taking over payments

[Anonymous]

can anyone tell me what is generally involved when someone is selling a vehicle for "take over payments"?  Does this mean that the title is transferred and the loan is assumed ? if so, do you generally have to go through an approval process with the current lender to take it over or is it simply transferrable? 

[Anonymous]

What is the seller offering you?

Taking over the payments has as many meanings as the vague description describes.

What situation are you in?

[Anonymous]

to try to make a long story short, son in accident week ago - got broadsided and car is totalled- we are in middle of haggling over value with the liability carrier - figured probably wouldn't get enough to replace with a comparable vehicle, so I contacted our CU (have been members for several yrs but have never taken a loan there) about a possible small (like 25% of total) auto loan to replace vehicle - they took app & asked about a couple of small issues on CRs, and just said to get back with them when we find a vehicle and we can see about approval etc them - so I really don't know if I can look in that price range - only talking about a 1500-2000 loan but if it won't be approved, that puts us back to the insurance settlement and what little extra we can put on it ourselves -  so, maybe not such a short story - while all this is going on, not only does hubbys car start acting up this weekend, I lost all steering on my jeep while driving home last night - turning a corner and bam, headed across the road. So, in less than two weeks, we are down three of three vehicles.  I pulled FICO scores yesterday so I would have a better idea what the CU was looking at - sadly although I had been told they pull either EQ or TU, they pulled EQ which still needs work (mine 570 and hubbys 600) - TU is 650 for me and 610 for hubby. I was looking at ads for private party sales and saw an interesting vehicle and it said just take over payments - I emailed and they said the book value was 14,900, the payments were 299 mo and the balance was about 12,500  - apparently this is from a kid because he/she then asked me to call the mother for more info - I don't want to go too deep into this not knowing what it  might involve -         

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:
to try to make a long story short, son in accident week ago - got broadsided and car is totalled- we are in middle of haggling over value with the liability carrier - figured probably wouldn't get enough to replace with a comparable vehicle, so I contacted our CU (have been members for several yrs but have never taken a loan there) about a possible small (like 25% of total) auto loan to replace vehicle - they took app & asked about a couple of small issues on CRs, and just said to get back with them when we find a vehicle and we can see about approval etc them - so I really don't know if I can look in that price range - only talking about a 1500-2000 loan but if it won't be approved, that puts us back to the insurance settlement and what little extra we can put on it ourselves -  so, maybe not such a short story - while all this is going on, not only does hubbys car start acting up this weekend, I lost all steering on my jeep while driving home last night - turning a corner and bam, headed across the road. So, in less than two weeks, we are down three of three vehicles.  I pulled FICO scores yesterday so I would have a better idea what the CU was looking at - sadly although I had been told they pull either EQ or TU, they pulled EQ which still needs work (mine 570 and hubbys 600) - TU is 650 for me and 610 for hubby. I was looking at ads for private party sales and saw an interesting vehicle and it said just take over payments - I emailed and they said the book value was 14,900, the payments were 299 mo and the balance was about 12,500  - apparently this is from a kid because he/she then asked me to call the mother for more info - I don't want to go too deep into this not knowing what it  might involve -         

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I understand that a "total" is a total.  But why not take the other two to a reputable shop and see what it takes to repair?

[Anonymous]

my hubby is probably going to be able to fix the other two, but his is an 89 jeep and mine is a 94 - the totalled car was a 2000 jimmy we bought for our son last year to get him through college & grad school - I'm just antsy about not having something newer and more reliable at home - if we can find a replacement for him with little or no extra $, then I was looking at the other for us - I'm just not familiar enough with the concept of "taking over payments"to be comfortable with it. i agree with your earlier comment about it being vague.

on a slightly different note, I emailed the CU loan officer to see if they could work the application on a TU pull instead of the equifax they  already did - told her we were having better results with correcting erroneous info on TU and the scores were better - don't know if she will be amenable - I had checked awhile back with customer service and was told they pull Equifax or TU -          

[Anonymous]

I used to work in a dealer and we sometimes did something called a substitution of collateral.  That may be something to consider for the jimmy.  Here is an example of what it is. 

 If your car is damaged beyond repair in an accident, the insurance company of the liable party generally offers to compensate you according to the fair market value of the vehicle. This may not be equivalent to the amount outstanding on your car loan, so you owe the bank or institution holding your car title more than the amount the insurance company is paying you. Instead of paying off part of your outstanding car loan and finding additional funds needed to lift the lien on the vehicle, you can suggest a substitution of collateral. In simple terms, this means that you use the money received from the insurance company to purchase a vehicle similar in value to the one that was destroyed, and ask the bank or loan company to accept an exchange of the title of the original vehicle for the title of the new one. If the lender agrees, a lien similar to that on the original vehicle is placed on your new one, and the title of the wrecked vehicle passes to the insurance company. This course of action requires that all the parties involved, including the bank or loan company, the insurance company, and the dealer selling your new vehicle, agree to the substitution. The procedure is not unusual and can often be arranged without undue difficulty. For more information about substituting collateral, contact an attorney.

Just one idea.  

[Anonymous]

good info but we didn't have a loan on the jimmy - we paid cash for it. I did occasionally run into situations where people needed to do that though in my previous life as an insurance adjuster -

[Anonymous]

i guess a different question you need to ask yourself is this really the time to upgrade the vehicles?  even if they do need fixing (talking about the running vehicles), the fixing won't cost $12,500.  is $12,500 really worth the piece of mind at this time?  can't it wait until you're in a better financial position?

i'm not trying to discourage you, it's your money after all, just a different perspective...

gl

[Anonymous]

actually very true - anxiety and panic aside, I really don't want to take on anymore than we need to right now - have been trying to hold out to get both kids out of college - one down one to go!  hubbys problem is his starter so a fairly inexpensive fix - I'm just so sick of cars right now...  

[ficonewbie01]

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@Anonymous wrote:
actually very true - anxiety and panic aside, I really don't want to take on anymore than we need to right now - have been trying to hold out to get both kids out of college - one down one to go!  hubbys problem is his starter so a fairly inexpensive fix - I'm just so sick of cars right now...  

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If it's just the starter...a temporary fix that might work is to bang on it a couple of times to get it "unstuck". I did this to my Jeep until I had the time to replace it.