Auto/FICO Score and dealer financing???

[Anonymous]

Hi,

Just wanted to ask as my husband and I are seeking to purchase a new car and the dealer is offering 2.9% financing for 60 months or 5.9% financing for 72 months. We are seeking to get the 2.9 financing but I think we may not qualify, is there anyway to get a feel beforehand on what they considered "well-qualified?" I'm aware of tier funding but is there any sort of standard quide??

My scores are better than my husband's 611TU, 624EX, 668EP but we may be better off with the auto scoring as we have never had a late payment for our autos, our credit score is low due to being a little overextended in our credit cards and a public record for a bad tenant's water bill lien that was taken care of in '03.

What are your thoughts?

[Anonymous]

I work for Toyota and 680 qualifies you for the rate programs.

[Tons_of_Debt]

Anyone know what it is for Honda??!?!

[athensguy]

I don't believe that you will qualify for the promotional APR, but that is probably decided based on your Auto-Enhanced FICO. If you have had problems but your auto history is clean, you might have a better chance. If you have a repo or auto lates, then your Auto FICO could actually be lower. I would want to have a 700 Classic FICO with perfect auto history before trying for promotional rates. American Honda Finance appears to pull TU.

[App_Addict]

I have went to several large dealerships during my search and have been surprised that they have not used a "Auto Fico"  the scores that they are pulling are the exact that I have pulled.  I expected a difference.

[Anonymous]

Honda at the time I purchased a car in May of last year was 760 for the top tier offer. If their promo is less inticing it may have gone down considerably. I eneded up going with bank financing because I couldn't qualify for the teaser rate.

[rom828]

Jhilton, is 680 pretty much the norm to qualify with Toyota?  And I assume it's different according to the various makes?

DH and I are looking to buy a car, still undecided on new or used. (Haven't quite decided the level of debt we want to sink into!! LOL)

Our FICOs are mine:  EQ 690  EX 715  TU 690  DH:  EQ 672  TU 692  EX 669

We both took some hits on our scores when we got new CCs in April.

We both have paid car loan accounts (5) going back to 1997, never late, on our reports.

Could you give me an idea what sort of % we should expect from our bank or other financing if we go the "used"  route? 

I've read the various posts here about the tiers and auto-enhanced scoring etc, but I'm still very confused.  From what I've been reading, though, our scores may not be considered "well qualified" unless the auto-enhanced version really take them um a few notches.

We want to be prepared before we go to the bank or the car lots!  DH used to sell cars "back in the day" but things have changed a lot since then!

If we'd even qualify for the 0% or other promo rates, is are there things we need to look out for, like "hidden costs", etc. ?!

 If we do go new, we would still want price of car low enough that we could pay it off in no more than 4 years (we've never financed for more than 30 months..or at least paid all the loans off in 30 months or less), but cars cost more now so we're being realistic that might take us 48 mos, and that's for something under $20K.  We're getting older, our egos aren't tied to what we drive, and we intend to keep whatever we buy til it dies.

If we opt for used, I want to be sure we're paying a reasonable interest rate.  I've seen everything from 6-7.5% for our scores, but saw another poster advising that someone with scores lower than ours could get a better % than the 5.75% they were offered.

Thanks for any advices!!

Message Edited by rom828 on 08-20-2008 04:45 PM

[Anonymous]

rom, 680 will qualify you for the special rates, 0%-3.9%.  However, you will still qualify for financing with Toyota if you chose to do traditional financing (so you could also get the rebates).  Your scores look to be in the Tier 2-3 range with Toyota -- Typically 8%-9% range.  But maybe lower through another lender.  I recommend seeing what you can qualify for through a credit union or personal banker.  Then compare that to what you are offered at the dealership.  Ask them to only send your information to 2-3 banks for good comparison.  Keep in mind that the this is an area of profit for the dealership and they want to earn your business.

[rom828]

Thanks so much,Jtilton, for the good advice!

Exactly what I wanted to know.  Plan to see what our bank can do before we go to dealership so we can make the comparison.

And we'd heard financial guru Clark Howard offer the same advice about low interest vs. rebates, so we'll be sure to really crunch those numbers.

How do you keep the dealership from sending out your info more than you want??!  I've read some horror stories on this forum of people getting 30+ inqs without their knowledge or permission.  Is there a way to protect ourselves from that....have them sign something or whatever????

[athensguy]

Navy even has a little calculator to compare their rates while taking a rebate vs. promo financing at a dealer.

Financing comparison:
http://www.navyfcu.org/calcs/CUAutoRebate.html

Here are the rest of their calculators:
http://www.navyfcu.org/calcs/index.html

Navy has a lot of useful stuff.