$250 to dispose of your vehicle, $1000 for extra miles you put on the clock and $200 to replace the light bulb and the worn tyres-lease agents constantly nickel-and-dime consumers when their lease runs out.

Here's a rundown of what can trigger those fees, and some steps to take in self-defense.

For auto-consumers, crunching the numbers is one of the most difficult and confusing aspects of leasing. Take the finance charge on a lease for instance. Most people just don't understand how this is calculated on capitalised cost AND residual value instead of just the capitalised cost. For most, it seems plainly obvious, just as is the case when purchasing, that a charge should be levied on the capitalised cost of the vehicle.

When leasing a car, it's easier to stick with the same company for your auto insurance. What you don't know, however, is that you may end up paying too much for your coverage and it's better to look elsewhere for lower rates.

When you lease, the vehicle that you will drive belongs to the leasing company. They want to make sure that their investment is covered in the event the vehicle gets damaged, totalled or stolen. They typically want to get covered for the difference between what your auto-insurer pays and your outstanding leasing obligations at the time of the accident or damage. This is called GAP, short for Guaranteed Auto Protection, and is usually included in the leasing contract. If your leasing company is called BMW Financial Services, Chrysler Financial or any other finance division of an automaker, then chances are your GAP insurance will be offered by the same lease company.

Leasing a used vehicle can be an attractive deal in many ways, no least getting you into that luxury model or SUV, for lower monthly payments than a brand new one. Be prepared, however, to do some more homework to dissect a good deal.

Some people would rather lease than buy, and there are as many reasons to lease as there are not to. Buying a car costs a lot of money, and you have no restrictions on mileage or anything else, but a lease is really just a way of renting a car for a long time. If you are worried that your car will not be worth much by the time it is paid off, or if you just have new car fever and cannot commit to one car for several years, leasing might be your thing. With a lease, the dealer basically sells the car to a leasing company, who collect the payments from you and at the end of the agreement, the leasing company can then sell the car to someone else. Almost all of the time though, the lease agreement will be between you and the dealer, that is, you will not have to communicate directly with the company providing the lease.

In order to get a good leasing deal, you need to understand leasing jargon. Read through this leasing glossary to get an overview of the basics:

Acquisition fee: A fee charged by a leasing company to begin a lease. Not all leasing companies charge an acquisition fee but if charge it starts at about $300 and is seldom negotiable.

Capitalised cost: The total selling price of the leased vehicle This also accounts for taxes, title, license fees, acquisition fee and any optional insurance and warranty items you elect to fold into the lease and pay overtime rather than upfront.

When it comes to ultra-luxury, high-end vehicle leasing, there is no doubt that the best deals are those cars that hold their value. With this in mind, we single out a few truths about residual values that consistently apply to high-end leasing.

The most determining factor when it comes to resale values is public perception of the brand, not its reliability ratings in quality surveys. Take the Jaguar for example: it is consistently rated as a quality car, but because of questionable reliability perception among the public, it takes a sharp dip in value at the end of its lease-term

You've come to the end of your lease and you like you car enough you want to keep it in the driveway. Just like buying a used car, there is some research to be done to nail a good deal.

To lease, you have two possible choices: either lease through a dealer's finance source or through an independent lease company. A conventional dealer has a captive finance source, which can be the car manufacturer's financial company, such as BMW Financial Services, Honda Motor Credit or General Motors Acceptance Corporation (GMAC), or a major national bank such as Chase Manhattan. Independent lease companies are no financial obligation to any single one manufacturer financing source, but work with dealers anywhere in the country.

So which one is better?

A prepaid lease is a new type of lease which has made its foray into the market in recent times. In this lease, consumers forego the cycle of lease payments if they make a large payment at the beginning of the lease.

There are two amounts in a conventional lease that incur charges and determine your monthly lease payments. First, there is a depreciation charge which accounts for the value the car loses during the lease term. Second is a residual amount which is the projected value of the vehicle at the end of the lease. The sum of these two charges gives the monthly payments on your lease.The idea behind a pre-paid lease is to eliminate the finance charges for depreciation and only account for residual value charges in a single, pre-paid payment at the beginning of the lease.