I’ve been looking into signing a new lease. One thing in my consideration is the lease-transfer option, that is the lease contract’s terms on whether I could transfer my lease to another qualified individual with some part / months of the lease still remaining.
I’ve learned much about it and it seems that not all, in fact only some of the financial arms of vehicle mfg companies allow this sort of transfer. That limits my leasing options by almost half as I want that option. I have seen though, that there are some banks which offer leases on vehicles, which are independent / third-party banks such as US Bank, Ally, etc… so I’m wondering, what are the advantages of leasing through one of these 3rd party banks and how do I go about it? I.e. is there some hack where a mfg’s financial arm doesn’t allow lease transfers, like Hyundai, but if I were to lease the same Hyundai through US Bank, I could get similar/same terms but with the lease transfer option?
I gather / assume this may still depend on/ change according to each specific institution, just like for mfg’s financial arms, and can find that info on swapalease, but conversely will these third party banks lease any brand car? Or where could I reference that info. Will they match or even outcompete the original terms offered by the mfg’s financial arm? & Once I’ve found the car I want to lease, how can I lease it with that company and not the mfg’s financial arm?
You can only lease through a 3rd party bank if the dealer has an established relationship with the 3rd party bank and offers leases through them.
You can’t find a hyundai at a random dealer, call up USBank and say “hey, can you buy that Hyundai from the dealer and I’ll lease it from you”.
The different banks will have different lease programs, different restrictions, different policies regarding turn ins at the end, etc. You can’t pick and choose some from one and some from another.
Also, keep in mind that the ability to lease transfer is a perk that banks can (and have) stop offering at any time. Just because a lease transfer is allowed today does not mean it will be tomorrow (see Mercedes as a good recent example of this).
as mllcb42 said in his post, one of the more important things is that different banks have different rules, so that $500/month BMW using BMWFS could be $600/month using USBank.
So you might be paying a premium just for the possible equity sale (assuming you are just flipping it right)
Ah ok, well is there any way to gauge how likely it is that one financial company, 3rd party or the arm of a vehicle mfg. corp, removes this lease transfer option? or that they remove the end-of-lease buyout option?
Your ability to buy the car at disposition is protected in your lease agreement. Transfers and third-party sales are a courtesy that could appear or disappear at any time. Nobody has a crystal ball, but you can look at history and judge for yourself
Another point for consideration - non-captives don’t seem to have exemplary customer service or are known to be efficient. Search for US Bank or Ally and you’ll see their reviews are pretty low for satisfaction.
Credit unions seem to be pretty good alternatives, but you’ll have to find a dealer that works with, and is willing to work your deal, with credit unions. Search for @RVguy previous posts. GLWT
Lease transfer option should be spelled out in the contract clearly. What Mercedes did was unfair to to its customers. Should they know they will not be able to transfer, some may not have leased a Merc in the first place.
hah well I hadn’t thought of that but maybe that’s the move. Trying to get a sense on how the lower end of the segment of the used market is currently with the overall used market being so inflated…
You want 455hp and 455lb torque in a 6 speed manual ? Look at the Camaro LT1
If you’ve never driven a manual , how do you plan on driving it off the dealer lot? You’re pretty confident you can just get in and jump into traffic?
Sadly, not too many manual options nowadays here in the US. We’ve become lazy and all want oversized 3 row SUV’s. They’re a dying breed here. Still going strong in Europe and other parts of the world tho.
Civics, Elantra, base Jetta S. Usually it’s the compacts (and their stripped variants) that generally offer manuals.
I merged them because all your questions need to be in the same place to avoid confusion & redundancy.
At some point someone was going to ask you what car(s) you’re looking to lease via third party banks, because hypotheticals only go so far. There’s no point having the same conversation in two threads.
Ah ok, yes I can understand these practices implemented by mods to reduce clutter of forums from new members like myself, I would have posted something about a manual transmission preference in the other thread but thought it was such a tangent that I’d rather make a new topic. As in I was also, and am also thinking about leasing cars with automatic transmissions via 3rd party banks; the whole manual question was, in my mind, a sufficiently separate consideration.
Manuals are fun… but they can get old very quickly especially if you drive through daily heavy/stop-go traffic, or when/if there are health issues (bad knees, arms). Friend of mine had his arm in a cast and it was torturous for a couple of months.
It’s also much smaller target audience when you’re looking to sell the car.
