Leasing out of state as Alaska resident

Ask the Hackrs Buy/Finance
1

I moved to Alaska from California last year and my current BMW lease is ending in June, so I’ve been trying to find my next lease.

Only good local deals I could find is a EV which wouldn’t work great in such a cold weather.

Problem #1 is, there is only one dealership per each car brand except for Chevrolet, Ford and CDJR, so I’m trying to lease out of state.

Problem #2 is, I contact one dealer in Seattle and two in California, all of them said they can’t do out of state deal with Alaska resident.

Am I just having bad luck with finding right dealerships or are there some law I’m not aware of?

2

I’ve sold Toyota to Alaskans many times with no issues. Not sure about the other brands. I can’t sell to Hawaii however per Toyota rules. If you decide to go Toyota lmk

3

I wonder what the shipping cost is to Alaska, does it go boat or through Canada?

and Most CA dealers won’t do an out of state lease.

4

It’s usually by ship from Tacoma(Seattle) port

5

Have you looked at private transfers here or Swapalease? Plenty of BMW deals but most would be EVs. You sure that wouldn’t work?

Any connections to CA or possibility or show CA address?

6

I’ve done Alaska deals before, but the deal was for a finance (shouldn’t be different for a lease), and the customer did performance center deliveries. He drove one up to Seattle and then shipped, and he drove the other one the whole way up through Canada. Shipping the whole way, may be expensive, but it may not be prohibitive if sourced through a PNW dealership.

7

  1. Not a huge fan of any of those brands but having 2+ choices for service is more important than that IMO.

  2. When you have huge one-time costs (shipping in your instance), you want to transact as infrequently as possible. Same advice as Hawaii.

8

I don’t think they pay tax in Alaska so that def offsets the shipping costs some or all depending on the vehicles. Iirc shipping from pnw was around $2k

9

I’ve found dealers in some states are more than happy to do out of state. Dealers in others would rather eat glass. California specifically is in the glass category. Utah and Colorado is in the happy category.