Mercedes Ended Lease Early--No Catches

[CarbonSteel]

Mercedes reached out to me to offer to take our C300 back early with no disposition fee and no further payments (about 7 months early). When I arrived at the dealership to turn it in, I saw why. Very minimal stock on the lot and the vast majority of that was previously leased vehicles. I was happy to hand them the keys and save a few dollars--it helped me because it was one less thing to have to move.

With the youngest in military college, the Challenger does not have a driver, so my wife will drive it until sometime in the spring when we may go car shopping again if things have settled down at that point.

Anyone else have a similar experience on a lease car?

 

[WylieCoyote]

My boss's lease is up on his Infiniti in December. The dealership acts as if they're dying for him to return it, but he wants to buy it, because they don't make the Q70 anymore. They're in for a big disappointment in a few weeks.

 

[mk378]

The lease contract allows a buy-out for the remaining payments (if any) plus the pre-set Residual Value. The contract being written back before used car prices went sky-high, the Residual Value was supposed to be about equal to the expected value as a three year old used car. Now it is possible to trade in for much more than the Residual Value, so the customer is at an advantage.

 

[mightymousetech]

Ya, almost nobody is returning leases right now. Vehicles are currently worth significantly more than residual. Easy flip to make some cash if buying another car.

 

[b_b]

I dont like the idea of leases, it incentives manufactures to build vehicle to only be reliable for five years and then turn to junk. if everyone bought something and drove it for ten years, manufacturers would be in a competition to built the most reliable vehicle because thats what people would value.

 

[BMWTurboDzl]

Mercedes reached out to me to offer to take our C300 back early with no disposition fee and no further payments (about 7 months early). When I arrived at the dealership to turn it in, I saw why. Very minimal stock on the lot and the vast majority of that was previously leased vehicles. I was happy to hand them the keys and save a few dollars--it helped me because it was one less thing to have to move.

With the youngest in military college, the Challenger does not have a driver, so my wife will drive it until sometime in the spring when we may go car shopping again if things have settled down at that point.

Anyone else have a similar experience on a lease car?

We can sell my wife's C300 Coupe to a Mercedes dealership and actually make some $$, however unlike you we don't have an extra car for her to drive around and we don't want to become a 1-car household.

 

[BMWTurboDzl]

I dont like the idea of leases, it incentives manufactures to build vehicle to only be reliable for five years and then turn to junk. if everyone bought something and drove it for ten years, manufacturers would be in a competition to built the most reliable vehicle because thats what people would value.

Cars are way more reliable today than decades or years ago. The issue is that they're expensive to diagnosis and repair when they break and they're not as forgiving for half@ss repairs. For me personally it's the mentality that some people figuratively believe a vehicle is junk if it isn't repairable with duct tape, loctite, some MMO and super glue.

If you want an uber reliable vehicle with features and performance you desire then get ready to pay more because the automaker is only going to get one sale out of you over a decade.

 

[b_b]

Cars are way more reliable today than decades or years ago. The issue is that they're expensive to diagnosis and repair when they break and they're not as forgiving for half@ss repairs. For me personally it's the mentality that some people figuratively believe a vehicle is junk if it isn't repairable with duct tape, loctite, some MMO and super glue.

If you want an uber reliable vehicle with features and performance you desire then get ready to pay more because the automaker is only going to get one sale out of you over a decade.

i am prepared to pay more, we only buy body of frame pickups and suvs. or toyota/lexus products. buy once cry once and then drive it for 10 years. saves us a ton of money.

 

[Nick1994]

They are looking for suckers and they found you.

Could have bought the car at the end of the lease and then sold to Carvana or similar for a good profit.

They're offering this "good deal" with "no fees" to buy back early before anyone realizes their options.

 

[CarbonSteel]

They are looking for suckers and they found you.

Could have bought the car at the end of the lease and then sold to Carvana or similar for a good profit.

They're offering this "good deal" with "no fees" to buy back early before anyone realizes their options.

LOL - I knew my options and I did not want to have to move the car from Texas to Colorado which would have cost me $$ and as it was a RWD it was not the best choice for the CO climate in the winter. For me it worked out great and I hardly see that as the definition of a sucker, but obviously your views and mine are not the same.

 

[PandaBear]

I dont like the idea of leases, it incentives manufactures to build vehicle to only be reliable for five years and then turn to junk. if everyone bought something and drove it for ten years, manufacturers would be in a competition to built the most reliable vehicle because thats what people would value.

That's not how it works, if they keep doing that they will lose money on the residual and they have to jack up the lease to break even. The only exception is if they try to use lease to work around trade tariff.

Typical residual is 58-62% of MSRP and if they sell you a car that only last the lease term they would lose a lot of that 58-62% of MSRP because nobody would buy them and the market price of it would be way lower.

 

[Hall]

If a dealer or the automaker contacted you in a situation like this, you have the upper hand. It shouldn't be any surprise that there were "no catches". Hell, I would have negotiated a ride home in the deal too !

On a different, somewhat related note, in some car groups I see people being suckered into trading in their cars and yes, for more money than is normal, but there's little to no selection of cars to replace theirs with and what cars are available have inflated prices because of the current conditions !

 

[BMWTurboDzl]

They are looking for suckers and they found you.

Could have bought the car at the end of the lease and then sold to Carvana or similar for a good profit.

They're offering this "good deal" with "no fees" to buy back early before anyone realizes their options.

Maybe. A chunk of that gain will just be recuperating lease payments which he no longer has to make. Perhaps if he waited until 7 months (depending on the market) he nets $1,500 in "profit" once 7 months payments are deducted. Not a big deal in the grand scheme of things.

 

[CarbonSteel]

Maybe. A chunk of that gain will just be recuperating lease payments which he no longer has to make. Perhaps if he waited until 7 months (depending on the market) he nets $1,500 in "profit" once 7 months payments are deducted. Not a big deal in the grand scheme of things.

Not when you deduct the cost to move the car and the reduction in insurance payments/maintenance/fuel costs that I am no longer making as well as I did not have to replace a set of $1400 run flat tires which were close to replacement time and would have needed it had I kept it until the lease was actually due. From my point of view, it was a no-brainer decision and was perfect timing.

 

[BMWTurboDzl]

Not when you deduct the cost to move the car and the reduction in insurance payments/maintenance/fuel costs that I am no longer making as well as I did not have to replace a set of $1400 run flat tires which were close to replacement time and would have needed it had I kept it until the lease was actually due. From my point of view, it was a no-brainer decision and was perfect timing.

Well the dealer would deduct the cost RFT's from their offer so I wouldn't be surprised if you only broken even by selling at lease end. Definitely a no brainer to unload it now.

 

[javacontour]

LOL - I knew my options and I did not want to have to move the car from Texas to Colorado which would have cost me $$ and as it was a RWD it was not the best choice for the CO climate in the winter. For me it worked out great and I hardly see that as the definition of a sucker, but obviously your views and mine are not the same.

Sounds like it was a win win in your case. For those not moving, or needing to replace the car, it might not have been as some suggest.

There is no one-size-fits-all solution.

Heck, if someone was WAY over their miles and a true no-gotcha get out of the lease, pay no fees, mileage overages, etc was offered, it might be in their best interest to let the dealership or leasing company have the car.

It's easy to take pot shots from across the InterWebs. None of us have all the information you had when making your choice.

If you like it, good on you!

 

[Wolf359]

I dont like the idea of leases, it incentives manufactures to build vehicle to only be reliable for five years and then turn to junk. if everyone bought something and drove it for ten years, manufacturers would be in a competition to built the most reliable vehicle because thats what people would value.

Mercedes offers a 7/100k extended warranty and their CPO models have 7 years unlimited miles so while I don't know about other manufacturers, Mercedes does have an incentive not to make them too crappy otherwise they'll eat the cost in repairs. Their standard warranty is 4 years/50k.

 

[Wolf359]

Oh and Mercedes always had the option where if you got another Mercedes, you could end the lease early by 6 months. I did check some of the local Mercedes dealerships and they're basically wiped out of cars, placed that used to have 300-500 cars are down to 20-30 or so. Couldn't find E class cars at several dealerships and the ones that had them only had one or two.

 

[Chris142]

They obviously have a buyer already.

 

[alarmguy]

Dealers are buying up leased cars when they can because the leased car is now worth 30 to 50% more than when the lease was purchased see years ago. More or less if you bought the leased car from the dealer at the end of the lease you could turn around and sell it at a minimum of 30% profit no matter what the brand is