Wanted to share a datapoint.
tldr: Sold Ally lease to a dealer with help from cars.com
Had a Tacoma on lease through Ally. Moved and wanted to sell it with about 5 payments left on it. Obtained quotes from the usual online companies, dealer websites and brokers on LH. They either didn’t buy Ally or offered bellow my payoff of $38,000.
As a last ditch effort I submitted for an instant offer through Cars.com not expecting much. Offer came in at $39,000, and they had a dealer lined up. Got contacted by the dealer, came in for inspection and they offered $36,500. I ask why is it so far off the instant offer. The guy says he hasn’t seen the offer, and in any case they use carfax but Cars.com uses KBB. I leave and contact Cars.com to let them know and ask whether this is a real offer or bait-and-switch, and are dealerships supposed to honor it? Get a response saying they should honor it and they’re looking into it. A couple of days later I get an email saying my offer was reassigned. Get contacted and this time I ask them if they’ll honor the offer. They say max they’ll go is $37,500. I say no thanks and contact cars.com again and ask whether they have any mechanism in place to hold dealers accountable. The person replies that it’s a new program and they’re still working out the kinks, and he re-assigns again saying that if this one doesn’t work out, he’ll “escalate up the chain”. Third dealer contacts me, I ask if they’ll honor the offer. They say they can’t commit without seeing the truck but will do their best to honor it. Come in for inspection, they like it and will honor the offer.
But wait - it’s Ally? Now they have to check the dealer payoff. At this point I’m thinking it’s over. Turns out the dealer payoff is $39,300 and the dealer agrees to buy it out at that price. The guy buying also said that KBB spiked on Tacos over the past few weeks but the market hasn’t caught up.
Didn’t get any equity but for me in this situation walking away without paying off the rest of the lease was a win. And lesson learned - never again with Ally.
