FICO Score and Interest Rates...

[KeithW]

I have been building my credit over the past 6 years, making sure never to have a late payment. I currently have 9 credit cards, and the only late payments were 3 30 days in 2009. Since then it has been perfect of every CC and loan.

With that in mind, my credit score had jumped up to a 700, then dropped back to mid 600s when I had my CC utilization jump up to 63%, bought a new car, and opened a new CC last fall.

I am in the process of getting my CC Utilization down, it is around 50% now, but what has me confused is my interest rate on the auto loan.

Even though my FICO had dropped down to 650 when they pulled it for the auto loan, they approved me immedately at 1.99% through Ford.

Two years prior my FICO was 680 and we bought a car, but they would only go down to 5.99%.

[CH-7-Mission-Accomplished]

1.99% is an excellent interest rate.

Ford Motor Finance is a captive lender whose job it is is to help Ford dealers sell cars.  The low rates are kind of like a rebate or a concession they make to help make it easier to sell.  A 650 is a decent score.  The other lender was probably purely in the lending business and wasn't also making money on the sale of the car per se.

With a higher score you likely would have qualified for a 0% loan.

[KeithW]

Thank you for the helpful answer.