Lease Trade In
 

So my lease is coming up and I will likely be picking up an FR-S. I see tons of info on this in the US but I wasn't sure if this was common in Canada. My residual is quite a bit lower than market/trade in value. Has anyone had any experience working out a deal where you trade in a leased vehicle with a lower residual in the past?

Is that you Yan? :bellyroll:

LOL funny seeing you here Johnny

I'm here because I'm waiting for the new toy to arrive:happyanim:

If the residual is a lot lower, you might finance buying the vehicle outright and then selling it privately for market value so you can apply the profit to your new ride. Depends a lot on the difference, the demand for your current ride (and therefore the likelihood you'd be able to sell it quickly and for what you expect), etc. Just a thought.

Buy it out, sell privately. Pretty simple...

There are 2 key things here that I need to say...

1) Keep in mind you residual value is taxable and will therefor be 13-ish% higher than the number you see. For you not to lose any money, you would have to sell the car for that new amount...which the person buying it from you would have to again pay taxes on. At which point, the car would no longer be under market value.

2) that aside, what kind of car do you drive that has a residual value lower than the current market value? (Assuming you took a regular or low-mileage lease - if you took 35K + lease, than it's understandable) I work in sales and have never seen a car actually worth more than the residual value.

With answers to these questions, I might be able to help you out a little easier. Cheers.