@Anonymous wrote:
Many banks use NADA Retail price, which you can look up. Your dealer's finance person will also know what the LTV is on the offer you agree to!
$8000 should cover a car with a retail price of $40,000 (including taxes and fees) and that's a lot of car. If you buy something over $40,000, you can probably safely get teh LTV below 80% with a few payments, depending on what depreciation is.
I generally tell people to track their NADA price on their car every 3-6 months and see if their loan is upside down or not. If it is upside down, adjust your payment amount enough to catch up so you can always trade in if you need to.
If you regularly keep cars longer than 6 years, you likely don't have to worry about that at all. But as with all things in life, if an emergency happens where you have more car than you need, being ahead of what it's worth means you CAN trade it in and get a more financially efficient car.
Wow, thank you! I just learned a ton!
The dealer's asking price, after dealer discount of $3600 and $3000 in incentives is $33175 (MSRP is $39775 and dealer invoice is $38382 according to NADA). I'm honestly not sure I can talk them down on the asking price at all since NADA shows the lowest most recent price paid as $33553, with the highest being $36705, and they are including the incentives in that range. Wow, am I about to get a good deal? It seems like it.
(Sidenote: I tried to talk a dealer down last weekend, who was offering the same dealer discount of $3600, and it was no go, lol! So, DH and I walked. I'm glad because we've since decided on the Trail Rated version which the last one wasn't. DH wants me to do all the dealing, but we're really tag-teaming.)
Sooo, assuming I pay the asking price of $33175, plus tax and license which most estimators have coming in at about $3600. Minus my down payment, should end up financing $28775.
