Car Loans?

[JL8Jeff]

Just curious, does anybody have a serious car loan? I've been kicking around the idea of getting something to play with and I don't mind doing a car loan since I don't have one. But I modeled a couple of loans and dam! I don't want to pay more than $350 a month and to get any size of a loan it would have to drag out for 4-5 years. How the heck can some people afford these $35-45K cars and SUV's and be making $500-700 a month payments? My mortgage payment takes at least half my monthly income so a car payment would leave me with very little after gas and food.

[The Fixer]

My loan is real cheap. We paid around $11K after takes and stuff for my '01 Cherokee, and put down $5K. My payments are a whopping $135 a month for 5 years. Good thing, since my mortgage is almost both of my paychecks per month.

[Fastbird]

We found a killer deal on our 00 Lincoln LS8 ($10900) and financed $13.5 and out payments are only like $255 a month for four years.

Find a good deal on what you want and a good interest rate and you're set.

[JL8Jeff]

That's the thing, no way I'm doing a 4 or 5 year loan. I've only had 3 car loans in my 20+ years of driving and the longest one was 3 years around $300 a month. The others were 2 year loans around $350 a month.

[foff667]

well jeff...36monthsX300=10800.00 lol what do you expect? thats not including interest. If you want a 30K car your gonna pay 30k payments for a long time :) my credit union sets up bi weekly payments which cuts the interest by a lot...something to look into if your serious.

[foff667]

fwiw 40k loan for 5 years at 5.99%=773.13 roughly with 60 monthly payments

that same 40k loan for 5 years at 5.99 with biweekly payments=$356.42 payments...so its like a $70 savings every month...which might allow you the room to do a 4 year loan for just about the same price.

[ShitOnWheels]

I"m paying $285 a month, $1800 down, financed ~$13k, 5 year loan. 02 Hyundai Elantra

[JL8Jeff]

fwiw 40k loan for 5 years at 5.99%=773.13 roughly with 60 monthly payments

that same 40k loan for 5 years at 5.99 with biweekly payments=$356.42 payments...so its like a $70 savings every month...which might allow you the room to do a 4 year loan for just about the same price.

That's kind of my point. $773 a month car payment plus a $1500-2000 a month mortgage payment! Add new car insurance plus gas and it must mean that most of these people driving new $35-40K cars/trucks are making $200K a year! Oh, and a lot of them have new toys like WaveRunners and ATV's. I'm just keeping my fingers crossed that my 4Runner keeps running well until I can get my JL8 done. I guess the bad situation for me is that the only running vehicle I have is worth $2500 so if I did want to buy something newer it would mean I'd have no real trade in.

[foff667]

well we arent all single income families :) my wife takes care of the mortgage ie heloc which is $950/mo for the next ~4 years...I take care of everything else...I just dont buy new...i would be less then 10% of the people on this site bought their most recent car new. I suggest you look at demo's or something 1 or 2 years old thats still got a good portion of its factory warranty left.

[JL8Jeff]

I know most of the people on this site didn't buy their car new. I'm just saying how difficult it is to get a new car. Buying a first time house is even more ridiculous. You could buy a house for $150K back when we bought our house. Today you can't find anything in our area under $375K! But there are plenty of brand new cars on the road. I'm guessing most of them are leases. I know my dad leases a new car every 3 years. So it's like having an infinite car payment that stays in the same range every month.

[foff667]

dunno what to tell ya other then your absolutly right about new car prices being rediculous...thats why i havent bought new since 98 when i bought my s-10...well most know how that turned out :lol: so i just end up buying cars a few years old with avg mileage at good prices and go from there.

[V]

i bought my SS brand new in summer of 2001, just mainly cause i wanted a car that was mine and only mine, sticker was 32k, i got it for 28.9k, after taxes fees and financing it was like 35k, i put 11k down and financed the remaining 24k. my payments were 422 a month for 5 years. i saved up here and there and back in feb. i paid it off early, after 3 1/2 years. I also had my motorcycle payments since summer 2002. And 2 months ago i just paid off the bike as well. it feels good not to have payments anymore, but in like 2 years, itll be a mortgage payment to deal with, oh well. you gotta pay to play.