Adventures in FAKOland...

[Anonymous]

In February I needed to buy a new car and applied to CapitalOne online through their ad on the website as we have a personal and business line of credit with them (for a few years in good standing). For some reasons they passed me directly through to RoadLoans, who passed themselves off as CaptialOne at first (except in the fine print at the bottom of a very long email - their information appeared as if from CapitalOne, therefore I assumed that was the name of their auto financing program until I recieved actual paper from them). They said I was approved with a $20,000 loan - not a great interest rate, but a little better than the loan on my husband's truck - and they DHLed overnight a check (which had to be delivered twice as it was lost by DHL), paperwork to fill out verifying my income and paperwork for the dealership that said they have to fill out a form and fax it for verification of the check will bounce.

ALL OF THIS WITHOUT MY AUTHORIZATION!

I called them the first time to tell them the DHL packaged did not arrive per thier emails. I called them the second time to tell them that I didn't give them permission to write me a loan check, conditional or otherwise. I asked them about the terms of the loan and then asked them that if they don't write loans to people without W2s why did they bother to even look at my information as "self-employed" is all over my file everwhere for the last 15 years, including the information at CapitalOne, the primary of which is a business loan specialized for small business. (All I expected when I applied through CapitalOne was a quote on an auto loan from them, and hoped it would be better than average since we have a very good credit history with them - personal and business and we are both self-employed.)

When I spoke to my dealership the next day, I told them that CapitalOne and RoadLoans were the same company and explained the above to them. They pulled my credit w/o considering those to inquiries and I was written a loan for a nice car that I love at a much lower interest rate and 12 payments less on the loan (which also required extended warranties, 2 year maintenance package, and 6 year repair warranty per the bank that the dealership threw in for free). The final loan was written through Wells Fargo - I don't know much about the bank or its services, although it has a well programmed website.

I hope this helps. Don't bother with RoadLoans, and be wary of CapitalOne.

[scoreupper]

and 12 payments less on the loan (which also required extended warranties, 2 year maintenance package, and 6 year repair warranty per the bank that the dealership threw in for free). The final loan was written through Wells Fargo - I don't know much about the bank or its services, although it has a well programmed website.

Wells Fargo is a Prime Bank, they would not require you to purchase a 6 year warranty, if you look over your loan paper work and sales contract you paid for that somewhere!

It sounds like you are happy with the transaction so srry to bring it up.

Yes, I am an employee of Wells Fargo Bank NA.....this message contains my personal thoughts and is not advice on behalf of Wells Fargo ro its partners.

[jackg]

Neblet, my friend, you are beginning to see the complexity of credit repair/rebuilding and believe me, you are going to need an extreme amount of patience to accomplish what you want, which I assume is a near perfect report at all 3 CRA's.

You also need to step up above all that you see going on so you can see and understand the BIG picture.

 I'm not sure I know how to explain it to you, but I do agree with all those who say to start by getting a copy of your credit report from each CRA and begin to compare and identify the differences.

To get these reports I recommend you sign up for the following CRA monitoring services,

1. True Credit: it's owned by Transunion but it will monitor changes to all 3 credit reports and notify you when something changes. You will be able to view new credit reports every 24 hours 1 minute from all three CRA's. I believe it's $12.95/mo but it's well worth it in my opinion. Pulling daily credit reports also helps achieve something called "bumpage". Supposedly when you pull enough reports their computer system reaches overflow and begins to remove "Inquiries" from your credit report. This occurs at Equifax but not Experian. You will need to know all this shortly.

2. Equifax: their monitoring service is named "Equifax Credit Watch Gold" and it's $12.95/mo.& it does basically the same as True Credit, except you now have a way to dispute information on your Equifax credit report that may be in error. 

3. Experian: their monitoring service is "Credit Manager/Keeper" and in my opinion you probably don't need it unless you feel you have to have a way to dispute on line which I do not recommend.

Next, establish a base line for your FICO scores by purchasing them unless you already have them, I think you said you do. You are going to want to chart your progress in repairing your credit reports by monitoring FICO scores. Be patient though they are expensive, use discount code (MW01) for 20% discount. Every month in the beginning is more than enough, 6 weeks would be better. It's important to keep yourself motivated and this is how I did it. And, do not pay any attention to the comments made in the FICO reports, they will only confuse you and they are meaningless.

If you decide to do what I recommend I will be glad to help you based on my experiences over the last year. I really can explain in detail the car loan deal as I just went thru it myself.