Can anyone point me to this 120 day policy in my lease contract? I don’t see it anywhere so I’m curious how Ford is getting away with all of this unless I’m missing some legal verbiage.
No where in your contract does it say you can sell their vehicle to someone else. They extend a courtesy exemption to this up until 120 days out, so there’s no reason to expect to find discussion of this in your contract. If you follow the contract language, you can’t sell it before 120 days out either.
I agree it’s annoying that their exemption policy isn’t made clear, but it’s an important delineation when you’re looking for verbiage in the contract.
All your rights as a lessee are spelled out in the contract. Beyond that you have no rights
It’s like renting an apartment and saying “where in the lease does it say I can’t sell this apartment for profit?”
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Well that’s just it, I see no where in the contract referring to this 120 day rule. Either I can never sell the car to a third party or I can. There is no timeframe listed in the contract so I’m confused how this “can’t sell a Ford within 120 days of lease end” is a thing because it isn’t in the contract I signed.
I’ll update once the Ford lease specialist returns my call because maybe I missed something, but this all seems like Ford is making up rules as they go and as long as no one presses them on it they can get away with it.
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Per the contract, you can not sell it ever, as is the case with most every lease contract.
The bank may offer, as courtesy, to allow you to sell it, if they wish, but there is no contractual obligation for them to do so.
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So I just spoke with Ford and the first “specialist” confirmed the 120 day rule but when I asked her to tell me where that was in my contract, she sent me to another specialist. This lady told me there is no 120 rule at all and the car just has to be purchased through the Ford dealer.
So assuming she is correct, my Chevy dealer can walk across the street and pay the Ford dealer for my Explorer and everything will be fine. This lady confirmed this was in fact possible. I’m curious how different the payoff amount will be from the amount I can purchase the vehicle for personally. Sounds like Ford will increase the price since it isn’t me purchasing it.
I’m confused because based on most reports here and online, people have had no issues trading in Ford leases outside of this made up 120 day timeframe. It seems you can sell to a 3rd party if you are not within 120 days of lease end, according to Ford, but also according to Ford there is no 120 day rule. So I have no idea what’s going on.
You’re not going to find anything in the contract that says you can’t sell in the last 120 days because per the contract, you can’t sell ever.
As a courtesy, they will allow a sale up to 120 days before, at their discretion. They have no obligation to do this ever.
You’re looking at this as is “they’re restricting me in the last 120 days.”
What this is actually is “they’re enabling me to sell for the first 990 days when they don’t have to.”
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We can keep going in circles but the lessee has no rights beyond what’s specified in the contract. Beyond that the owner of the asset decides everything.
They can allow a sale today and disallow it tomorrow
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I guess my next logical question would be am I able to trade in my lease at a Ford dealer? I don’t see any reason any Ford dealer would offer me any more than the residual for it seeing as I’d have to turn it in to them soon anyways, but is trading in even possible since it’s technically not me purchasing it and that seems to be my only other option?
If memory serves, Ford only allows the originating dealer to buy it out in the last 120 days, unless the originating dealer doesn’t want it.
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Quick update. It seems this 120-day thing is only in Ford’s system in that within that time frame you fall under the lease ending requirements which include having your vehicle inspected and all that jazz. It really has nothing to do with Ford owning the vehicle and not allowing it to be sold to a 3rd party, it’s just the stupid way Ford’s systems work.
I confirmed if I extended my lease out a few months, I’d have zero issues trading it in. Basically Ford is stupid…the only stipulation for extending your lease is that the current contract is satisfied, e.g. you’ve completed all payments. Seems like an easy loophole for such a ridiculously stupid situation.
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Update to the update! Every time I’ve called Ford their representative has told me something different. I was told today extending my lease will not work because I can never trade it in. The second representative repeated that I could have traded it in had I been outside this magical 120 day period the first representative said didn’t exist. A supervisor is supposed to be calling me within 24 hours. I can’t wait to see how they will interpret their own rules.
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I’m kind of in the same boat. I’m 7 months away from my lease end and ford credit and my dealer told me I have to buy out the car before I can trade it. So as of now i’m just going to buy it out. I have about 4k equity in it and after taxes will leave me about 2.8k. Hey, every 1k counts right?
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I called Ford about my extending my lease that ends next month. They gave me the option to extend up to 12-months, in whatever increments I wanted. They needed a reason for the extension, and I said due to lack of inventory because of the microchip shortage. He agreed. They said the contractual end date is extended based on the new lease, so the 120-day period starts over. That will show up in writing with the extension I sign.
Also, the extension is kinda cool as it is basically month-to-month for the extension period. I can return the truck anytime, and as long as I do it before the payment due for the month it is turned in like a normal lease, and all remaining payments are cancelled.
I asked about third-party buyout and was told it isn’t a problem as long as it is outside the 120-day window. I hope this is true, as it would be nice to have the option if needed as the used car market looks to be favorable for the next few months. Ford said in the 120-day window the dealer has to buy it out for market value, whereas outside the 120-day window the dealer, a third-party, or me, can buy it out for “my” price, which is residual value.
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So I’ll keep you updated then because the last representative I talked to said this is not true. The lease end date does not change when you extend so you still can’t trade it in even with an extension. But another representative told me the opposite. Basically no one at Ford has any idea what their actual policy is, nevermind all this 120 day nonsense is no where in the lease contract.
I submitted a BBB complaint last night so hopefully someone high up enough to actually make decisions reaches out because this is ridiculous. But bottom line is don’t trust any Ford employee unless you can get what they say in writing and even then they’d say your contract supercedes that so who knows. I’ll update when I figure everything out but so far Ford sucks.
Haven’t we been over this? There’s a reason it isn’t in your contract.
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The contract either states we can trade in our leases at any time or never. It can’t be both. And if they are allowing some people to trade in and others not, then that would put Ford in a position to be sued for discrimination so I have to believe it’s one or the other, not either at Ford’s discretion.
Regardless, it’s ridiculous even Ford’s lease specialists don’t even know because each one has told me different. I’ve now had them tell me you can’t trade in within 120 days but can outside of that, you can NEVER trade in a Ford lease, the 120 day thing doesn’t exist at all, if you extend your lease the 120 days is based off the new end date, you can extend but still can never trade your vehicle in, etc. All of this has been from Ford’s own lease experts.
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Your contract allows you to buy out your lease. It doesn’t allow you to sell their property.
They may choose to extend to you the courtesy of sharing the profit on the sale of their asset if they want to, but that is their prerogative. They certainly aren’t required to.
I agree that it is annoying that they aren’t consistent in communicating their internal policy of when they extend this courtesy.
It’s not both, it’s neither… If they elect to allow you to do something out of the kindness of their heart, they can do so on their own (even changing) terms no matter how much it may hurt your feelings as they are not contractually obligated to do anything other than allowing YOU to buy their car. I do agree that the inconsistent responses you’ve received has to be frustrating.