LIMS407

Good evening everyone,

Is there a way out of current lease and able to buy any other car?
I am currently leasing a 2020 ES350 and wanted to upgrade to used LC500.
Still have two years left on the lease but received some feedback that dealership might able to buy my car out and offer the deal on the used car.

Wanted to know if this is even a possibility and please let me know if this isn't the right thread to be posted.
If it makes any difference, I am a royal Lexus customer as this is my fifth vehicles through Lexus financials since 2012.

RNM GS3

You can do it but you will lose a lot of money.

Not sure on Lexus policy for lease transfers but you have to put the car on Swapalease and incentivize someone to take your used car vs leasing a new one.

Fizzboy7

All dealers will offer or promise to get you out of your lease, but it is all to their advantage. You will pay dearly to terminate that early. Also, you are better off not negotiating based on monthly payments. This is where the dealer hides his profit. I'd wait a bit longer if you can, when you have more of the lease paid off.

Wandl

THIS

Every dealer will be incentivized to move units (i.e. sell you another car), there are instances where you could end up ahead on your lease terms and not lose money (or lose much), but assuming you leased this in the past 12-14 months, you may be underwater on getting out of the lease. Certainly no harm checking with them though!

arentz07

If my car buying experience has shown me anything, it's that waiting it out is usually a good strategy. I was unhappy in my 2015 Camry and was upside down into my lease on my IS 300 AWD. I was unhappy in my GTI (well, more like, I loved driving it but worried it was slowly breaking) and slightly upside down on my GLI now. I probably could have gotten something nicer if I wasn't upside down.

I'm kinda in that mode of "waitiing" now though... Since I only have one car payment at the moment, trying to save up a little for the downpayment on the next one!

bitkahuna

iTrader: (20)

Maybe you could find someone to take over the ES lease.
right now you're obligated to all the remaining payments on the lease. So if lease payment is $500 for example, and you have 2 years, that's $12,000. Since an LC (even used) is not an inexpensive vehicle, maybe that amount doesn't scare you. If the dealer had a used one for say $80K you'd be looking at $92K to get it and get out of the lease. Maybe the dealer can sell the ES and make some money and discount the LC some, so maybe you'd only lose half the $12K or $6K? In the end it all depends what you want to spend and how bad you want to do this.

flipside909

You're going to take a hit unless you can find someone that is qualified to take over your lease.

If you turn in your lease now, it will be treated as a trade in. Find out what your current pay off is and what the current market value for your car. Get quotes from CarMax and Carvana to compare. If you're willing to take the hit with negative equity, it may be worth going for.

Good luck!

SW17LS

Lexus makes lease transfers very difficult.

What you need to do is get a payoff from LFS, and trade or sell it for as close to that as you can.

LIMS407

Thanks for all replies and feedback.
Contacted LFS and advised that my payout is 36k out of my lease and dealer offered me trade-in as 34k.
Really not bad considering the situation and hopefully I can get a great deal out of LC soon.

mmarshall

I agree that the current laws and policies on leasing are very strict...perhaps too strict. It's possible that perhaps (?) some laws should be changed to make it a little easier for people who have Leaser's Remorse to get out of the contract and into a different vehicle...but that discussion may go beyond the scope of this thread.

The argument that people need to know just what they are leasing is indeed a valid one....and I agree with that. But, like it or not, circumstances sometimes come up where you find out things about the vehicle that you didn't on the initial inspection or test-drive.

stasek

Did you try the likes of Carvana, Vroom, Carmax etc???? Considering the wacky used car market, it’s not unusual for people to have positive equity in their leased cars.

FWIW, here’s MMR for a base ES350....

swajames

I agree with the advice to get a price from Vroom and Carvana etc. inventory is tight at the minute, new and used, and pricing reflects that. Been looking at a Land Rover defender recently, and both Vroom and Carvana both offered more than I was expecting for one of my cars. Vroom was highest. A few thousand more than the dealer offered as a trade in.

bitkahuna

iTrader: (20)

that honestly seems like a fantastic deal, and i can certainly recommend getting an LC, it's just awesome!
just don't expect the room of the ES

SW17LS

Sorry, its not the manufacturer of the lender's responsibility to subsidize people making bad choices for themselves. Leasing is like any other sort of financing, theres a payoff and if you want to get out, you sell/trade the car and pay it off.

mmarshall

Well, if you have Buyer's Remorse, you can trade in your car any time you want....I've heard, in extreme cases, of people doing it in as little as two weeks. Of course, you take a bath in depreciation if it is early in the vehicle's lifetime.....the heaviest depreciation is in the first year, and the first three years in general. So why should it be any different with a lease?