Terminating a lease early is a costly headache.

One option is to turn the car over to the leasing company and pay early termination fees, which can be substantial. The earlier you turn in the car, the bigger the fees.

If your lease allows, another option is to find someone to take over your lease. Many Web sites will help you find someone. You will have to pay a fee, but it is likely to be less than the early termination fee you would pay the leasing company.

Another option is to exercise an early termination purchase option and either keep the car or sell it yourself and use the money to offset the amount you paid to purchase the vehicle. You can get an idea of the current market value of the car at www.edmunds.com or www.kbb.com.

You also could trade in your car for a new one, but beware. You aren’t really avoiding the termination fees, the dealer most likely will roll them into the new car lease.

The worst option is to simply drive the car to the leasing company and turn over the keys, without satisfying your obligations. Unlike the other options, this will show up on your credit report as a "repo," and negatively affect your credit rating.

For more, see http://www.federalreserve.gov/pubs/leasing/resource/consider/endclosed.htm.