See this sweet little honey? That’s right, it’s available on the Mercedes-Benz Century City’s dealership page on 7days. You know all about 7days – it’s that excellent Cape start up nailing the way people buy cars. If you’re ready to buy this thing, you should know that you’ll be paying way, way less for your installment than your mate who drives a Toyota, and it’s thanks to this genius finance plan.

Agility is a specialised vehicle financial programme from Mercedes-Benz Financial. It’s geared at getting more cars sold by offering customers a price plan where they pay less on monthly installments with three options at the end of the agreement to settle the remaining balance.

So how does it work?

Mercedes-Benz Agility is a type of vehicle finance known as the personal contract plan (PCP). If you’re wondering how you can possibly be paying less on monthly payments, especially with Mercedes-Benz products, here’s a breakdown about how PCPs like Mercedes-Benz Agility work.

When you apply for vehicle finance with Agility, Mercedes-Benz will calculate a predicted minimal value for your car at the end of the agreement. This is the fundamental factor in PCP. The deposit you then make and following monthly instalments you pay for are for the difference between this predicted minimal value and the actual price of the car. This means that you can pay less on the deposit and on monthly payments.

The deal is really about the value of the car, so the length of the agreement is 36 months or 3 years rather than 4 or 5. This is becauseMercedes-Benz has calculated that the market value of the car will not have depreciated a lot over 3 years.

The benefit of the predicted minimal value – which upon the signing of the contract becomes guaranteed minimal value (GMV) – is that it tells you exactly what you would have to pay when you have to settle the outstanding amount after the agreement has ended.

The best part of the GMV is that at the end of the agreement you have a few choices to settle the remaining amount. If you want to keep the car, you could pay it off in monthly instalments, but at normal rates instead of the PCP rates.

You could give the car back. At the end of the agreement the car’s market value should correspond with the GMV. That means that giving the car back would take care of the outstanding balance.

The final option would be to use the car as a trade-in to buy another car. Should you buy a car that is not much more than the GMV of your current car, Mercedes-Benz will pay the amount of the GMV while you will then pay off the remaining amount. This final option would suit Mercedes-Benz just fine because you could take out another PCP.

So many options…

When applying for Agility finance you will be offered a contract that suits your financial constraints plus at the end of the agreement you’re getting more than one option of how to finalise the agreement.

Lekker, ne? Check out 7days, here.