Time flies and I’m already 1 month away from the end of my Chevy Bolt lease. GM usually uses AutoVIN for pre-inspections, but after a couple calls to them, I learned they are on hold due to covid and putting customers on a waitlist for inspections. Talking with GM Financial, they basically said I would just drop my car off at the dealer without an inspection.
I called my local Chevy dealer this afternoon and spoke with the lease retention manager about the turn-in process there and how they handle the inspection. He said that given pre-return inspections aren’t possible, they are “waiving” any damage because nobody at the dealer inspects the cars when they are turned in.
I have one small issue I need to get corrected (simply popping the bottom of the front fascia plastic back in), but other than that I saw two small scratches (both below the 4 inch criteria stated by GM) and a rock chip on the window that’s smaller than 1/2 inch so I doubt I would have normally been charged for those items anyhow. However, my two rear tires at 15K miles look to be right at 4/32 (some slight space between the edge of the tread and the top of Washington’s head on the quarter) so I would normally replace them before turning the car in.
Now I’m wondering if that’s necessary given they’re not inspecting the car? That doesn’t sound right to me that they wouldn’t look at a turned-in lease vehicle to see whether it had any unreasonable damage. Any experience that would validate the dealer’s comment?
I mean technically he’s right even though he’s being disingenuous and borderline lying.
GMF holds your lease, not the dealer. The dealer never has inspected cars. They have nothing to do with it besides grounding the vehicle and keeping it safe for GMF to come pick up.
There is a very comprehensive GMF lease return guide online which you seem to be familiar with. Use that to do your own inspection. GMF seems to be fairly lenient with returns but will charge for damages that fall outside of the guideline.
I turned in my volt last week. They instructed me to bring in the two keys, owner’s manual, and the charger. They noted all of the above, checked mileage, and did a 360 video of the vehicle, also focusing on the tires. I presume the video will be inspected by someone else other than the dealership.
I returned mine at the end of May. I also was not able to get an Autovin inspection done either. About a week after returning it I received a bill for a new tire(it had sidewall damage and was expected so I didn’t fight it) and a few excess miles from GMF. The car had a few dings and scratches within the limits of the return guideline policy that I was not charged for.
The GMF bill did show a detailed Autovin inspection that was completed after I returned the car. I’d recommend, as stated above, to just be sure you take a full walk around video showing the mileage, complete interior and exterior, including wheels and tires while at the dealership when returning it, in any case they try to come at you with other charges.
Thanks Sunny. If you don’t mind my asking, do they apply a heavier charge to replace the tire vs. had you replaced it before turning it in? My rear tires are right below the limit so I was going to assume they would have an issue with it and replace them before returning the car. Might as well take the chance if the charge ends up being the same either way, though.
I’m wondering what happened to my Acadia. I dropped it off at the end of April, lease was paid off by mid May and I still have not received a statement from GMF. I search for the VIN every now and then, and nothing comes up for sale, so I guess it’s possible that it’s still just sitting there at the dealership.
That’s not bad at all. Seems like it’s best for me to return and take the chance they won’t ding me for two tires. The expense would be pretty much the same as replacing the tires before turning the car in.
I was roughly on the same timeline as you with my drop off.
I NEVER got an invoice/bill in the mail. I was told by GMF Chat that I “might” get a formal bill but if not to just sign into my GMF online account periodically and wait for the balance due to show up (I already paid off the lease but was over miles). About 3 weeks later the fee for miles showed up online so I paid it off. About 6 weeks later I got a letter stating the lease was paid off in full.
The car I turned it was super clean, a few minor door dings and the tires were RIGHT at the limit. I did anti-up and have all 4 wheels repaired (bad curb rash) the day before turn in.
EDIT: Just googled the VIN…it’s sitting at a GM dealer for sale in Rapid City, SD! (I’m in Colorado)
The market is so weird (as expected) right now. NADA Clean retail CPO is $28,800 and they are asking $34K!? I had valued it at around $27K and my buyout was $30K.
My GMF account actually somehow has a CREDIT of over 800 dollars sitting in it as of yesterday. I asked support if this was a refund and what I should expect. They told me that they were still in the process of finalizing everything, but it looked like a refund. I’m not sure how that happened. I know that I should be getting a credit for the disposition fee since I leased another GM product within an acceptable window of time, but outside of that I’m not sure.
I just looked at that… Seems awful high at first glance, but I don’t know what the market is like for these used. Mine is priced just under 23k but it’s a FWD SLE-2.
So I got my lease return statement today, and sure enough GM owes me 843 dollars. I have absolutely no idea how that happened, but I’m not going to argue.
I turned in my 2018 Encore in February. My electric garage door had closed (separately) on both the hood and on the rear (DW - bless her heart). I was worried about the dent on the hood center ridge-line. The body guy I talked to let me know that dents on the center-line are very difficult to remove and that the whole hood may have to be replaced. The back had a number of pretty deep scratches on both the rear hatch and on the bumper from the garage door incident.
I was worried about having to have the whole hood re-done, The back hatch redone, and the bumper filled and re-painted at a cost measured in k$.
But when the vehicle was inspected, he generously listed the hood dent as only 2 inches (I measured 5 or 6). The rear scratches were listed as “normal use”. I didn’t have to pay anything. I felt that they (GM) were very generous. Had the lease been though someone like USBank and not GM financial I would have paid a lot.
I saw that the car went at auction to Carvana and was sold in Texas for ~$16k. So they must have sold the car at auction for around $11k (or so). I paid less than $4000 all-in total for the lease. So that car that lists for ~$26k made GM all of $15k (11k auction+ 4k lease).
