Maryland EV lease fees- are all these mandatory?

Ask the Hackrs Buy/Finance
1

Looking for some perspective here on a Maryland lease. Told by the dealership that the following fees were non-negotiable and “set by Maryland”.

$1,567 total fees

  • $323 Maryland registration for 2 years
  • $250 EV surcharge
  • $100 MD title
  • $20 Lien fee
  • $20 MD electronic filing fee
  • $50 MD temporary tag filing fee
  • $800 Processing/Document charge

Combining this with the full price tax burden in MD means there’s a lot up front money not going toward any lease payment! I would prefer to pay the fees up front and not finance them with the monthly payment.

2

This is capped by law, but you can always negotiate a doc fee into the discount.

For example, I pay 20,000 for the car in MD, or 20,500 in NY with a $200 doc fee instead

The rest seem fine, I’m not too shocked by any of them. Leasing in Maryland isn’t always great.

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Also a reason many MD residents cross the border to buy a car

4

Into PA?

VA and NJ are just as bad generally.

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NJ I’m used to seeing high 4s into 6s, and PA is capped at high 4s now.

6

As hershey noted everything looks ok and in fact “set by Maryland” except the $800 doc fee, that is 100% set by the dealer and can be as high or as low as the dealer wants (within the limits of any state regulations).

$800 is high for a doc fee but unfortunately that’s pretty nomal for most states in the Mid-Atlantic and Southern US.

You just have to factor it into your total deal analysis including any options you may have to get a car from another state with lower doc fees.

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If I buy it in another nearby state, do any of those MD fees disappear? I would imagine I might get the new state’s temp tag fees too potentially? Trying to figure out the utility of going far afield to get a better doc fee. I mentioned to the dealer that OH had a similar car for a $250 doc fee but he wasn’t ready to match it.

8

Negotiate for the deal in totality. A temp tag fee is probably like $20-$50. If you save $300 on the doc fee, and value your time accordingly, yeah it’s fair.

You’ll skip the electronic filing fee and MD temp tag fee if you do that, substitute those fees for an OOS runner/filing fee, and an out of state temp tag fee, and if the EV surcharge is an MD licensing / regisration fee on top of your normal registration you will pay that as well.

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That’s the wrong way to go about it. Don’t ask the dealer to cut the doc fee, they won’t do it, especially not to match another dealer that is hundreds of miles away.

Just analyze the total deal from the dealer in OH. If its $500/mo. with $1k DAS and the MD dealer is $525/mo., then just tell the MD dealer you’ll sign tomorrow for $500/mo. If they refuse, then it’s really up to you whether you take the local deal, go out of state to save a few $$, or try other dealers.

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Is this for Maryland residents only? I’ve leased two cars from MD out of state and the deals were much better than what I could get locally.

Maybe that’s why Maryland dealers like out of state deals because all their residents go out of state haha.