Has anyone in California actually bought out their lease from the Dealer paying SALES TAX, Doc-Fee, License & Fees, sold the car within 10 days and then recouped the sales tax & fees? I’ve read all the threads where the idea is discussed but nothing is mentioned about someone actually doing it.
Backstory:
I have an Infiniti QX60 that has about $2500 equity in it. Car Trackers is willing beat a CarMax offer to buy the car from me once I make the purchase from the Infiniti Dealer (you can’t purchase directly from IFS.) Car Trackers say that so long as I can get a ‘lien release EMAIL’ from the dealer, they can pay me and pick up the car. They’ll then deal with the title transfer from the DMV. (This is a little unclear to me as I was under the impression that the ‘Lessor released title’ would get sent to me.)
To buy out the lease from Infiniti (it’s past maturity) I have to pay them sales tax, a Doc Fee of $85, License and Fees of $414 (I think this includes a new registration.) They are charging a $75 buy fee on top of my $300 purchase option which seems fair.
The issue here is if I sell the car to Car Trackers, how do I get the Sales Tax and DMV fee $$ back?
I called the California Department of Tax and Fee Administration (CDTFA) to get an answer. While it was a challenge trying to understand the guy on the phone (heavily accented) this is what I understand from the conversation. Once I sell the car to Car Trackers, I would need to go BACK TO THE DEALER to show them my proof of sale (possible including a ‘General Resale Certificate’ from from the CDTFA website) and I would then need to RELY ON THE DEALER to file a claim for the refund and pay me back. This seems highly suspect to me and I have no faith that a Dealer would even want to get involved in this with no upside for them. And while it’s clear that I could try to recoup sales tax, it wasn’t very clear if the DMV fees could be returned.
If anyone in CA has gone through this process can you please share how you were able to succeed or fail in recouping the Sales Tax, etc.?
Many thanks!