Anyone have any experience with getting rid of a leased vehicle? I have a 2005 Civic that I need to get rid of before I can leave for the US. If anyone has experience with this I'd love to get some feedback!

It's a bad deal all around... Bad, bad, bad....

Don't know what to tell you, but I would try to talk with a dealer about how to get out of a lease by buying the vehicle now... and not some shady "lease buster" deal... remember, you'd still be on the hook for the lease...

Reading the lease document it clearly states that if i terminate the lease early I am on the hook for the remainder of the lease payments (about 8K right now). Not really an option.

Like I said .. it's a bad deal all around... had to do the same thing with my wife.. we ended up giving it to her brother to drive until the lease was up and had to pony up for his insurance for a year to make the deal work... but were able to transfer the lease over to him after getting hit with a $1,000 transfer fee from GMAC and the couple of grand to pick up his insurance

As I said, your dealer may be able to help you on this... but this really is a no win situation... don't be surprised if you have to pay through the nose to make the numbers work out...

If you don't know someone who would be able to take over your lease, then going through a broker like Lease Busters is probably your best bet, but just be aware that it will cost you at a minimum the transfer fee, some lease payments and other cash on the hood plus lease busters fee... don't be surprised if it will cost you $3 to 4 k to get out of your lease...

I don't know where you are in the process, but if you have months to go before you enter the States and marry, might there be some wiggle room?

Kinda feel a bit silly for answering my own Posting, but I found all this out this week -

Leasebusters at least for my part of the country (Atlantic) is really not geared up for us. It's mostly Central Canada (ONT & PQ). I went to my Honda dealer, and they told me my options are the following:

Place an ad in the local papers (buy sell & trade, papers etc). Ask someone to takeover the lease, and advertise myself. (400$ for a lease transfer, plus i'll probably have to offer a couple of months payments up to make the transfer seem appealing)

Let their used car sales guy buy it from me (I'd end up paying about 200% more than doing the lease buy out on this option, but at least it's AN option if i have trouble finding someone to take over the lease).

Buy the car outright. He was unclear about loans, but I believe if you don't own the title, you can't import the car.

Anyway, that was my findings to date. At least I have an option if i can't find a lease taker. I have high KMS, so that's my major issue.

1 good thing for you,most honda's are a desirable car that keep their value. Try putting it up for sale, you might be suprised of the people wanting to buy it. And giving a few months free with a lease buy might be what some one is looking for, people like free!! I sold my car for a major loss. If I had liked it would have brought it over, but for a car ( a 2004 Nissan Spec V) that I did not like, not worth the hassle. Best of luck

From what Ive read , not all financing institutions require the note to be paid before importing the car. However my husband, a honda driver, called Honda financing and they said they do require the loan to be paid upon importation of the vehicle to the U.S..



I was wondering if , since initially you wont be required to acquire a new registration , you could continue to make your payments as is until the time you need to re-register your vehicle? Just a thought............

By law I think one onlyhas like 30 days before the registrationmust be changed. Most likely varies from State to State. DMV.org would probably tell ya

I got lease on my car, a Toyota echo 2003 with 18 months left on it.

So here are my solutions.

I cant buy the car as I would have to get out 13 000$ (money left on it plus taxes) straight in order to have the title of the car. If you get a loan to buy it you still dont have the title. No title = no license plate in the US because its an imported car. As for the lease itself you cant get your car out of Canada for more than 30 days.

So either I tranfert the lease to someone else ( 500$ ), or I sell it for the value left on the car. I got only 30 000 km on it so its still really good for someone that wants to drive like crazy in a year !

But my dealer offered this to me. I asked what If I need to move to the US now and I cant find someone to sell the car to? They told me they would evaluate my car, lets say 8000$, and then I would have to pay the difference that is left on the buy back without taxes. So if there is 10 000$ left I would have to pay the difference of 2000$. Im putting money aside for that right now. In January 2006 they said my car had a 10 500$ value and I had 12 700$ left on it. so 2200$ to have them taking my car back to sell it back at 13 000$. Whatever .

Im sad cause I wanted to buy the car after the lease back in 2003. Never knew my future would change so much . That was my first and last lease in a lifetime. Too much hassles.

So I checked the Michigan Secretary of State website.........

TECHNICALLY as soon as you become a resident of the state , you're required to register your vehicle...however........if youre not planning to stay then its not required. So to me it begs the question......how would they know.....how would anyone know really. So if you needed more time to pay off the lien or get out of a lease.
I dunno , just a thought.

Thanks for your input guys!! Yeah I thought about doing that.. just getting a loan and paying it back, but the registration thing gets ya.. And I have over half of the vehicle left to pay.. so unless EAD comes through in 2 weeks and Donald Trump hires me as the next apprentice than.. I think I'm over my head in this

Mephys my Honda guy offered that to me as well.. I'm going to try the whole "lease buy out thing" for a couple of weeks, and at least I know that's my last resort. I was careful not to tell Mr. Honda guy that i'm planning on leaving in 3 weeks - he would give me even less if he knew he had me over a barrell.. SO.. just a heads up for you there, in case you haven't talked time frame with them.

I havent said timeframe and anyways that discussion happened in January 2006 SO i dont think they even remember me. But I am planning of getting rid of my car 2 months before I move to the US. Luckily I have been living with my mom for the last year cause I couldnt get into an appartment lease cause I didnt know how long it would take for me to move. And my mom just got hired 3 months ago at my workplace so Ill be travelling with her in the last few weeks. So i really dont have a date to give them, ill just tell them Im moving to the US in the future. Hopefully the money I will save by not having a car payment + insurances in the last 2 months will cover a little bit for what I will have to pay to get rid of it.

So my latest update is this. I have advertised on the Internet, the local paper, the local buy sell & trade, and nothing. Very few calls, and not a lot of interest in my high KM baby. She looks like a brand new car right now (just been to the detailers), but she's going to have to go back. Been racking my mind about what I've learned here, but the truth of the matter is, no one could have forseen 2 1/2 years ago that I would be packing up and moving to the US.. SO.. whatever.. cut our losses, give the car back to Honda, pay our $$ and be done with it!!! (only 5 more sleeps till POE day!!)

I know you've probably put all of the car stuff behind you by now but I was just wondering what the final outcome was with your Honda lease? How much did you end up paying out? Only asking because I'm going to be in a similar situation a few months from now...

Thanks!

Sure!!! It was a frustrating, exhausting experience. I ended up paying Honda 3000$(including my last car payment) to take the car back. I had too many KMS on the car for anyone to want to take over the lease. I had people look at it, but they all ended up buying new (sigh). The ad in the paper ended up being the best bang for my buck, and I did have some serious calls, but the KMS turned so many off.

I talked to the business manager at my local honda dealership and he told me it would be about 2500$ to return the car. He never returned my calls, refused to do what I asked of him and was a general pain in the butt! When the "mechanic" finally looked at my car they said they were going to ask 3000$ for it (I had just made a payment via direct deposit). I ended up going back to the guy who sold it to me, and he said "why didn't you contact me earlier??".. that's my tip.. contact your salesman first.. he will help sell the car (or at least mine would have), he heard all the troubles I was having with the business manager and knocked a few heads around and got the price knocked down again. Basically Honda didn't want my car either..gah! It was a lot of money, and it upset me but I got it off my hands (on Friday I left for the US on Monday) eek!

I'd also like to know how this turned out. I am facing a similar problem with a Kia Spectra. They told me I could either buy it outright (not possible), pay the remainder of the lease (not possible), or transfer. They did not mention any option of letting their used car dept buy it from me with me paying the difference. I tried to bring this up but maybe I didn't use the right words. I'll try again in a few months. Assigning the lease would be ideal, but we need the car, so if it sold even two weeks early, we'd be in trouble of a different sort.

The Honda dealership that I used had a used car department. They did buy out leases, although they had the exact same car as mine (minus the spoiler) sitting on their used car lot. I think it was one reason that I got such a sucky deal. When I pressed the business manager about the price and that he wasn't doing a very good job for me he said "we just don't want your car".. to which I said, "you guys are getting a sweet deal in this, I've paid for the lease for 2 years, and I'm GIVING you money to take it off my hands, you are not hurting on this deal buddy".. GAH.. anyway, my best advise is to talk to the salesman who sold you the car at the dealership. My salesman was very empathetic and said he would do everything he could to help me.

As a woman selling a car is a VERY frustrating experience, my hubby wished so much he could be there to help..