Cost data

What Is the Disposition Fee for Each Brand?

Written by JaredReviewed by JaredLast reviewed 2026-08-07

Figures reviewed 2026-08-07 (today). Rate data is sourced per table and each table states its own reporting period.

What is a disposition fee, and who sets the amount?

A disposition fee is a flat charge for returning a leased car instead of buying it, and it covers the cost of cleaning, inspecting, and reselling the vehicle. The amount is set by the finance company behind the lease, known as the captive, not by the dealer you signed with. Complete Car Lease is not a dealer, lessor, or broker; we do not set or collect these fees, and this page reports what each captive has published about its own.

Generalist sources typically quote a flat "$350 to $500" range for disposition fees industry-wide, with luxury brands at the high end. That range is a reasonable starting point, but it blends every brand together. The brand-by-brand figures below come from each captive's own lease-end guide, offer disclosure, or support page, checked directly in August 2026. Not every captive states its dollar figure in the same place: Toyota's own lease-end guide confirms the waiver terms but not the $350 amount itself, which appears instead on Toyota's own new-vehicle lease offer pages rather than the lease-end guide cited here.

What disposition fee does each brand charge?

Amounts below, current as of August 2026, are what each captive currently publishes on its own site or in its own lease-end materials. Where a captive does not publish a specific dollar figure, that is noted rather than guessed.

A few brands, Honda, Ford, BMW, and Tesla among them, confirm the fee exists and describe how it can be waived, but as of August 2026 none of the four states the dollar amount on its own consumer-facing pages. Mercedes-Benz and Audi sit in a middle category: each brand's own site suggests a fee in the $495 to $595 range without stating a plain base amount clearly enough to confirm as fact, so this page reports what each source actually says rather than converting an implied number into a confirmed one. Treat any specific number you see for these brands elsewhere as unverified until your own lease paperwork confirms it.

Chrysler, Jeep, Dodge, and Ram share a different captive, Stellantis Financial, in the same way Chevrolet, GMC, Buick, and Cadillac share GM Financial. This page does not include a verified Stellantis figure because we could not confirm one on the captive's own published materials.

Why do Chevrolet, GMC, and Cadillac charge different amounts if GM Financial handles all three?

Because GM Financial, the single finance company behind all four GM brands, sets a separate published ceiling in each brand's own lease-end guide. Chevrolet's 2024 guide states a disposition fee of up to $395. GMC's 2025 guide states up to $495 for the same fee, described in nearly identical language. Cadillac's 2026 guide does not print a number at all, only that a fee "may" apply where state law allows it.

This is the clearest example on this page of why "GM's disposition fee" is the wrong question. GM Financial is one company, but it publishes different figures by nameplate, and only checking your specific brand's own materials tells you the real number.

How do you get the disposition fee waived?

The pattern across nearly every captive is the same: buy your own leased car, or lease or finance another vehicle from the same brand within a window the captive sets. Toyota's window is 30 days after return, or a history of 3 or more prior contracts. Nissan's confirmed window is 30 days after you return the vehicle. Several brands, including Hyundai and Kia, are commonly cited at 60 days, though we could not confirm that exact figure on the captive's own primary page.

These windows and conditions are not fixed forever. Captives change loyalty programs, and a waiver that applied to your friend's lease last year may not match yours. Confirm the current terms with your finance company before you count on a waiver. For the full synthesis of both levers into one actionable plan, see can you avoid the disposition fee.

Does buying your leased car instead of returning it avoid the fee?

Yes, at every captive checked for this page. Toyota, GM Financial, Nissan, Mercedes-Benz, Audi, BMW, and Ford all state that the disposition fee applies to returned vehicles, not purchased ones. If you exercise your lease's purchase option and buy the car, the fee simply does not come up, because there is no vehicle for the captive to recondition and resell.

That is a different decision from a loyalty waiver, which still requires returning your current car but rewards you for leasing or buying a new one from the same brand. Buying out your own lease is the more direct path if you want to skip the fee without shopping for a replacement vehicle.

Is the disposition fee big enough to change your lease-end decision?

Usually not on its own. Run the math on a realistic 36-month lease: a $32,000 MSRP car with a $30,000 negotiated price, a 60% residual, and a 0.00275 money factor comes to $15,671 in total base payments over the term, computed rather than estimated. Toyota's confirmed $350 fee is about 2.2% of that total. GMC's confirmed $495 fee, the highest confirmed base figure on this page, is about 3.2% of it.

Keep the fee in proportion. It is real money, and worth knowing about before your lease-end date arrives, but it is small next to what you already paid in rent charge and depreciation over three years. The bigger lease-end decisions, whether to return, buy, or roll into a new lease, should turn on the car's actual value and your own driving needs, not on a few hundred dollars you can often see coming and plan around.

Argued honestly against interest: a few hundred dollars in disposition fees rarely tips the return-versus-buy decision, but the far bigger cost most shoppers ignore is leasing itself for drivers who do not fit the pattern. If you drive well over your mileage allowance every year, or you keep vehicles for a decade or more, the rent charge and repeated acquisition and disposition fees across several leases usually cost more in total than financing one car and driving it past its loan payoff. A brand's disposition fee is worth knowing; it is not worth letting it distract from that bigger comparison. For the full anatomy of every fee in a lease, start with how leasing a car works; for the broader return-versus-buy call, see leasing versus buying.