Renting, Buying & Leasing a Car

The Truth About Cars in Denmark
Cars in Denmark are very, very expensive. If you think ‘This can't be, I will find a cheap solution!’ – just like I did when I arrived – we recommend you to save your calories. Cars in Denmark are very, very expensive.

Here are some options you might want to look into.

Leasing
Generally, leasing is the most used way to have a car. All car brands have selected ‘private leasing’ offers which typically run 36 months with an initial down payment along with monthly rates. Depending on size, model and make of the car the monthly rates are between around 2,500 to 7,000 DKK/month. Luxury cars such as BMWs, Mercs or the like will be substantially more. A disadvantage is that you won’t be able to buy the car at the end of the lease.

Another option in ‘flex leasing’. The difference to ‘private leasing’ is that most offers are based on used cars. While down payments and monthly rates are similar to ‘private leasing’, though the selection of cars is a lot wider (many many websites available if you google it) and the cars tend to be a bit bigger and more upmarket. The key advantage though is that typically these agreements run for only 12 or 24 months.

Car hire / Mobility service
Hire car companies such as http://www.sixt.dk offer ‘long term car hire’ for up to 12 months. This is probably the cheapest option you might find for mini and compact city cars. Again, larger cars tend to be more expensive. No real disadvantages exist, though the selection of cars and equipment (eg. automatic transmission) is limited for the best-value options.

Another new option is ‘mobility service’ such as http://www.dribe.dk. This is a mixture of car hire and subscription-based mobility services. With dribe there is a monthly fee of 449 DKK per month for the first 6 months and then all cars which are displayed on offer in the app are available to rent either on a monthly basis or even daily basis. All cars are VW Group cars ranging from VW, Skoda, Seat to Porsche and Audi. A VW Golf is around 5,000 DKK per month, a Skoda Citi Go is around 3,200 DKK per month (March 2019), which isn’t cheap cheap but not a lot more than normal leasing. The main advantage is flexibility! During summer months you may decide not have a car at all, so you can maybe save one or two months. If you normally need a small car to get around, but on a given day you need a bigger car you just book this for the day and swap.

Next to having a permanent car there is ‘green mobility’ also called ‘bybil’. This is a classic car sharing scheme with 400 electric Renaults across Copenhagen. At present its superior to other offers as it has a larger area where it is active – particularly to the north towards Gentofte, Hellerup and Klampenborg. There is no monthly or membership fee. A typical journey from eg. Hellerup to CPH city centre is about 140 DKK, plus it saves on parking as ‘bybil’ has preferential arrangements.

Buying a car
Doesn’t matter how you turn it: it is very expensive! The only reason to buy a car in Denmark could be if you are taking it with you when you move away from Denmark after only a few years. Why is that? A special tax makes cars very expensive. This 150% tax on the car dealers selling price (yes, 150%!!) can be reclaimed pro-rata when you leave the country. Due to the high tax burden, car dealer prices in Denmark actually range among the lowest in Europe (go figure!) which may give you an advantage when you reclaim tax in Denmark and import into another country without this car tax and lower VAT. It still is a load of cash to put into a car.