Collector Cars Wanted

680 isn’t a particularly good score. You have to be at or above 720 to be considered a “well qualified buyer” in today’s market.

Your debt to income ratio will also play a big part, as will carrying a large balance on a high interest credit card.

There are factors involved other than your credit score:

Time on the job
Provable income
Time at residence
Previous car loan history
High credit
Amount you’re asking for — Too much? Under $7500?
Number of credit lines — Too many? Too few? If your only credit line is one card that is 75% used up, it doesn’t look good.

Banks are tightening up.

As of yesterday, Dec 31, GMAC had converted a lot of its debt into bonds which greatly freed up a lot of money that it can now loan out. It also got a $7,000,000,000 gov’t loan and was approved to become a chartered bank, rather than an auto/home mortgage lender.

What does this all mean? GMAC is now offering 0.0% loans on many new 08s and 09 cars. And they lowered the qualifying FICO score from 700 down to 621. Anything 620 or less is still considered subprime. You might want to check out their deals.

Now its back to business closer to normal than before. That means its a lot easier to qualify for a $20,000 loan on a new car than it is to qualify for an $8000 loan on a used car. Lenders are more apt to approve the higher loan since the car is brand new and has 20 miles or less on it. A used car may be 3 to 5 years old with a lot of miles on it. it’s value will crash in just a year or two after buying it. That’s why lenders are skittish about lending money out on a 36 or 48 month note. If they have to repo it, they’ll never re-coop their money and they’ll spend $1000’s suing you for it.

Now in your case, how much more do you owe each month besides your CC bills? What’s your rent/mortgage? Any student or personal loans? Child support? Alimony? Medical bills? What’s you monthly gross from work? If your monthly debt to income ratio is 34% or higher, that’s why you got turned down.

How many years have you been at your present job? Your current address? Lenders look for stability. 2 years at your job and 5 years at your address qualifies you. Anything less will be a turn down, unless you just changed jobs or you moved. If your previous work or residence history is at least 2/5 years, you should be good.

Final consideration … how much do you plan to put down? All lenders still want to see some kind of investment from the customer. At least 10% of the total price or enough to cover tax, license and fees.

If you have that much for your down and meet all the other qualifiers, you should be good to go with a GMAC loan right now. All the others are still sweating it out and it will be more difficult to get funded through them.

I don’t sell GM products. i sell exotics. So if you ever have an extra $250,000 burning a hole in your pocket, email me! =)

No financing for dealers on credit scores under 700. Get that score up and buy the car in 2 months..