I am aware of this. The issue the op indicated was auction loss. This is what I’m referring to. This isn’t my first rodeo
sounds like it be better to do a lease transfer in these cases and structure it somewhat intelligently.
a 15 months lease on the car has an attractive price of $X. that’s also about 12.5K miles (at 10k a year). 12.5K overage miles cost costs $3125. Therfore find someone who is willing to give you $X-$3125. If said number is negative, pay said person that amount to take it off your hands as a transfer. They will be responsible for any overages. If they drive less than 12.5K miles they win even more, if they drive more, its on them. Advantage to the original leesee is that they have wiped their hands of it.
thoughts?
Op was at max miles on the contract at 9 months. He would’ve been hard pressed to find someone to take over a lease with 15 months and 0 miles, knowing that all miles would be paid for by the new lessee. 3125/15=208/month In miles alone. It would have to be someone who was going to drive extremely little to make it worthwhile.
Since the lease was already paid for, I’m not sure how GMF handles lease transfer. However, I don’t think it’s as simple as you make it sound. There’s also a lease transfer fee that has to be paid as well. Without looking, I want to say it was somewhere between 350-500.
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as I said, he might have to incentivize the deal.
ex: if a fair value for the lease is $2K (i.e. $133 a month) and it costs $500 to transfer and the overage miles would be 3125, then he might have to pay someone 1625. (i.e. to cover the transfer fee and excess miles, the new person will be responsible for the mileage, but they are being paid up front for that purpose).
While $1625 might seem high, that might be better than the unknown of turning it in early and if a fair value of the lease is more than $2K (perhaps $3K, its more in favor of the original leasee). One also has to factor in the insurance cost of the vehicle for the remaining 15 months if they don’t transfer it.
I’ll try to look at the paperwork from my one pay GMF lease, but I don’t recall it saying anywhere that it was not transferable.
Gotcha…I misunderstood where you were going there regarding payment
i posed that to the forum when i had 5k miles left. my thought was that it would be great for someone that drives little. But no one said it was a good idea.
Hindsight being 20/20 if i knew i would be liable for more than disposition fee, i might have looked at it harder.
I hope you are right. I did find (by googling) that someone conjectured this letter goes out to specific states where GMF would be required by law to pay me the difference if the auction price is higher than the residual. If the auction price were lower than residual, i would pay nothing. of course, i took that info with a grain of salt.
just curious, which state are you in?
i would say either way, the letter is shocking!
if i only pay the disposition at lease end, fine. otherwise, i should buy the car outright and sell it private party, just to avoid this (extreme) liability.
I honestly think you’re going to be ok with paying just disposition fee + potentially damage charges (if any exist). I really don’t see them coming after you for recouping their loss at auction. I know in my many years of leasing GM through both GMFinancial and GMAC, it’s never happened to me and I almost always turn it in early.
I sent a Trailblazer back early back in 2008 due to divorce. I actually got sent a check on that one, as they sold it for an amount over my residual. I wouldn’t expect this to happen on a Cruze, but I wouldn’t lose sleep over you owing them thousands either.
Where your risk comes in is if you default, have the car repo’ed, and add all of the fees for that on top of your lease. This isn’t the case here, and you paid them what you contractually owed them at inception, since this was a 1-pay.
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I wasn’t blaming you, was more thinking out loud. so along the same thoughts as you.
the car was registered in CA.
When I got that letter, I myself was worried but after calling them, they said ignore that letter and so I did. You would think GMF would appreciate it if you paid everything owed and returned it early…
i agree. it is a win for them. i will keep everyone updated. thanks for the help!
my carrying cost (insurance) was $80-90/mo for the car. so if i garaged the car for 15 months, it would cost me $1350 plus disposition = $1750. Just FYI
That’s when you know you have a fantastic deal…when insurance is more expensive than what you paid (in your case, profited) for the car.
Hello,
Do have the final update?
Did you get to hear from GM? Did they close your lease account?
Thanks.
i never heard another word from GM. no disposition fee. nothing.
Hahaha… that’s a good surprise from GM 
So I have a Cruze lease due May 12 that I’m turning in for a Canyon on April 28. Sounds like I should be ok to ground the Cruze on May 12 and drive off in the Canyon?
I’m wondering if I even need to get it inspected. Don’t think I have $500 worth of excess wear and sounds like the dealer wants to buy it anyways, assuming they can get it for less than residual.
Glad to hear you didn’t pay any fees.
How many years/miles did you lease the Cruz for? Mine was 24mo 10k/yr. So wear and tear was very minimal.
If the dealer buys the car, you will avoid the disposition fee. Might be worth checking a few dealers if possible.
I have the disposition fee waived since I’m leasing a new GMC. Did 24/15k per year. Have 27k miles on it.
Did you actually like the Cruze? Seems like a total snooze fest of a car.