drbooya

I'm turning in my 2013 A4 and leasing a 2017 A4 later this month.

I had my end-of-lease inspection today by SGS, the company contracted by Audi Financial Services to check lease-end vehicles.

The process takes 45 minutes or so and involves picture-taking and testing of the car's basic functions.

I drove my car 37.5k miles on a 36k mile lease, so I expected the mileage charge.

I checked my tire tread depth and was pretty sure I'd be buying new tires (depth needs to be 1/8" minimum), so I shopped a little online before the inspection.

With the disposition fee, that comes to $350 (dispo) + $600 (tires) + $500 (mileage) = $1450.

Yikes.

So at the end of the inspection, the only non-mileage charge (which came to $388 so far) was multiple chips in the paint on the hood. This came to a charge of $220.

So that left me with $350 + $220 + $388 = $958

A local body shop quoted me $800 to paint the hood, so obviously that’s not an option.

I got on the phone with AFS who confirmed that if I did nothing but turn in the car, I’d get a bill for that total amount later.

Then at the end of the conversation, she mentioned that AFS is offering a $500 waiver of excessive wear and damage charges plus a waiver of the disposition fee if I lease or finance a new Audi before May 30th.

I’m doing that anyway, so needless to say I was pretty happy at the end of the chat on the phone!

She said to be sure and keep the turn-in receipt and the waivers should be applied automatically.

She claimed it’s rare for AFS to waive excessive wear and damage - no idea if that’s true.

So it looks like I’ll owe a mileage charge and that’s it.

I've included the front and back of the card Audi sent me with some guidelines on estimating excessive wear and damage.

CrnVuk

Thanks for the info! I've always owned, but I think when my 2014 is driven into the ground I'm going to go lease. It's the age old argument lease or buy a car. After you lease, if you don't mind, can you share your costs for leasing. There's the reality in person and what I see in adverts.

drbooya

Yep - I have all those numbers. I'm set to get the car around May 19th. If you haven't heard from me by that weekend, just PM me as a reminder and I'll post the numbers.

drbooya

Got the car today. Love it so far!

Lease numbers:

Payment = $892

The only thing I paid at signing was the first lease payment. Nothing down.

Acquisition cost was $795 and I added Audi Care for $849. Tax and title were $24.50. Documentation Fee was $119.

These were all rolled into the lease payment.

I did my own calculation using formulas from ridewithg.com and came within one dollar of the dealer's calculation.

Money Factor was 0.00199 and residual percentage was 56% (up from 55% when you add Audi Care).

The only discount I got was 6% for Audi Club of North America membership.

Let me know if you have more questions.

Mike_TX

I always lease and I've turned in only one car at lease-end. Even though I keep my cars pristine, that inspection was nerve-wracking and I didn't want to do it again.

I learned I can avoid all the inspection/charges nonsense by simply trading the car in before the end of the lease. In fact, I seldom go more than 18 to 24 months before trading nowadays, but even if you do, trade it a month before the lease ends.

After all, a lease is simply another way to finance a car, and you can trade out of it at any time. If the value of the car doesn't equal the payoff, you simply owe the difference just like when you trade out of a conventional finance contract.