About a month ago my mother signed a lease for a new car. When talking price she told the dealership she had some special discount but did not have the information present. They apparently guessed the discount code, based the price on it, and she signed the contract with it. She has already made one regular lease payment for the car.
The dealer has now come back saying she had no right to use the code she did and she owes the dealership itself a decent amount of money. They have quickly become very aggressive and are resorting to legal threats.
My opinion is that the dealership made the mistake and it is theirs alone. They are becoming aggressive because they won't get their commision. They were responsible for validating the terms of the lease before signing it. The lease is a contract between my mother and the leasing company. If for any reason the lease was invalid it would be between the leasing company and my mother and the the dealership would not be involved. In the worst case the lease would be null and void. She could sign a new lease and pay the money or let them take back the car. I seriously doubt it is worth it to the leasing company to pursue this amount of money.
What are your opinions on the issue? If you have any legal documentation to support your opinion please post it.
Thanks.
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Edit:
I thought some people might be interested in a quick update here.
My mother called the leasing company directly to talk to them about the matter. The first thing they determined is that the difference for the discounts was about $200, not $2000 like the dealer tried to bill my mother for. After that the company said the dealer had no right to ask for money in the manner they did. They suggested that my mother take the car to another dealership for service and said they would handle the matter.
A few days after the call my mother received a letter from the dealership apoligizing for the confusion and saying nothing was owed.
I guess the dealership got a bit greedy in the end. The funny thing is if they would have asked for the true difference my mother probably would have just paid them to get them to go away.
The dealer has now come back saying she had no right to use the code she did and she owes the dealership itself a decent amount of money. They have quickly become very aggressive and are resorting to legal threats.
My opinion is that the dealership made the mistake and it is theirs alone. They are becoming aggressive because they won't get their commision. They were responsible for validating the terms of the lease before signing it. The lease is a contract between my mother and the leasing company. If for any reason the lease was invalid it would be between the leasing company and my mother and the the dealership would not be involved. In the worst case the lease would be null and void. She could sign a new lease and pay the money or let them take back the car. I seriously doubt it is worth it to the leasing company to pursue this amount of money.
What are your opinions on the issue? If you have any legal documentation to support your opinion please post it.
Thanks.
--------------------------------------------------------------
Edit:
I thought some people might be interested in a quick update here.
My mother called the leasing company directly to talk to them about the matter. The first thing they determined is that the difference for the discounts was about $200, not $2000 like the dealer tried to bill my mother for. After that the company said the dealer had no right to ask for money in the manner they did. They suggested that my mother take the car to another dealership for service and said they would handle the matter.
A few days after the call my mother received a letter from the dealership apoligizing for the confusion and saying nothing was owed.
I guess the dealership got a bit greedy in the end. The funny thing is if they would have asked for the true difference my mother probably would have just paid them to get them to go away.