My Wife's Co-Signing Nightmare!

[Anonymous]

In 2009 my Wife Co-signed for her Cousin for a brand new Toyota Camry. At the time her cousin had a decent job, however she had terrible credit. Everything was great until about four months ago when her cousin moved to a different state and has been jobless since. Low and behold, it turns out that she has stopped making payments on the car and it is now considered over 60 days late. At one point Toyota was threatening my wife with having it Repo'd. During all this chaos, I found out that when her cousin bought the car my wife's name was named as the owner of the car and her cousin was considered the co-signer. Her cousin is having a difficult time making payments on the vehicle and the car is more than likely upside down. This vehicle is over 1,600 miles away, and she is behind about $600 on the vehicle. Should I just go fly over there and pick up the vehicle and drive it back? Would driving the vehicle to the nearest Carmax to sell it outright be a viable option? Does anyone know if Carmax would even work with her cousin to downgrade to a cheaper more affordable vehicle, even though she is behind on her current car payment and is currently jobless. Ugh..Moral of the story is to NEVER EVER EVER COSIGN! My wife has definitely learned her lesson, that is for sure. Any advice would be more than appreciated, thank you!!

[IOBA]

IMO, yes, if the cousin can not make the payments, then take the car back.  Most likely, you will not be able to take it to the nearest Carmax and sell it.  It has both the cousin's name and your wife's name on the title right?

Take your wife with you when you go recover the car.   Drive it back together.  

You can try to refinance it in just your wife's name or your name.  That would get the cousin's name off of the paperwork.

And you should insure the car right now.

If you have ANY hesitations, please read what I posted in the thread, in this forum, of "Woes of a co-signer".  I think it's my 2nd post in that thread, but it lists 6 ways you could be financially ruined in addition to the car payments NOT being made.

[IOBA]

The link for the thread I mentioned.   Read it all.

http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Auto-Loans/Woes-of-being-a-co-signer/td-p/1170761

And a ps about cousin going to Carmax - your wife has to sign off on the title before the cousin can do anything with the car.   At this point, it's probably best to get the cousin to write a note or something giving the car back to you guys, and you keep it/sell it.   

[GCSCORE]

First thing your wife needs to do is bring the account up to date to prevent further lates from showing up on her credit report.

Is the cousin telling you to come get the car?  

[pizzadude]

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@Anonymous wrote:

In 2009 my Wife Co-signed for her Cousin for a brand new Toyota Camry. At the time her cousin had a decent job, however she had terrible credit. Everything was great until about four months ago when her cousin moved to a different state and has been jobless since. Low and behold, it turns out that she has stopped making payments on the car and it is now considered over 60 days late. At one point Toyota was threatening my wife with having it Repo'd. During all this chaos, I found out that when her cousin bought the car my wife's name was named as the owner of the car and her cousin was considered the co-signer. Her cousin is having a difficult time making payments on the vehicle and the car is more than likely upside down. This vehicle is over 1,600 miles away, and she is behind about $600 on the vehicle. Should I just go fly over there and pick up the vehicle and drive it back? Would driving the vehicle to the nearest Carmax to sell it outright be a viable option? Does anyone know if Carmax would even work with her cousin to downgrade to a cheaper more affordable vehicle, even though she is behind on her current car payment and is currently jobless. Ugh..Moral of the story is to NEVER EVER EVER COSIGN! My wife has definitely learned her lesson, that is for sure. Any advice would be more than appreciated, thank you!!

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Wow, I am sorry that you have to deal with this mess.   Assuming that you can get the vehicle I would definately make arrangements to sell it to stop the bleeding.

I hope that you can at least enough for the car to settle the note on the car.

Who is on the title to the vehicle ?   If it is your wife only then you can sell it without her cousin.   Otherwise, as has been mentioned, you will have to get her involved.

DO NOT worry about trying to get Carmax or someone else to work with her on a new car, the finance people will just want you co~sign again.  There ain't no way that her  cousin is going to get approved with no job/income and recent late payments.

[CS800]

Sorry to hear about your wife. I was a cosigner too once and man i paid for it dearly. Never again though.