Personal finance experts often say the first thing you should do is negotiate the price of the car BEFORE you talk monthly payment. However, it is estimated that only 25% of car shoppers do this. It's important to do this because it shortens the "window" of the vehicle's lease payment. The window is often referred to as the portion of the vehicle a person pays in a lease, since they aren't paying for the entire vehicle.

Here's a comparative breakdown from Swapalease.com of how and why this is important. See the two examples below. Example A represents a vehicle where MSRP isn't negotiated first. Example B represents the same vehicle and finance term, but the shopper negotiated $2,000 off the MSRP before any other negotiations took place. See how it can impact the monthly payment?

"Arguably the biggest trap in negotiating a lease is failing to address the opportunity to negotiate on the MSRP first," said Scot Hall, Executive Vice President of Swapalease.com. "As you can see in this example, just $2,000 off the MSRP, which is reasonable in many cases, can result in a significantly lower monthly payment. This doesn't even take into account any trade-in value that may also be used to lower the monthly payment even further."

Headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio, Swapalease.com is the world’s largest automotive lease marketplace and the pioneer in facilitating lease transfers online. More specifically Swapalease.com matches individuals who want to get out of their lease with people who are looking for short-term lease agreements. Prospective buyers can search the listings for the exact vehicle they want, and then register for a nominal fee, allowing them to use Swapalease.com’s safe online system to contact the prospective seller and close the deal.