Put simply: do I qualify (does this make sense)?

[jl4]

I'm looking to purchase a new car in December and am curious what the community experts think regarding how good my position going into it will be. 

I'm planning on financing with my credit union that pulls TU FICO 8 (regular) for all applications.

Credit Score: 714 (as of this morning; dropped from 727 once my previous auto loan finally reported as paid off; sad day)

AAoA: 44 months

# of positive trade lines: 40-something 

# of negative trade lines: 2 (1 closed in 2013, 30-60-30 lates from 2013; 1 30-day on co-signed auto loan with now XW) 

Income: 120K this year

Lenght of Employment: lots of years

Previous Loan Experience: 3 auto loans to completion in the last 10 years without issue; 1 with a 30-day late from September 2017

Debt-to-Income (DTI): ~36.7% (counting co-signed auto loan)

Year of Car: 2018

Miles: 0 

Purchase/Refinance: Purchase for $33,500 plus TTL for ~$36,800

Requested loan term (XX Months): 72 months

Down payment amount: $8000

Co-borrower/Co-Signer: none

Some notes:

- I'm putting a lot of my extra money toward the down payment right now; I can probably lower my DTI a couple points by zero-ing out a few cards with low balances on them, but that's it. If I didn't have to consider the co-signed auto loan, my DTI would be ~30%. DTI also includes the roughly $1600 I pay for my portion of our rent.

- I have two open in-good-standing credit products with my CU and do all of my banking with them. I had two credit products open with them in the past that I closed (had my XW's name on them, wanted them gone). This equates to roughly 6 years of history with them thus far without issue. 

- The thought of leasing has crossed my mind, but I don't know how many miles I plan on driving in the next three years.

- Based on rough math using advertise rates from the CU, in addition to extra monthly payments, I expect to have this car paid off in 4-4.5 years. 6 years gives me the option should something come up and we need to pare back expenses. (for context, my previous car payment was $323 and I was paying $600 a month on it for the last 12-ish months of the loan's life, plus a lump sum pay off with a bonus I received 2x a year)

[sccredit]

Sounds like you'll be fine.

[Anonymous]

As stated above, you should be fine, I see no issues with you getting approved.

[jl4]

Thanks. I updated the loan amount because although I said it included TTL, that was the pre-TTL number. The real total is roughly $36,800, about $3,300 more. Going to look for the car I'm eyeing in a lower sales-tax county to get that down about $800 or so. 

[pipeguy]

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@jl4 wrote:

Thanks. I updated the loan amount because although I said it included TTL, that was the pre-TTL number. The real total is roughly $36,800, about $3,300 more. Going to look for the car I'm eyeing in a lower sales-tax county to get that down about $800 or so. 

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Given your history with your CU, along with the other factors you listed, you should have no problem getting approved. I know some credit unions charge a higher interest rate for 72-month loans, DCU upcharges after 65 months, NFCU upticks at 37 months, 61 months, 73 months and 86 months (no idea why ANYONE would finance a car for up to 96 months). 

As far as the highlighted text, I'm not sure what you mean (or what state you are in), but generally sales tax on a vehicle is state regulated and any local county add-on is based on where you live rather than where you buy the vehicle. In DC metro, we have a choice to buy from an MD/VA/DC dealer, all jurisdictions have different sales tax rates, but all will do your paperwork and tags (title/tax/etc) for you  based on where you live, not where (county/state) you buy the vehicle.

[jl4]

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@pipeguy wrote:

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@jl4 wrote:

Thanks. I updated the loan amount because although I said it included TTL, that was the pre-TTL number. The real total is roughly $36,800, about $3,300 more. Going to look for the car I'm eyeing in a lower sales-tax county to get that down about $800 or so. 

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Given your history with your CU, along with the other factors you listed, you should have no problem getting approved. I know some credit unions charge a higher interest rate for 72-month loans, DCU upcharges after 65 months, NFCU upticks at 37 months, 61 months, 73 months and 86 months (no idea why ANYONE would finance a car for up to 96 months). 

As far as the highlighted text, I'm not sure what you mean (or what state you are in), but generally sales tax on a vehicle is state regulated and any local county add-on is based on where you live rather than where you buy the vehicle. In DC metro, we have a choice to buy from an MD/VA/DC dealer, all jurisdictions have different sales tax rates, but all will do your paperwork and tags (title/tax/etc) for you  based on where you live, not where (county/state) you buy the vehicle.

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Yeah, I've been looking at how I can make a 60-month loan work and how much and the end of it all would I be out if I went with a 72-month, instead.

My understanding is, at least in the state of Washington, when I buy a car, I have two options: I pay sales tax or use tax. Use tax would be determined based on my address and the sales tax rate there and sales tax based on where I buy the car within the state. Use tax is paid when WA sales tax on the purchase is not. The state forces use tax for out-of-state purchases so I can't go to nearby Oregon, pay zero sales tax, and walk away with a killer deal. Dealers all over the place in lower sales-tax counties of WA even advertise that they're worth checking out because of their lower sales tax 🙈. Some counties here have sales tax as low at 7.7%, down from my home address sales tax of 10.0% (our highest is 10.4%).

The use-tax/sales-tax rule actually applies to literally everything in the state of WA but who's going to keep track of that? For cars it's easy to police because they require evidence at registration time.