BAD CREDIT CAR LEASING
Bad credit car leasing
If you've been turned down by the mainstream leasing companies, it usually isn't because you can't afford the car. It's because a computer never got as far as asking.
£299 to £399
a month, inc VAT
3 months
rental up front
36 months
road tax included
10,000
miles a year
Fresh Start arranges car leases for people with CCJs, defaults, an IVA, a debt management plan, or a bankruptcy behind them. Our lending partner works the other way round from the big brokers: they read three months of your bank statements first, and only run a credit check if the affordability side already stacks up.
This page explains exactly how that works, what you'll need, and who we can't help.
The short version
- Most cars are between £300 and £400 a month, including VAT and road tax. Occasionally something comes in below that.
- You pay the first three months up front, somewhere between £900 and £1,200 depending on the car. There's no no-deposit option.
- You need income from work. £1,500 a month minimum after tax, and realistically £2,000 is where it starts working properly.
- Your bank statements are read before any credit check happens.
- Past problems are fine. Current ones usually aren't.
What "bad credit" actually covers
People arrive here having been told they have bad credit without ever being told what that means. In practice it's one or more of:
- CCJs: county court judgments, satisfied or otherwise
- Defaults on a credit agreement
- Missed or late payments on your file
- A debt management plan, ongoing or completed
- An IVA, in progress or finished
- A bankruptcy, once you've been discharged
- A thin file: no real credit history at all, which mainstream lenders treat almost as badly as a poor one
We can work with all of those. What we can't work with is trouble that's happening right now. See "When we can't help" further down.
Why the mainstream companies say no
It's worth understanding, because it explains why your situation isn't as hopeless as they made it feel.
A large leasing broker will typically pass your application to a panel of funders, who score it automatically. That score is built from your credit file (the number of searches, the age of your accounts, whether anything has ever gone wrong) and it produces a yes or a no in seconds. Nobody reads anything. Nobody looks at what you actually earn or what you actually spend.
That system works perfectly well for someone with a clean file. For everyone else it's a blunt instrument. A single CCJ from four years ago, long since settled, can outweigh three years of steady wages and never missing a payment since.
The funders behind those panels also set the criteria, and most of them simply don't want adverse credit at any price. So the broker isn't necessarily judging you; often they've got nowhere to place you.
Specialist lessors like ours work differently because they own their cars outright rather than borrowing against a funder's criteria. That means a person can make the decision instead of an algorithm.
How the decision actually gets made
Three months of bank statements, read by an underwriter, before any credit check.
He's answering one question: would these payments sit comfortably alongside everything else this person already pays?
Not "is their score high enough". Not "have they ever had a problem". Whether the money is genuinely there, month after month, once everything else has gone out.
There's no formula and no pass mark. He's looking at what actually leaves your account each month (rent or mortgage, bills, food, fuel, anything you're already repaying) and whether there is comfortably enough left over to cover the car on top. If there is, the credit file becomes a much smaller part of the conversation.
What else he's looking at
The arithmetic is most of it, but not all. On the statements he'll also notice:
- Returned or bounced direct debits. More than the occasional one is the single biggest reason an application doesn't go further.
- How steady the income is. Regular wages from the same employer read very differently from income that swings around month to month.
- Whether payday lending is in the picture, and how recently.
- Regular gambling transactions, which most lenders treat as a problem regardless of the rest. Worth knowing before you send anything rather than after.
None of that is a character test. It's the same question in a different form: is the money reliably there?
What you'll need
The first three months up front. Somewhere between £900 and £1,200, depending on the car. There's no version of this without it.
Income from work. Employed or self-employed. £1,500 a month after tax is the floor; £2,000 and above is where it starts working comfortably. Benefits, child benefit and other regular income all count, but on top of earned income, not instead of it.
Payments up to date right now. Not behind, not in arrears, no bounced direct debits over the last few months.
Three months of bank statements: full statements, every page, as PDFs from your banking app, for the account your wages are paid into.
A photo of your driving licence, front and back.
A full UK driving licence and an address in mainland England or Wales. Scotland isn't impossible, but ask before you apply.
That's it. No payslips at this stage, no proof of address, no three years of employment history. Those come later, and only if the affordability works.
What it costs
Ordinary, practical cars: hatchbacks and small SUVs, two to three years old, with mileage already on them. Most sit between £300 and £400 a month.
These are examples from recent stock. Cars and prices change every week, so check the current list for what's actually available today.
| Car | Per month | To start | Total over 36 months |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fiat 500 | £313 | £939 | £11,268 |
| MG ZS | £319 | £957 | £11,484 |
| Vauxhall Corsa | £329 | £987 | £11,844 |
| Citroen C3 | £329 | £987 | £11,844 |
| Nissan Juke | £349 | £1,047 | £12,564 |
| Peugeot 2008 | £389 | £1,167 | £14,004 |
Every price includes VAT. Road tax is included for the three years at today's rates, and delivery and collection are free. Servicing, tyres, MOT and insurance are down to you. The mileage limit is 10,000 a year, 30,000 over the three years, and going over costs extra per mile.
At the end you hand the car back. There's no option to buy it.
Insurance: the cost people forget
You'll need fully comprehensive insurance for the whole agreement. That's a condition of every lease, not something we've added.
It's worth getting a couple of quotes before you apply rather than after. Two reasons. Insurance on a two-year-old car is usually more than on the ten-year-old one you might be replacing. And if you pay monthly rather than annually, most insurers run a credit check to set that up, which means the same credit history that brought you to this page can push the monthly premium up, or occasionally rule it out.
Nobody else in this corner of the market mentions this, and it catches people out. Five minutes on a comparison site before you apply will tell you what you're really committing to.
Leasing or buying on finance?
Plenty of people arrive here not minding which. They want a car for a monthly payment. It's worth understanding the difference, because one of them will suit you better.
| Comparison | Leasing | Buying on finance |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly cost, same car | Usually lower | Usually higher |
| At the end | You hand it back | It's yours |
| Mileage | Capped, extra miles charged | Drive what you like |
| Condition | Charged for damage beyond fair wear and tear | Your car, your problem |
| If values crash | Not your risk | Your risk |
| Getting approved with poor credit | Specialist lessors will look at affordability | Depends heavily on the lender |
Leasing suits you if you want the lowest monthly payment for a decent car, you do ordinary mileage, and you don't mind not owning it.
Buying suits you better if you cover big miles, you want something to show for the payments at the end, or you're likely to want to sell it partway through.
We only do leasing. If buying is genuinely what you need, we'd rather tell you now than take you through an application for the wrong product.
If things go wrong later
Nobody likes thinking about this at the start, but you're taking on three years and things happen.
Tell them as soon as you know. If you lose your job, your hours get cut, or you can see a problem coming, contact the leasing company straight away. Do it before you miss a payment, not after.
Lenders and leasing companies are required to treat customers in financial difficulty fairly, and to try to find a way through. What that looks like varies: it's genuinely case by case and depends on your situation and theirs. We can't promise you what any lender would agree to, and you should be wary of anyone who does.
What we can tell you is that the outcome is almost always better for people who pick up the phone early. Burying your head and hoping it goes away is the one approach that reliably makes things worse.
Free, independent help is available from MoneyHelper (moneyhelper.org.uk) and StepChange (stepchange.org), and it's worth talking to them at the same time.
Your situation
CCJs. One or two are fine, particularly where there's a payment plan and you've stuck to it, which reads as a credit positive rather than a negative. Several recent ones are a different matter. More on leasing with a CCJ →
An IVA. Some of the work our lending partner does most. You'll need your Insolvency Practitioner's agreement, and the order in which that happens matters. More on leasing with an IVA →
Bankruptcy. Fine once you've been discharged, usually twelve months after the order. While it's still running, you can't take on a lease at all. More on leasing after bankruptcy →
A debt management plan. Workable, as long as you're keeping to it and the new payment genuinely fits alongside the plan.
Defaults and missed payments. Common, and rarely the thing that stops an application on its own.
No credit history at all. New to the UK, never borrowed, always paid cash. Mainstream lenders find this almost as difficult as a poor file. We don't. The bank statements tell us what we need.
Applying as a business. New companies without filed accounts, and directors whose own credit file is getting in the way. More on non status car leasing →
When we can't help
We'd rather put this on the page than find out after you've sent us your bank statements.
- You can't cover the first three months up front. There is no no-deposit option, and there never will be.
- Your income is from benefits or other sources only. There has to be earned income alongside it.
- You're behind on payments right now, or direct debits are bouncing.
- You drive more than 12,000 miles a year. The excess mileage would cost you more than the car is worth to you.
- You've been declared bankrupt and haven't been discharged yet.
- You've several recent CCJs. Two from a bad patch four years ago is one thing. Five in the last eighteen months is another.
If that's you today, it may not be you in a year. Come back to us.
Five things you've probably been told that aren't true
"There's such a thing as no credit check car leasing."
There isn't, in the way it's usually sold. Almost anyone handing over a car worth thousands of pounds wants to know something about who they're giving it to. Where a company genuinely doesn't check, the risk is normally priced into what you pay. See our page on no credit check car leasing.
"You'll need a guarantor."
Not with us. We don't arrange guarantor agreements, and you don't need someone else to sign for you.
"Leasing works out more expensive."
Not usually, month to month, for the same car. You're paying for the use of it rather than the whole value, which is why the monthly figure is lower. What you don't get is anything to show for it at the end.
"A CCJ means an automatic no."
It doesn't. One or two, especially with a payment plan you've kept to, often read as a positive: someone who had a problem and dealt with it. Several recent ones are a different matter.
"Applying will damage your credit score."
Not at the first stage. Nothing touches your file while your affordability is being assessed. The credit search only happens later, and only if things already look positive, and we tell you before it does.
Questions people ask
Find out where you stand
It takes about five minutes, and nothing touches your credit file. If we can't help, we'll tell you why.
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