Staying Fit
The Problem
In the fall of 2019, Jan Dunham, 66, a dental office manager, and her husband, Duwayne, 68, a filmmaker, splurged on a three-year lease of a fully loaded electric Audi e-tron, an SUV with room for their massive Labrador retriever in the back. Then COVID-19 hit. Jan was laid off for months, Duwayne's work dried up, and their $1,229 monthly payment (more than double the average for U.S. leases) became a burden. Returning the car and ending payments, they feared, would ding their credit score. “Can we get out of our obligation?” they wrote.
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The Advice
Duwayne and Jan Dunham leased a car prior to the pandemic.
Alyson Aliano
In normal times, exiting a car lease early is really tough. “The contracts are airtight, pro-leaser, and things can be very expensive,” says Jack Gillis, executive director of the nonprofit Consumer Federation of America. To get out, you generally have four options:
- Pay back the entire amount due on the lease and turn in the car, leaving you with no car and a lot less money
- Return the car without paying off the lease, defaulting on your commitment and hurting your credit
- Find someone to assume your lease
- Sell the car yourself — buying it from the dealer and either profiting from the sale or losing money on the deal.
But these are not normal times. Auto prices soared this spring, giving the Dunhams and me hope that high demand for used cars could lessen the financial sting. Here are the steps I suggested for them — and recommend for anyone else trying to leave a lease.
1. Start with the leasing company. See how much you'll be charged to return your car right now. That figure is usually about the total of your remaining payments, though given current used-car prices, it might be lower. The leasing company, putting the e-tron's buy-back price at around $63,000, said the Dunhams could return the car by paying $19,512 — about $1,300 less than the sum of their 17 remaining payments. They passed.
