Has anyone refinanced an auto loan?

"E90M3" (e90m3)
08/14/2017 at 12:43 • Filed to: None

I’ve got a pretty high rate on the loan on the E92, which I believe is due to the fact I got a loan on an 8 year old car. As a result, I’ve been thinking about refinancing, does anyone have any experience?

DISCUSSION (31)

random001 > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 12:47

I’ve done it. Not a bad experience. I did it to centralize my accounts, though, so I went through USAA to consolidate where my loans were. My interest rate stayed about the same, but it was pretty low to begin with.

E90M3 > random001
08/14/2017 at 12:49

My loan right now is with PNC, and I like them even less than Suntrust, the bank that financed the M3. I was thinking about applying for a BOA loan so I’d have all my accounts in one place, and also hopefully reduce my interest rate a little.

d15b > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 12:56

What is your rate right now and how long is your note for?

Since it is a used car, I would shoot for something around the ~2% mark and try to lower the total length of time to pay off the note.

Also, enjoy your car!

E90M3 > d15b
08/14/2017 at 12:57

Like 5.5% for 60 months.

TheD0k_2many toys 2little time > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 12:58

never used a loan to buy a car so i cant be any help

vondon302 > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 13:04

I’ve done it. Refinanced thru my credit union got a better rate and cut about a year off the loan. Would do it again in a heart beat. Was easy as pie too.

Arrivederci > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 13:15

I’d honestly be a little surprised if BoA would be able to bring that down any further. If you want it to come down, a credit union may be your best bet.

BeaterGT > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 13:15

You need a credit union in your life.

KeedyT > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 13:17

It certainly can’t hurt to try and I’d start with your credit union.... but what you are paying sounds typical of my credit union’s rates, the 1.99% rates are reserved for brand new cars, the 3.x% ones for 2-3 year terms and under 3 years old. Older car, more miles, more term all = higher.....

and that’s not high, I expected you to say 13% :-D

Nothing > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 13:26

On an 8 year old car, it might be tough to get a better rate than you have. I know for 3+ year old cars, APR goes up quite a bit.

FTTOHG Has Moved to https://opposite-lock.com > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 13:32

I’ve done it twice. Both times through my credit union. Once was on a 4 year old Hyundai purchased at CarMax in 2010 with their in-house financing from 7.85 down to 3.9% and the other was my Forester purchased 1.5 years old at a Subaru dealer at 3.9 from BoA down to 1.65%. Both experiences went very smoothly. There was a little bit of an issue with some forms and paperwork on the Subaru but I forget the specifics - just required an extra trip back to thto credit union and call to the dealer to fax something. My credit scrores were roughly 720 the first time and 780 more recently.

functionoverfashion > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 13:51

I know some others have said it, but a credit union would probably give you the best possible rate for an “older” used car like yours. I’ve only ever financed one car (our current 2012 Volvo) and it was very easy through a credit union. We weren’t previously affiliated with them, either; our first transaction with the credit union was financing the car.

d15b > Arrivederci
08/14/2017 at 13:58

Agreed. My local credit union has a promotion right now for about ~2% used car note for 60 months.

Go check out your local credit union!

d15b > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 14:00

Whoops! Agreeing with Arrivederci .

Check out your local credit union! BOFA will give you like a .10% reduction at most for bringing it in-house.

RPM esq. > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 14:52

I have, a few times. Pretty painless, really, assuming you have good credit (and I assume you do).

victor > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 15:04

I get auto loans through my local credit union. Super easy. For example, my “local” credit union has 42 month loans at 3.99 on used cars, 4.39 upto 66 months.

WiscoProud > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 15:07

Yup, actually I’ve done it twice. Most recently, after I opened an account with a credit union they offered it to me. I wasn’t planning on refinancing it, but they cut almost 3% off my auto loan with a similar pay off date. Didn’t cost anything to do either.

Check out what they charge to do it. If its free, it will almost certainly be worth it. If not, the fee may eat up any savings you were going to get. I wouldn’t extend the terms of the loan either, which can be tempting.

E90M3 > d15b
08/14/2017 at 15:49

They were offering like 3.2% so I might check it out.

E90M3 > Arrivederci
08/14/2017 at 15:49

Probably, I’m going to look into it.

E90M3 > KeedyT
08/14/2017 at 15:50

If I couldn’t have gotten anything better than 13% I’d probably gotten something cheaper and paid cash.

E90M3 > Nothing
08/14/2017 at 15:52

That’s what I’m kind of thinking, that the car is so old the rate is really high. I was hoping for a rate better than what I had on the M3. That was 4.5% for 60 months.

E90M3 > FTTOHG Has Moved to https://opposite-lock.com
08/14/2017 at 15:54

7.85%? Damn. I thought I had it bad. I think I’ll look into it. I never thought about it for the M3 since I planned to pay it off really early. Sounds like it’s worth looking into though.

E90M3 > functionoverfashion
08/14/2017 at 15:54

Everyone seems to say credit union, guess I need to find one to look into.

E90M3 > victor
08/14/2017 at 15:55

I wouldn’t save that much by changing to one of those plans.

nermal > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 17:00

I have. Most larger credit unions will do this. You will need to apply for the loan as usual, they pay off your existing loan, and the the title switched so that they are the lien holder.

The process was simple for the one I went through, I signed the paperwork in their branch and they did everything else.

B_dol > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 17:14

Try lightstream.com (Suntrust Bank) or PenFed (requires annual fee) - both are well regarded in the car community. Financed a 10 year old car purchase at ~2.9%

FTTOHG Has Moved to https://opposite-lock.com > E90M3
08/14/2017 at 17:19

Definitely worth looking into. CarMax has notoriously bad rates and rates were higher in 2010 across-the-board. The CarMax up in Austin had the car I wanted and I really didn’t want to have to make another trip up there, so I just accepted their shitty terms and refinanced it the next day back in SA.

KeedyT > E90M3
08/15/2017 at 12:09

That would have obviously been the wise decision but sometimes when cars are involved people make irrational decisions :-) - I’ve financed WAY too many cars when I shouldn’t have and never paid more than 6.x% but I know many that haven’t been so lucky.

I just meant 5.5% didn’t sound like a high rate to be hoping to lower [to me].

E90M3 > KeedyT
08/15/2017 at 12:16

Yeah, I’ve tried to buy a car with emotion before. Since the E90 M3 is basically my dream car, this second car was all about the numbers. I might have paid a littler more than I should have, but find me another manual E92 M-Sport with 40k miles on it. It was a unicorn and for 1k more than I wanted to spend, it really wasn’t that bad of a deal.

KeedyT > E90M3
08/15/2017 at 13:28

I remember reading when you got it, you did make it sound almost rational. I’ve done far worse things for lesser cars so I tip my hat. Trying to learn from my mistakes but the outlook is cloudy

E90M3 > KeedyT
08/15/2017 at 18:04

I mean, I could have been more rational and gotten something cheaper, but since I could afford what I wanted, why not get what I wanted.