How do I politely tell a dealer the residual on my car is too high?

Ask the Hackrs
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I’m in an unfortunate position of loving the 2017 Volt LT I leased and there not being any inventory nor lease deals on 2019’s that I can find. I’m going to buy back the car which I’ve never done before. The residual is a little over $18,000. There are a number of Volt LT’s under 40k miles in San Diego hovering around $17,000

I want to negotiate everything over email and not be hit with any surprises walking into the dealership. I’ve never negotiated a purchase. How do I politely tell them I’m not willing to pay the residual for this car? Also, would it be wise to tempt them with the extended warranty to lower the cost out the door then cancel it and pick one up outside of the dealership? Any advice would be appreciated. I have about 3 weeks to figure this out. TIA

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You can’t because it’s in the contract you signed when you started the lease.

Why waste their finance guy’s time with this? The used car market is so competitive these days, coupled with the fact that your residual is set in stone, there will be no wiggle room.

If you really wanted a used Volt for $17k, go turn in your current Volt and buy one of those.

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“How do I politely tell this guy the residual is something he agreed on three years ago?”

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Return it, see if the dealer can buy it under residual from the leasing company and resell to you. If that doesn’t work (and you can be carless for a awhile) google your VIN and see where the car ends up and buy it from that dealer.

If neither of those are good options only you can decide it buying the car above market is worth it instead of buying a car that someone else drove before you (knowing the history).

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“How will the finance guy politely tell you that they undercharged you for your lease based on the actual residual and you now owe $2,000?”

Think about it on the positive side that you made out well on your lease and move on to a new car if you can’t get a deal worked out.

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I’m sure if you came with a check to pay for the depreciation your lease didn’t cover due to the too-high residual, he’d be willing to listen.

Otherwise, turn it in and buy a different used one.

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You can’t negotiate with the dealer. It’s the bank’s car. Dealer has no say on sales price until/unless they buy the car from the captive.

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my understanding of this was way off. I’m glad I asked. Thanks.

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Pedro…your higher residual gave u lower monthly payments on your lease. Higher residual equals better lease payments but worse of a value to buy in the end

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Some leasing companies do adjust residual to better reflect market conditions at the time, if the residuals were hyper inflated to move stale inventory…For example, my 80k ATS-V had a residual of 48k, they are going used for about 35. The bank, through the dealer, communicated to me the willingness to drop the residual to 38k… In your case youre talking about $1k, if that. Unlikely.

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Several folks recently have reported in threads here that BMW lowered their residual for buyout purposes. Audi refused to do so on my A4, so I turned it in last week.

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Who you really need to ask is your financing company. There were cases even on this forum where they actually agreed to a lower buyout…nothing to lose.
Here is some input from a financial company website…

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Pedro, If your lease is with GM Financial they will not negotiate your purchase option price. If the residual is greater than current value, they are insured for any loss on sale at auction. So they have no incentive to sell to the customer or dealer when insurance prevents a loss.

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The dealer has little to do with the purchase of your existing lease. I just turned in a Cadillac ATS-V. The residual was $46,000. Cadillac finance offered me a $3,000 discount on the car a couple of months ago. On December 5th, when I turned in the car I was offered the car for $40,800. This number came from Cadillac finance, not the dealer. The dealer was offered the car for $35,800 and I was told they do not plan on buying it. I purchased a 2017 ATS-V at the same time for $40,000 with a longer CPO warranty.

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