Has anyone had any trouble returning any Toyota leases down in South FL? Leased my vehicle from another location then relocated. Have called 5 dealerships thus far and all have stated that they cannot take anymore lease returns unless car was leased from that specific dealership. One dealer also stated they had nearly 150 lease returns waiting to be picked up and literally had no more space. Made a call to Toyota financial that advised that leased Toyotas can be returned to any accepting dealership of any brand as long as Toyota is made aware of the location and the dealership accepts and doesn’t charge a storage fee. Anyone ever had this happen before?
Never heard of this problem before, but I know that Toyota vehicles in Florida are distributed by Southeast Toyota Distributors, a private company separate from Toyota. In many parts of the country, Toyota distributes its cars directly. Since Southeast Toyota is separate from Toyota, it appears they can set their own rules for some things. Maybe lease returns is one such area, especially if you leased the car from a dealership that does not deal with Southeast Toyota, but deals with Toyota directly. Does your lease agreement say anything about who you can return the car to?
I don’t know about Toyota but we have a VW lease and are having the hardest time. We have lease about 10 cars over the last 20 + years and never had an issue, I always sell the car to the dealership where I am getting the next car. This VW nobody wants - they say VW leases are impossible to get out of and VW won’t give me the payoff amount, or the dealers. Only the dealer I purchased the car from has the payoff amount. It is very strange!
@cruiserchuck is right about Southeast Toyota and I can also say that all the Toyota dealerships down here are pretty cutthroat and simply just don’t want to deal with it because there’s no money in it for them. I suggest you call Southeast Toyota’s offices and ask them for help. They control what every dealership can and cannot do, so if they can help they could make it happen.
A dealer not wanting to buy the car is one thing, but dealers refusing to accept a lease return is completely different. Toyota Financial (or whoever bought the car at the time of the lease) owns the car, and is responsible for it once the lease period is over.
