Pleasanton 335

Any suggestions on the best way to get out of a lease early?

cpayne

They might buy out your lease stright up...in fact I went traded in my 2001 S4 for a 92 UrS4 and actually got about $1500 out of the deal. You never know..good luck

GrandPaJohn

Go park it in NJ.

davematthews-S4

hows that UrS4 going?

JasonS4+Festicle

what you need to do is basically buy the car. There is always a buy-out price at any point in the lease - just like when you finance. Depending on how much time you have left in the lease will determine how much your buy-out is...also has something to do residuals. So, you take the car and find out what it is worth....then find out your buy-out - the difference is your "penalty". If you have low miles and leased the car at a good price you might not be upside down....usually you will be. If your trading out of the lease however, you can apply the "trade-in" value to a sort-of downpayment and save some money in taxes on the new car. For example, if your buy-out is currently $32,000 and the car is worth 28,000 you have a $4000 "penalty" to get out of it...this can be rolled into a new payment on a new car. The problem is, if you're trying to trade-down into a cheaper car and you're financing (or leasing) you end up paying interest on that penalty...then your monthyl payment might end up being the same. Let's say you are paying $600/month now and look to get a cheaper car - 25,000 for example...at today's cheap rates you may be able to get 0% - so on a 25,000 car at 0% over 48months...by the time you add taxes and the $4000 in "penalty" your payment could actually be more ($25,000+1500tax+4000penalty = 30,500/48 = $635/month) - if you're going for a more expensive car it obviously will not matter much financially to you...so the penalty is not that big of a deal. You can also try to have someone take over you lease payments until the lease is over. My experience is that is always costs money to "get out" of a lease....when you lease you can actually treat the car as if you own it (as far as trading in goes) because there is always a buy-out at any point. The problem is, most people do no money down leases and are very very upside down (owe way more than the car is worth)

davematthews-S4

what if you want to go from leasing to buying the car (financing) is that an option?

JasonS4+Festicle

tell them you want to buy your car..you will need to complete a buy-out package (although if you trade for something you do not need to do this) - depending on which state you live in you will need to pay taxes...I only say this because in Illinois, when you lease, you pay tax on the ENTIRE car up front, then, when you buy it out you pay tax AGAIN on the buy-out...kind of screwy but this is what they do. In states where you only pay a usage tax (like in Wisconsin) - you still pay sales tax on the entire car buy for the time you've been leasing you only have paid tax on what you've used...you follow me?

Andy Hedin

Can probably get a conventional loan for the amount "owed" on the lease.

JasonS4+Festicle

that is, you car's buy-out is more than the actual value (which is really not that terrible of a thing if you've owned it since day 1 and know how it's been treated) you will prob not be able to finance the entire thing because a bank will not loan you more than the car is worth...although, there are exceptions (based on credit I think) - I went in to buy a Nissan Maxima (mid-lease) - I was leasing from NMAC (Nissan Motors) - I literally just showed up at a random Nissan dealer (not where I bought the car because it was far from my home) - I said I'd like to buy my car off the lease...1 hour later I left..payment went up like $30/month but I had 2 yrs left on the lease. Anyway, the finance guy told me NMAC would never let me do this no money down because of what I mentioned above (no loan for more than a car is worth) - I said I have good credit - he argued with me and said I need to put down like $4000 - I said no, run my credit and submit the financing to NMAC on my car with taxes - NO MONEY down...he came back 15min later and said, "Oh, I guess they will do that" - I have no idea how they do this..I think if you have good credit and are asking for more than the car is worth - they will do it, because they are charging you interest and making more money.

No More B5 S4

True dat playa, playa.