My 2003 S8 is coming off its lease next month and have been wondering what to do while I wait a year for the next S8. My best options appear to be to either get a one year incentivized lease on an S4 (2005.5) or get a two year lease on an A8 and then early terminate. Does anynoe have any insights as to how expensive that can be? Alternatively, I could try to get rid of the lease in the secondary market. Does anyone know how liquid that market is?

try to find a different car for the term, or keep the S8. The depreciation on the lease + buyout might snake you pretty hard. Leases aren't designed to get out of, and if you do you're going to pay.

You'd have to get a dealer or another to buy the car, and if it's close to wholesale or above, you might get clear. If value drops further than anticipated, you're left holding the bag. Doing a lease swap isn't the greatest idea, because you're still holding the bag if someone defaults.

S8 values seem to be holding well...think about buying it at the end of your lease, then selling when it's time to get in.

I was considering that, but won't the value of the old S8 plummet when the new one comes out?

I can only extend for 6 months, I am told.

Never gotten out of a lease early unless it was though a dealer of the same brand.

Tell you Audi dealer you want an S8. See what he can give you in the meantime. They are in the market to sell cars. They'll make it work for you.

and there seems to be a bit of a cult market out there for it. It's not like an A6 which becomes worthless....

If it's a nice car and you've maintained it, it might not be bad to hold onto it. I think you'll get hosed pretty bad just to try and get out of the car early in a lease. Any car within it's first year takes a big hit....

Leases are designed to beat you up if you try and get out early. With your S8, it does have want and value. The dealers however, with the used car market, can get stuff pretty cheap, but still want a large premium over what they get the cars for.

as long as you're willing to pay. At month 13 let's say for a 36 month lease, they aren't going to do much except charge you a big premium to get out....unless you're close to value on trade in and where you are at in payments. If you have a car that depreciates fast, you're in for a hit.

If I am going to lease another car from them they'l let me out.

If I want to turn in the A8 for a 911 then it's gonna cost me.

That's just my experience anyways.

Generally, when you get out of your lease early, you still have to make the remainder of payments. So if you have a 36 month lease with payments of $1000/month, but want to get out at 18 months, you have to come up with the last 18 months of payments. That could possibly be another $18,000. The problem is that you are paying interest and fees on the money PLUS depreciation on the car for the last 18 months, even though you are not using it. Your dealer will offer you special "deals" to get you to roll over your lease, but usually much of the costs are just quietly rolled into your new lease. The problem with a lease include: 1) the numbers are not as transparent as a loan and 2) they are costly to get out of. It is not that leases are a bad idea, just a bad idea if you plan to terminate early. Some third party leasing companies structure the leases differently and the above may not apply.

In your situation, I would consider buying your 2003 S8 and keeping it until the new S8 comes along. That of course assumes you can buy the 2003 S8 at a good price. I think it will hold its value pretty well. The S and RS cars seen to depreciate fast the first few years and then become fairly stable. The B5 S4 and RS6 are examples that support this.

Personally, I too am thinking about an S8. I am thinking about a 24 month lease, which may be pretty close to the correct the time frame for US arrival of the new S8. I?sup>TM</sup>m waiting until something official is announced to make my final plans.

How did you do that? LOL

3-year '96 A6 lease. Early terminated for about $1,700 (if I remember correctly)--which was the difference between buyout and what wholesaler was offering for the car. On the other hand, when I inquired into getting out of my 2-year allroad lease after 1 year, the buyout was about 4 grand!!! Man, that would have been a harsh depreciation hit.

D3. The salesperson at the time said that if it's through Audi Financial then the dealership would buy my car from me. They do this for A8 owners occasionally. He said there would be no penalties.