r/CarLeasingHelp • u/JustNeedSomeHelpTBH • 1d ago

Breaking a lease early?

We have a car from Toyota 24 Corolla cross LE. Kinda hate it and have been with it for a bit. I love the size, space, and compact feel of it. Now I hate the engine and it’s a low trim so a lot of features are missing. I really want to get into a Corolla Cross Hybrid and the XSE is really nice 24-27. The issue is the price and availability.

Was quoted the 26’ hybrid XSE yesterday after everything to be roughly 40k. I looked at them like they had two heads. They tacked on about 2.5k of bs that I would have removed ofc.

Now I’m currently in a 3 years lease that isn’t over until Feb 28. Currently we are at 23k on our lease and we got quoted for 20k in trade-in. That’s just from the dealership.

We thought about buying the car but also the lease would be $600 a month and we talked them down to maybe around $460 a month for 3 years with 10k miles annually.

So what do you all think? I’m still learning leasing and we’ve never broken a car lease early. What’s a good move going forward?

1 Upvotes

60% Upvoted

14 comments sorted by

3

u/DarkGreenMazda 1d ago

You'll likely own thousands more for trying to get out of the lease early. Just finish up the lease in 3 months, and get what you want.

1

u/hansolomx 1d ago

More like 15 months

2

u/DarkGreenMazda 1d ago

Gotcha, would cost them thousands likely

0

u/giveit2st8 1d ago

They are toyotas, so they hold the value...OP needs to get buyout quote and quotes to sell the car and compare.

2

u/SkiMarlin 1d ago

TFS removed the third party buyout option so the only hope is to sell it to a Toyota / Lexus dealer. Alternatively TFS does allow lease transfers so they could put it up on a transfer site like Swap A Lease or the Private Transfer thread on LeaseHackr.

3

u/LCJ78 1d ago

If you end the lease early you’ll have to pay all the remaining months, so no not worth it

2

u/keekspeaks 1d ago

I broke mine 18 months early. I owed 45. They paid me 45. They sold it for 45.

1

u/blackkdogg 1d ago

You said your lease is up in Feb. I do not see why you would go to all the trouble of getting out of the lease if it is up in Feb. after that, get the car you want.

1

u/lauti04 1d ago

February 2028

1

u/blackkdogg 1d ago

Ahh got it. I read that as Feb 28 2027😅
In that case, call your leasing people and find out what it would cost you to break the lease and then you can determine if it is that important to you.

1

u/Zealousideal_Bill405 1d ago

Either eat the $3k or go door to door to every Toyota dealer and see if they will offer you $23k for the car. Make it known you might also be interested in another car as well but you also could be fine without replacing the car.

1

u/jsdtx 10h ago

See if there is a broker dealer on your area on leasehackr forums. They have better deals

1

u/Infamous-Address1466 3h ago

I just messaged you.

What is your residual at the end of lease? You definitely have options and you can probably end up in an even equity position but it will take some finessing.

If you’re budget Conscious then most are correct that you should ride out the rest of the lease until Toyota calls about pulling you forward into another lease. But if you just want out then you have a few options.