Need to refi my car or purchase a new car & considering trying NFCU

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Hi guys, I've been able to rebuild and tackle most of my credit goals here within the past two months thanks to this forum.I now need to work on refinancing my car at a MUCH more favorable intrest rate or trading my car in for another as this purchase was one of those "credit rebuilder" purchases.  So here is my situation -

2008 Chevy Impala

88k miles

APR 22.99%

Amount remaining $10,466.99

Payments remaining 38

Monthly payment $354.76

I bought this car when my credit was complete crap but my 3B FICO scores as of today are EX-652, EQ-636, TU-589

I bank with NFCU so trying to refi or do a trade in with them is an option FYI

Also, I app'd for and was approved for 2 new credit cards last night (Amex blue cash everyday and Discover IT). The inquiries show on my report BUT the accounts do not as of yet. I'd imagine that these accounts will increase my FICO when they report rather than make me take a hit but anything is possible right?

I'm wondering if I should try to do my refi now before these new accounts appear on my file (potentially making me look desperate for credit) or wait until they do appear in a month OR insert your opinion here. I 've never refinanced a car before and don't know how doing this now may set me back. What I mean by that is I'm not actively looking for a new car but I'm considering it and maybe if i refi now, NFCU wouldn't do a new auto loan with me for a year or so down the road. An ideal situation is probably one where I get out of the car that I am in now and "upgrade"  to a newer car with a lower interest rate and get a lot more bang for my buck.

Any and all suggestions are welcome and I'm open to other financing options besides NFCU. 

My credit profile

FICO from CCT: EX-652, EQ-636, TU-589

My current inquiry situation: EX-3,EQ-2,TU-3

Baddies: EX-0,EQ-0,TU-1

Last late payment: 7 months ago

No BK's ever

No public records

Credit util:8%

Oldest credit line:17 years

Avg age of credit 6.6 years

Thanks guys!

[Anonymous]

 Congratulations on your progress so far with rebuilding - unfortunately, there isn't very good news about this car.

Trading it in would probably be the worse option, financially speaking, because you have somewhere in the range of $5-7K in negative equity sitting there, depending on the condition of the car and its body kit.  You would have to finance whatever price the newer vehicle is, plus that $5-7K, and while your scores are greatly improved, you are still not in prime interest territory for auto lending (that's generally over 680), so you're still going to have a higher interest rate.  Should  be nowhere near the monster rate you have now, but will likely be in the 6-10% range.

Obviously selling it will  not help either, as I don't imaging you could get $11K for it, so you wouldn't be able to pay off the original lender and clear the title that way.

I think your best option at this point is to pursue a refi, and if you belong to the credit union already that is probably a good place to start.

As far as planning only to keep it another year and then buy something new, assuming you can get it refinanced and then make extra principal payments,  you may be able to get the car's trade-in value and remaining principal balance into line by then.  The only way this is probably going to work is if you get relief on the interest, which means you need to refinance yesterday.  With your scores and profile, you should be able to get a fair deal on refi, especially if you have a good relationship with your credit union.  Then with aggressive paying on principal for the next year, you could be in a good place to get financing on a new car - with a solid year of payment history on the refi loan added into your profile.  Assuming you eat away at the distance between your principal owed and your current car's value, you could enter a new car loan with only a small piece of negative equity to deal with.