The car is worth 8k more than the payoff. A lessee has the option to buy the car. It is what she intended to do at the end of the lease. No reason she should lose the equity.
Assuming your friend followed the mandated policy, NMAC is the listed lienholder and was the lienholder at the time of loss. Thus they’ll make payment to the lienholder listed. If you tell them you’ve since purchased the car, more than likely they’re going to tell you to take it up with the captive to have them forward payment or provide proof of ownership of vehicle at time of loss.
But again, you’d have to verify with the insurance company and captive.
Infiniti finance which is probably same as nmac set the lease termination the day insurance reported as a total loss. I bet your insurance already informed them about it.
IFS refunded me the payment from the day lease termination was effective.
And no. They don’t share equity with you. Your friend might get some money - in the form of taxes because the insurance makes you “whole”.
If the $8k of equity is predicated on them listed for $25k at retail then the price she can sell it for is probably closer to $21k, but until you actually check with each 3rd party, that’s just a guess.
Do you have the cash to buy it? No one is going to finance a totaled car. To finance it the car is the collateral.
Also if the car is totaled and it’s already been reported to the insurance and Nissan, I’m pretty sure Nissan is going. To tell you they can’t sell you a totaled car. They are going. To take the check because it happened when they owned it.
You leased the car, this is the chance you take, if you owed more that it was worth you’d owe nothing because of gap insurance. You either take all of the risk and get all of the reward/punishment, or you play the lease game and you’re free and clear.