Should I do this???

[Broke_Triathlete]

So, long story short I've had a 26% car loan for 15 months now. Due to my lack of understanding of how APR works I was sold on the fact that my $10K loan would yield $2,600 TOTAL interest. I didn't care or look any further, and I just wanted the damn car. This forum has opened my eyes to pay more attention to these obligations and I'm finding that by the end of the loan ill be paying out more than $7K of interest on the $10K loan. Shoot me now. I refuse to let this happen. It purely sickens me to think about giving $7K to someone.... Again this is my fault for not caring about the understanding of how it all works but I think I have an idea and I'd like your opinions please. 

Ive been on a Dave Ramsey kick lately and liquidating a lot of stuff that I have sitting around to pay the car off ASAP. I owe $7,500 left and I have roughly $4K towards the balance saved. I have $7K in credit that I could obviously use for the remaining $3,500 but that will put my utilization at an all time high of 50%. However I have no interest on the lines until April. 

So what should I do? Should I take a small score hit by having my utilization higher for a few months and get out of the raping interest payments? Or should I continue to save and hopefully pay it off in 2-3 months with just cash and not use my cards? I DO NOT plan on buying another car or home in the near future (1-3 years) and I may apply for a card here and there as my credit improves, but in reality after the steps CLI on my C1 cards, ill have a much higher limit than I'd ever plan or even think about using. 

Thoughts?

[juggalo9er]

why not try to refi the remaining principal and put does down with the refi......i did this and went from 21.54% to 4.9%, i did not mind the interest so much then

[Broke_Triathlete]

I forgot to mention that. I got denied from my CU because I applied within 2 years for discharged BR. 

[Anonymous]

Were it me AND you are disciplined about money now, I would do it. The amount you are saving would be substantial I would think.

Having said that, don't leave yourself broke.

Be sure that however you access the credit card cash is really going to be 0% and not looked at as a cash advance. You would be paying big time if that were the case and I would probably then just pay down the principle and pay the rest of as soon as you can.

Just one old guys opinion for what it is worth.

[Broke_Triathlete]

Thank you for the post. That's what I'm afraid of is running into an issue where I need money and I don't have any because I paid my car off. So I'm thinking of waiting a month and then doing it after I get my commission check to help pad myself. Are you saying that if I use my cards they make use it as a cash advance? I was hoping it'd be just like any other swiped transaction. 

[Anonymous]

If they let you just pay off the balance as a regular transaction then yeah I think you would have no issue.

I don't know why i was thinking in terms of having to get the cash to pay it off.

You are right though about just using the card. My bad on that.

Your score would actually drop a bit from the loan being paid off too - but it would recover quickly.

I think you got a good plan. You figure where else could you make 26% on your money? Paying off that loan is the same as making that kind of return.

[StartingOver10]

Good plan.

Get the commission check and pay down your balance on the vehicle. Even doing this one step will save you tons of interest. Natually it is better if you can pay off the entire auto loan, but sometimes it takes a bit to do that.

Check the cards to see what you have to do to get the zero percent. Sometimes you have to use a 'check' that is sent to you. Check it out, you don't want a cash advance fee or cash advance interest rate.

[Broke_Triathlete]

Where would I need to go to figure out if I use the card if it'll be used as a cash advance or a regular transaction? Would that be capital one or the car loan place?

Also I'm paying on student loans so if the auto loan closes out it shouldn't affect it too much because I still have an installment loan, correct?

[Broke_Triathlete]

Actually I did a little more research. Based on a calculator on bankrate I'm finding that I have already paid more than half of my interest and somewhere in the neighborhood of $2,600 for the next 30 months. So with that said it looks like the damage is already been done with this loan. So now I'm thinking that I'll put a few grand on it here now and then some more in a month or two and just pay it down with cash ASAP and leave my cards alone. 

Or should I pay it off tomorrow?

[Remember0]

Is your job stable?

Either way (pay a lot down now, some more a month or two, and then pay off with cash) or transferring to your CC's will save you a lot of money (as you said, 20%+ is killer).

If your job is stable, I'd personally pay off using cash + balance transfer the rest. Make sure you don't use up all of the cash reserves you have though.

If your job isn't that secure, then I'd probably lean more towards the pay off a bit now, more in one month, and PIF ASAP.

Honestly, a refi might be the best route here. What do your FICO scores look like? And what bureau?