The most challenging part of my move to NYC was getting out of my three-year auto lease. My son-in-law told me about Swap-a-lease dot com which gave me a good head-start. I didn’t know it was even possible to do such a thing. Registering on Swap-a-Lease and finding a buyer was the easy part.

Getting through the Toyota Financial Services paperwork, for someone else to assume my lease, was a Herculean task. Everything had to be a ‘wet’ copy.  No faxes or scans allowed. The new owner and I had to wait for snail mail to deliver envelopes from Iowa to New York and the Boston area where he lives.

In addition to the overwhelming paperwork hoops, the clock was ticking on my CT registration which expired October 30. Now that it’s all behind me, I can say that I took a calculated risk after trying my hardest to get temporary plates.

I showed up at the DMV (this ranks on my list below getting root canal) on Saturday, October 27 with all the appropriate documentation. I knew there’d be a long line on a Saturday morning and waited patiently for 45 minutes to get to the head of it. Upon arrival at that desk I thought, “This isn’t so bad.” Then, the DMV worker handed me another set of forms, which I filled out and returned (gratefully without having to wait in line again). At this point, when I thought that the final step would be to receive the temporary plates, he gave me a slip of paper with this message:

Welcome to Norwalk DMV [and a very large number]
D676
10:07am
Please have a seat [no punctuation mark]
Your number will be called shortly.

By 11:15am they were up to D641 and only 3 numbers in that D sequence had been summoned. I needed to be in CT to attend the wedding of dear friends that day. The couple had asked that guests arrive at 11:30am. I thought two hours at the DMV was generous. I bagged the wait and went off to a most glorious wedding celebration. I figured I’d find my way back to CT on Tuesday (they’re closed Mondays) and breeze through a weekday crowd.

Then came Hurricane Sandy.

Roads, bridges and businesses were shut down. Thinking I’d have a few days grace due to an Act of God, I put it out of my mind. We were still waiting for paperwork from Iowa, so I wasn’t going to be able to make the swap yet.

Oh, I forgot to mention one other piece running parallel to the leasing ordeal. There was a very small dent on the side of the car. At Toyota, when I brought the car in for its final servicing, they said it would run me $350 to repair. Really? The dent was the size of a quarter, but I was committed to giving the new leaser a car in perfect condition and made arrangements for its repair.

The day I was going to move to NYC there was a note on the windshield of my car. Yes. That day. The last day I would have parked it in a public place–my apartment house’s garage. It was from the mom of a 17-year old girl apologizing for the scratch her daughter had put on the driver’s side of my car (the opposite side from my dent) when she was pulling out of an adjacent spot. The mom was honest and gracious enough to leave her cell phone number. I’m very appreciative of that, because whoever created the $350 dent did not extend me that courtesy. That new “scratch” repair was estimated at over $700.

This teenager’s mother said that her ex-husband, the girl’s dad, would take responsibility for whatever costs were incurred. They didn’t want to involve insurance companies, understandably, with such a young driver. She said that she’d text me his contact information and did.

You know how you can give a contact a nickname? Remember now, this is her ex-husband. Well, I’ll share her nickname for him a little later in this entry.

Because I was knee-deep in moving boxes, emotions and the physical requirements of my move, my generous and everloving boyfriend drove my car to his neck of the woods and handled the repairs–locating the best price, dealing with getting the payment from the girl’s dad, and having someone follow him to and from the body shop so he could leave the car while it was being worked on. Dave reported to me how easy it was to speak with the ex-husband, aka father of the car denter. He was totally compliant and asked to receive the estimates by fax; he’d send off a check pronto. That was a Friday. By the next Friday, after several phone calls, no check had arrived at the body shop. Gratefully, the body shop did the work anyway, because Dave assured him that I would be ‘good for it’ if the dad stiffed us. Saturday’s mail, no check.

After the wonderful, celebratory wedding on the 27th, we had a delightful dinner at my good friends’ home in Stamford. I was regaling them about the car situation, the mishap and the delinquent dad’s payment. My friend Dick, a lawyer, said “Say your lawyer told you to turn it over to the insurance companies from here on out.” I’d never thought of that. The second dent put the repairs well over my deductible. I thought, if I needed to, I would bring out the big guns.

I needed to.

The next morning, Dave received an email from the ex:

Glad we got a chance to talk this am, let me know your girl friend’s thoughts on sharing a small portion of the cost. If this went to insurance it would have taken way longer to resolve, making your lease return difficult. Sorry you are in the middle, if you want me to email her directly I would be happy to do so, I look forward to hearing back, thanks again,

Still no check of credit card payment to the auto body shop.

I called upon the wisdom of Dick and said “No.” And that, on the advice of my lawyer, I would now turn it over to my insurance company. Here was his immediate reply:

You have lawyers! As a I said I am paying him today.

And he did by credit card over the phone on a Sunday. BTW, his ex-wife’s nickname from him when she sent me his contact information is: The Evil One.

The final chapter: The new leaser hadn’t been able to get to DMV to get new MA plates for the car. The original plan, to meet halfway in Springfield, MA wasn’t going to work. I made the decision to deliver the car to his door, remove my plates (which had now expired) and have him put me on the next Amtrak train to NYC. I was willing to wait at the train station for however long, grateful that this leg of the journey was complete.

The exchange was peaceful and harmonious, and he drove me to the 128 Station, a little closer to NYC than the South Boston one. I dashed out of his car, went to the counter to buy my ticket and was told the train was on the platform right now. I made it on, relaxed back into my seat and let out a huge sigh of relief. It felt like a gift that the doors of the train were open and welcoming me aboard after a very hard job completed.

I’m thrilled to be done with car payments, insurance, being aware about gas prices and sitting in traffic. Yes, I’ve traded this in for subway fares, crowds and being out in the weather, but I’m ready for the new experiences and glad that this saga is over.