I saw several posts back, you mentioned a Tiguan. Not to give the VW fan boys a heart attack lol, but I wouldn't. And I've owned multiple VW's and was a VW service advisor. Individually and as a family, we've had 6 VW's combined. Two were reliable as sunrise. My sister still has her 2005 Jetta since new. Yes it's 11 years and 150,000 miles old now, but the repairs started long ago. It doesn't break every day, but when it does, it's always $1000+. Me and my hubby are now on our third Hyundai/Kia product in 8 years - curently 2012 Kia Forte5 SX with 80,000 reliable miles, and my two month old 2015 Sonata Sport 2.0T Limited. Still "new" but a great car. And the Sonata is part of my long-winded point lol.
When I went car shopping, it was more as a "let's just see now rather than wait until later in the year". My scores were lower than yours. With my scores and income, Capital One pre-approved me for $17,000. With a $6000 down-payment in hand, that meant my cap was $23,000 out the door for whatever car. I let the dealer run my credit anyway. With my $6000 down payment, Hyundai Financial approved me at 4.9% with using the $2500 Factory cash back and the Hyundai Financial $2000 incentive all going towards the down payment. So essentially a $10,500 down payment and financing me for $4000 more than Cap One. Had Hyundai not approved me for the car I really wanted, I'd have waited until later this year to have more of a down payment on my own.
MORAL lol: A car that has some good cash-back offers whether factory or their financing, might help your upside down trade situation a lot.
CH 7 Discharged 6/10/15
T/U - 643
EQ - 588
Ex - 647 as of 6/14/15
