Auto Loan Inquiries

[NeedinHelp42]

I've heard it mentioned here a number of times that when a dealer makes multiple inquiries for financing on your behalf, it ultimately is viewed or shows as one inquiry on your credit report-i.e. that you're shopping for a rate.  I'm curious if this applies to any auto loan inquiry made either by a dealer or by myself.  I've read numerous times that Toyota has a 650 floor in their tiered financing program, which hopefully would get me between 2.9%-5% on a new Highlander.  

What I'm curious about is this:  If I go to NFCU and apply for financing on my own to ensure that I have a competitive offer in place before going to the dealership, will this get lumped into the same bucket as the dealer inquiries on my report as I plan to purchase in the next couple weeks?  In other words, does it matter if it's me or the dealer inquiring, as long as we're doing it in the same time frame?

Thanks in advance for the help. 

[Anonymous]

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@NeedinHelp42 wrote:

I've heard it mentioned here a number of times that when a dealer makes multiple inquiries for financing on your behalf, it ultimately is viewed or shows as one inquiry on your credit report-i.e. that you're shopping for a rate.  I'm curious if this applies to any auto loan inquiry made either by a dealer or by myself.  I've read numerous times that Toyota has a 650 floor in their tiered financing program, which hopefully would get me between 2.9%-5% on a new Highlander.  

What I'm curious about is this:  If I go to NFCU and apply for financing on my own to ensure that I have a competitive offer in place before going to the dealership, will this get lumped into the same bucket as the dealer inquiries on my report as I plan to purchase in the next couple weeks?  In other words, does it matter if it's me or the dealer inquiring, as long as we're doing it in the same time frame?

Thanks in advance for the help. 

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The advice was not formulated from whole cloth, nor is it an anectdotal opinion, but is a standard aspect of FICO scoring.

Different Flavors of FICO do use a different time frame for inquiries that they include when coming up with a score, but for the most part a 2-3 week period. is a safe bet.  In many cases/flavors its longer.

There is no "difference" between you or the dealer.

[mross1080]

I dont know if there standards changed but I was approved for toyota a little under a year ago with around a 615 and got the promo 0% at the time.

[cdtotten]

Keep in mind your credit report will show ALL inquiries made (not 1), but for scoring purposes, all those inquiries within the period (difers by FICO model), will be scored as 1 inquiry. Having a large number of auto inquiries may result in you initially being declined for a credit product to to "too many recent inquiries", but you may have a decent shot at a recon since they were for a single purpose.

I just want to make this distinction because it appears that some people think only 1 inquiry is going to show on their reports.