EZ Desking Worksheets: Cash, Finance and Lease Pencils

One worksheet per deal, three tabs, the same math on the floor, at the desk and on the sheet the customer takes home.

EZ Desking turns the lead you are already working in LeadLocate CRM into a structured deal: cash, finance or lease, with the taxes, fees, trade and payment worked out on one screen and carried onto a customer sheet that reads exactly the same. That is the whole job, and it is worth being plain about it, because desking is the point where most stores still leave the CRM, open a spreadsheet or a separate desking product, retype the customer and the unit, and lose the thread between the conversation and the numbers.

The worksheet lives on the deal itself. Every deal in the Desking menu opens with the same tabs: Cash, Finance, Lease and Acquisition for the days you are buying the customer's car rather than selling one. The field set is universal, so a car store, an RV lot, a powersports dealer, a marine dealer, a buy here pay here operation and a fleet desk all work the same worksheet with the fields their unit needs. The dealership desking software page covers why desking belongs next to the CRM in general; this page is about the tool itself, using the labels you see on screen.

Picture the busiest hour of the week. A salesperson has a couple at the desk who like a crossover and are talking about a payment, not a price. The manager opens the lead, clicks Start New Deal, and the customer, co-buyer and unit are already on the worksheet because they came off the lead record. He types the VIN into the top bar, clicks Decode, and year, make, model and trim fill in. He adds the trade with its allowance and payoff, picks the term, and the Finance Deal Summary on the right updates as he types.

The couple want to see options, not one number. He expands the Multi-Pencil Grid, which lays out three down payments across three terms by default, each cell a real payment with its own rate row, and turns the screen toward them. They point at the middle cell and say the payment is close but not there. He opens Goal-Seek Desking, enters the payment they want to hit, and the solver tells him what down payment or selling price gets there. Two minutes later he prints a customer sheet, they initial it, and the salesperson walks it to finance. No spreadsheet, no calculator app, no second system, and the deal is saved against the lead with a status the whole store can see.

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On the desktop CRM, Desking is a main menu item alongside Leads, Contacts, Inventory and Messaging. It opens the deal list, and each deal opens the digital deal view with the worksheet, the customer chat panel, the Road to Sale checklist and the deal jacket on one page. A deal can also be started from a lead card or from the Unit field on a lead, which is how most deals begin: the customer asked about a specific vehicle, so the deal starts with that vehicle already on it.

The Dealership Profile page holds the defaults for the whole store, and it is where a manager sets the store up once. The mobile app carries Deal Tracker as its own screen, with the deal list, deal statuses like Negotiating, In Financing, Deal Sent and SOLD, the deal jacket and the customer chat, so a manager who is off the lot can still see where a deal stands and answer a question. The LeadLocate mobile app page describes the rest of the phone experience.

Desking software is judged by the edge cases, so here are the ones EZ Desking is built for. Sales tax comes from a 50 state tax matrix rather than one flat rate you remember to change, with a State Tax Setup Helper in the profile for stores that sell across a state line. Trade credit is applied by the method your state uses: credit on the full trade allowance, credit on net trade equity only, or no trade tax credit, and a Trade Credit Cap can be set on the deal for states that limit it. Negative equity is taxed where it should be.

Payment frequency covers monthly, weekly, biweekly and semimonthly, which matters to buy here pay here desks and to any store whose customers are paid twice a month. Leases carry their own tab with residual as a percent of MSRP, money factor, annual mileage allowance, excess mileage rate, disposition and purchase option fees, security deposit and a choice of three Lease Tax Method treatments, including tax on the monthly payment and upfront methods for the states that require them. Finance deals carry an External Financing option for the customer bringing their own bank or credit union, a Finance Reserve / Rate Spread line, a Good-Through Date, and a Deal Profit & Loss worksheet a manager can print on one page. Factory and dealer cash incentives sit on the worksheet, and the incentives showroom inside the deal view shows the current OEM programs for the make so the manager is not looking them up in another tab.

The reason a desk feels slow is usually that every worksheet starts blank. EZ Desking centralizes deal defaults in the Dealership Profile: default sales tax rate, dealer fees and DMV fees with their taxable flags, loan defaults such as APR, buy rate, days to first payment and down payment, lease program defaults such as lease type, residual percent, money factor, mileage and the fee schedule, the Default Pay Frequency, the default active tab, and the Pencil Grid Defaults for how many down payment columns and term rows the grid opens with. There is a separate set of Acquisition Workflow Defaults for stores that buy cars from the public.

Vehicle defaults apply to every sale pane, so a marine dealer and a car dealer each see the defaults that fit their unit. A manager changes a fee once and every new worksheet in the store carries it. When a state changes a rate, one edit fixes every pencil written after it. This is the difference between a worksheet and a calculator: a calculator is right when the person using it remembers everything, and a worksheet is right because the store already told it what to remember.

Most stores desk in one of three ways: a spreadsheet somebody built years ago, a standalone desking product billed per rooftop, or the desking screen inside a DMS that only the finance office can reach. Each one has the same weakness. The salesperson's conversation happens in the CRM and the numbers happen somewhere else, so the worksheet never knows who the customer is, the CRM never knows what was quoted, and the manager rebuilds context every time a customer comes back.

EZ Desking is part of the LeadLocate CRM subscription, not a separate line item. The deal is attached to the lead, the quoted numbers are on the deal history, and the customer sheet, the deal page, the chat and the deal jacket all hang off the same record. For the stores that already have a DMS, the DMS keeps doing what a DMS does; EZ Desking is where the deal is structured and presented before it gets there. Plans start month to month, and the pricing page lists them, including CRM Only for a store that wants the software without lead delivery.

A worksheet is a selling document, and selling documents get read by people other than the customer later. EZ Desking prints every customer sheet with one consistent disclaimer that opens by saying it is not a contract and that all figures are estimates until final lender approval, followed by the liability text and the name of the person who prepared it. Displayed odometer values on customer sheets carry a footnote marker so a printed mileage is never mistaken for a certified one. The payment range sheets deliberately show a band rather than a single committed rate for conversations that happen before the credit tier is known.

The store-level Worksheet disclaimer is editable, so your own language goes on your sheets. Each worksheet carries a Worksheet ID, the deal keeps a history with a verification trail, and a shared sheet that has been superseded tells the reader it is no longer current. None of that makes a store compliant on its own; it gives the store a record of exactly what was shown, when and by whom, which is what a compliance program actually needs from a desking tool.

There is nothing to turn on. EZ Desking is live in every LeadLocate CRM account from the first login. The practical first step is the Dealership Profile: enter the store's tax rate, fees and defaults, choose the default tab, and set the pencil grid the way your desk likes to present. After that, a deal starts from any lead with Start New Deal. If you want to see it worked before you sign up, the pre-recorded live demo shows a lead becoming a desked deal.

Pair it with the rest of the deal tools it was built beside. The pencil recap sheets share any of the customer print versions as a link the customer can open, mark up and sign. The customer deal pages put the structured deal on a branded page the customer unlocks with a texted passcode. The Road to Sale checklist tracks the deal from vehicle selection through delivery, and a worksheet can be pushed into SecureWebX so the finance office works the credit application with the same numbers. The full list is on the all features page.

Does EZ Desking handle leases as well as cash and finance deals?

Yes. The worksheet has Cash, Finance, Lease and Acquisition tabs. The lease tab carries residual, money factor, mileage allowance, excess mileage rate, fees, security deposit and a choice of three lease tax methods, and lease defaults are set once in the Dealership Profile.

What is the Multi-Pencil Grid?

A grid of real payments across several down payments and terms, three by three by default, with a rate row per term and optional per cell rate ranges. It is the screen you turn toward the customer when they want options instead of one number.

What does Goal-Seek Desking do?

It works backwards from the payment the customer wants. Enter the target and the solver tells you what selling price or down payment reaches it under the current structure, so the manager can answer the payment question with a number instead of a guess.

Does it know my state sales tax and trade credit rules?

It uses a 50 state tax matrix, applies trade credit on the full allowance, on net equity only, or not at all depending on the state, supports a trade credit cap on the deal, and taxes negative equity where required. A State Tax Setup Helper in the profile handles the details.

Can a salesperson desk from a phone?

The LeadLocate mobile app carries Deal Tracker with the deal list, statuses, deal jacket and customer chat, so a deal can be checked and worked from the lot. The full worksheet with the pencil grid and goal seek is built for the desktop screen.

Is desking an add on or part of the CRM?

It is part of every LeadLocate CRM plan, including CRM Only. No inventory feed or DMS is required to use it, which is why auto brokers and independent stores can desk deals the first day.

EZ Desking is included with every LeadLocate CRM plan, month to month. Set your store defaults once and pencil cash, finance and lease deals from the lead you are already working.

Prefer to talk right now? Call or text 844-376-2274.