Hi I’m a little over 2 years into my Mercedes lease and I saw our payoff quote amount is about 34,600 and got a Vroom offer of 32,800.
Can I please get some input on whether or not it’s worth to sell it, if there’s any hidden fees from selling a leased car (sales tax, transfer, etc)? I just found leasehackr today and have been reading up, I never realized this was an option before.
We got MAJORLY screwed over with this one due to not researching at all and being desperate for credit approval to get this one specific car as our first car.
Mercedes SLC300 2018, 51,500 value
Put 8k down at signing, and our payments are 700 a month + 62$ tax. There’s about 6.5k left on the lease.
700 a month includes 15k miles a year that we have not gotten any use out of, ding shield, tire warranty, and mercedes maintenance package.
We’re only at about 15.5k miles total on it with our lease ending July of 2021, and I would assume the low mileage is why we’re getting better rates.
Especially since COVID we barely use this car (working remote) and it’s costing $762 + another $140 for insurance per month. Am I understanding the rates correctly that I can basically pay $1.2k now to get out of paying 900 a month for the next 6 months?
A few more details:
Need to pay 600$ disposition fee to return lease.
Input car as “excellent” condition; front bumper needs to be replaced, but we would have to pay for this if returning a lease too.
Minor scrape on side panel above the wheel, I can see a bit of metal peeking through but I think we could buff it to under the size of a “credit card” that Mercedes wouldn’t consider it excess wear and tear. If we were to sell probably need to get this fixed and consider that cost?
Have some white marks on interior of car from sunscreen, would need to get it cleaned professionally if selling.
Feeling a little ouch about losing the 8k deposit if we trade in early but we’re still overpaying on our monthly payments right?
Do I have to pay the remaining 6.5k or any termination fee on top of the payoff quote mercedes provided?
And yes I will never be so dumb with a lease again. Getting a much cheaper car next time and doing my research as this was a big big waste of money.
You need to figure out what a dealer, Carvana, shift, vroom, whatever will pay for the car.
You need to figure out if that’s fair.
You need to find what your current payoff is, and if that includes your MSDs, and if you did down payment, you’ll 100% be a out of that amount. If you ask @Calvin.MB or @oarfish18 they may be able to help, in exchange for a review or something.
Dealer will pay - payoff = amount of equity, positive or negative. Negative you’ll have to ofc pay that amount.
Yes you won’t have any more payments if you have someone buyout the lease.
Termination fee wise, there may be a buyout fee, I know there’s a small one with chase, but unsure for MBFS.
This should be included in payoff, it should be residual + remaining payments + buyout fees (if applicable) and sales tax if for personal. If it’s a dealer buyout there is no tax for them.
Thank you! I checked with a few and vroom seem to give me the highest at 32.6k, which was within the KBB range. The others gave me stuff as low as 25k. Asked KBB for a quote too but they’re not in the office right now.
I want to check with bidlane too but they are in person, I want to see if it’s cheaper to replace the bumper and then trade in, or trade in as is and have them replace the bumper. Do you have any ideas on what’s probable?
The 34,600 figure is just from the request a payoff quote through my MBFS account. I am going to call them when they’re open to make sure. I haven’t made my payment for this month yet and am assuming that quote already took that into account.
I was told about 1800 to fix this and the silver ridge thing on top which was cracked from a repair place previously. May be less now because it’s been a year and parts should be more available.
Yeah I figured We looked at selling the lease a few months after but were told we’d basically lose 15k to get a dealership to take it. Only tonight I checked and only about 2k difference now.
If it’s vroom does that count as a dealership? So no sales tax? Not sure we can swing another 3.5k on sales tax tbh. We’d be paying around 2-2.5k already in difference/clean up so that would be about 5.5k out of pocket upfront. Paying through July is about 8k including insurance.
Oh gotcha, thank you, I will call them when they are open. Are you saying if it includes sales tax, then the amount would actually be lower, because the tax will be waived when selling to dealer? Was confused about you mentioning “lucking out”
Yes that’s what I meant, if it includes tax, you have a lower buyout, as a dealer does not pay tax.
Also, you may need a dealer to streamline getting your payoff, I don’t know if MBFS will release that to you, I have not called them before and do not have as much experience dealing with them for trades or buyouts compared to Volvo, BMWFS, or Chase, apologies.
That would be amazing. I just checked through the online portal (there’s like a pay now online) and when I go through the process the price stays the same, so I’m hoping it does include tax. I will double check tomorrow though. I hope they will give me a breakdown of the charges even if they won’t go through the process with me.
No worries at all, this was so helpful. I gotta head to bed as it’s 4 am here but will update when I hear back from them.
Thank you and everyone else who gave me advice! I’d be psyched to save 8k. We have another car to share unless we have to start commuting to work again.
Almost $4000 in add-ons and there is nothing any of these contracts can do to help repair the damage on your vehicle? I’d go over those service contracts and see if any can be used to pay for at least some of the damage.
We looked at selling the lease a few months after but were told we’d basically lose 15k to get a dealership to take it. Only tonight I checked and only about 2k difference now.