@Anonymous wrote:
Hello, I am trying to get some advice on what to expect buying my first car from an actual dealership...I will try to give as much information as possible because this is stressing me out. : ( I just turned 20 so I am new to credit. Hwever, my score is a 687, I know that doesnt carry much weight because my oldest account is only 1 year. I have 9500 worth of student loans and I have 2 credit cards totaling 1500 dollars. i am planning on buying a certfied preowned in 2 months. I just got a promotion at my job and I will be making a little over 2000 a month. I want to go to golden one to finance, does anyone know around what my apr would be by myself. My dad is willing to sign but his credit is bad. However, he and my mom (also bad credit), got their car with 14% apr. i am also planning on putting 5 grand on my car as a downpayment. And have been at my job for 10 months. Please give as much guidance on what I should expect at the credit union and dealer as much as you can.....or any suggestions
Thank you, sorry for all the missspellings too : )
Any double digit APR is bad news. Even 8% or 9% is too much. . . use your $5k and buy a car for cash before signing up for anything close to this.
I would also say not to be so quick to jump into debt at your age. My 37 year old self wishes I had been dumping $$ in savings at 19 instead of always having payments on nice cars that have long been crushed by now. Cars get you around, but they are disposable in the end.
That being said, it's great that you are getting an early start on your credit and learning about it. Lots of places offer credit scores, but often they aren't the scores that lenders actually use. You can do a $1 weeklong trial at Credit Check Total to get the scores that lenders actually look at. (Just remember to cancel before the week is up if you're not wanting to continue the $30/month subscription automatically.)
How old are your credit cards and what kind of balances do you run on them? Ideally, you want one card to report $0 on each statement and the other to report just a few bucks.
Are you paying on your student loans yet? All payments on time? (If you're not, start NOW btw.)
If you don't have any negative items on your credit and get your scores up pretty close to 700, you could be expecting 3-5 ish % loans. A HUGE savings over the life of the loan vs. 14%.
Capital One has an Auto Prequal you can do that won't hard pull your credit and may give you a good idea where you stand. However, if your scores are good enough you will likely get an even better rate at a credit union.
Again, I'd really think about using that $5k for a cash car though. You could easily get one to last you 5 years and if you put that $350/month (or whatever) payment in savings, you're talking over TWENTY THOUSAND DOLLARS you could put towards a house. How cool would that be at 25 years old vs. having an 8 year old car that was finally paid off?
