I’m sure they’d rather go the tesla route and make it so no one can buy it out, but they’re limited by the contract which involves the people party to the contract.
I get that it’s annoying, but the crux of this is saying “I’m suing so I can force a company to sell their private property to who I want so I don’t have to pay taxes”
I thought that dealers had to purchase vehicles from the manufacturers to begin w/?
I’m sure this is pretty much the only reason why you can’t sell to 3rd parties and the States will approve this, if tax was part of the transaction, this would then be a moot point.
This is an interesting case from a legal perspective; it tests the severability of clauses in their contracts. If it’s simply their property and you don’t have the standing to sell it, fine, but this is ostensibly a third party providing BMW with payoff on YOUR behalf, which is something you ARE contractually entitled to. So for those saying there’s no grey area: it’s actually more complicated than it seems.
What I don’t get is… why didn’t the lessee simply pay off the car and then turn around and sell it to the Toyota dealership? In California, DMV doesn’t collect tax from you if you turn around and sell it within 10 days of paying off a lease. For those saying tax would’ve been due to BMWFS — that is not the case, at least in CA. I just bought out my BMW lease in 2020 and turned around and sold the car… me and my buyer met at a AAA branch (which provides DMV services) and they charged my buyer his sales tax through the vehicle registration process when I signed over the title.
Because he’s lazy and wanted his equity NOW
But it isn’t saying “hey, let carvana know how much I owe so they can cut you a check and then you can send me the title”, it’s “hey, let carvana know how much I owe so you can sell it to them and process the sale transferring ownership to them for a below market rate that only I have a claim to”.
It might be a more interesting conversation if the 3rd party dealer was fronting the money for a first party buy out, bmw was transferring ownership to the lessee, and then the lessee was transferring ownership to the 3rd party dealer separately.
Then Tax would be involved as he doesn’t have Reseller’s license.
For years every single lease didn’t come back with 4-5 figures of equity. If I was the captive I’d do the same thing, why give away your profit to customers. It’s a gray area and the only thing you’re legally entitled to is the right to purchase the car for RV but again that is beating a dead horse.
Now its giving away the profit to the dealers (for the most part)
Well, if it’s gotta go back to BMW, where do ya think the car has to go?
For every year that leases didn’t come back with equity, those were the same years anyone could buy that vehicle. But because the car makers got caught with their panties around their ankles. they wanna screw you, i.e., to rob from Paul to pay uncle Pete.
But that’s the point: it’s NOT going back to BMW the manufacturer, right? It’s going to a BMW dealership.
Which incentivizes customers to stay with the brand in a time of record low volume… also profit.
And no, @SWF I wouldn’t argue they’re screwing you. To be honest the whole idea of a 3rd party buyout is somewhat outside of the realm of the contract as it’s a massive grey area. I just don’t think they cared before since it was saving them money with overinflated RVs, and now that they have equity they want to keep it. Definitely not an ideal situation but if I was in the banks shoes I’d do the exact same thing. It’s business.
The irony in all this was it was not too long ago when these same manufacturer’s couldn’t even force the dealers to take in lease returns when they chose not to. Suddenly BMW cares but when inventory was plenty and we were being told don’t return here since you didn’t buy from us they didn’t care.
Right but who do you think the dealership will try to finance the perspective buyer with once the car is at the dealership for sale?
You wouldn’t consider they are trying to screw you, now that makes me laugh, more than you know. Since when did a bank not try to screw people over and over, I’ll tell you, never.
My BMW lease has a lengthy section about arbitration.
It may also have an opt-out clause for class action lawsuits (I don’t have the doc handy).
And that’s before even getting to the merits (or lack thereof) of the complaint.
It’s nothing personal against you the customer. You see it as they’re trying to screw you, they see it as they’re maximizing profits for the business. It’s a smart business move that they’re fully entitled to make since the law is on their side. I think the real gripe here is with the States and their taxing laws. At least for CA customers you can theoretically avoid the tax implications by buying the car out yourself and re-selling it within 10 days to avoid the sales tax. More work for the customer, but it’s not the captive’s job to make the customer’s profit-making opportunity “easy.”