of these cars in used car auctions is because the residuals are far higher than their actual values. Plus there are more and better alternatives out there now that weren't available in 2011 or even 2012. Some previous Leafers have gone partially back to fossil fuel in the form of PHEVs like the Volt and the Ford Energi series.

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Yep on all of these.

My residual on my former '13 Leaf SV w/both packages was a crazy $20,601. I knew it wouldn't be worth that much after 2 years/24K miles going in. Nissan offered a discount for those w/'13 Leaf on 2 year lease of $6500 on the buyout price. So, discount + $300 purchase fee would've made it $14,401 + tax but out my car. At the time, it was about $3K to $3.5K above used market prices on the exact same car w/same packages. So, back my leased Leaf went.

I'm sure many folks did the above.

But, after I bought mine, it seems used prices have gone up (!). Used car dealer I worked w/said franchise Nissan dealers are snatching up some and they're willing to pay more. And, they have a greater markup. If the much of the supply's gone there (assuming dealer's are able to sell), then a $14,401 + tax to buy your own car vs. Nissan dealer doesn't look so bad.

Yep... I've known of someone w/a Leaf who was glad to get rid of his leased Leaf. For him, it was good riddance. He replaced it with a 4Runner. (Even when he had his Leaf, I'd sometimes see him drive a Porsche 911 to work.)

jtrinkle said:

It seems like people are getting rid of these cars at about 5 or 6 years.

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More like 2 or 3 years, the length of the most leases. A few were weird like 39 months. I believe there weren't 2 year leases available on the '11, only 3+ year. I don't recall about the '12 anymore.

cwerdna said:

But, after I bought mine, it seems used prices have gone up (!). Used car dealer I worked w/said franchise Nissan dealers are snatching up some and they're willing to pay more. And, they have a greater markup. If the much of the supply's gone there (assuming dealer's are able to sell), then a $14,401 + tax to buy your own car vs. Nissan dealer doesn't look so bad.

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Yep the used car dealer I bought my '13 from in Durham, NC said the same thing. He had picked up 40 off-lease Leafs back in Feb. I got a great deal on mine, but I was pressing hard on him to try to get it down a little more and he finally told me he was selling it to me at a break-even and couldn't justify going any lower. And he said if he wanted to go to auction and replace it it would cost a lot more today than it did when he bought it.

Not many dealers (even Nissan) are going to pick up 40 off-lease Leafs at one time.