New car and considering buying or lease

[Christian85]

Hi peeps, the misses has just got a new job and subsequently loses her company car, I've always used that so we now need to get a new car, we are saving at the moment so don't want to splash out a big lump sum on a second hand car, this has led us to either purchasing a new car or leasing one. We will probably keep the car for up to 4 years, we are looking at lease deals and are not sure because of the length of time we will have the car for it would be more feasible to buy a new one. Has anyone got any input or experience in this? Will we get a better deal purchasing from a dealer I.e servicing, better spec and haggling on price?
If we were to lease our budget would be maximum £250 a month with 10k miles a year. Cars we are looking at are Polos, A1's or a Fiat 500 Abarth (she mentioned a 500 but that's the only one I am wiling to get).

Thanks for all your advice and input. Christian.

[OldBuoy]

Two ways of doing this.

Have a car in mind and shop for the best deal.
Have an open mind about about the car and shop for the best car in budget.

Manufactures periodically support models so you don't always get the best deal on your preferred car.

Look @ the whole "life" cost of the car (i.e. deposit+payments+running costs i.e car "x" may cost £6700 over 2 yrs and car "y" may cost £7100 is it worth £400 more?) to compare lease deals.