The MILES Program has lowered their interest rates in both their E1-E4 program and their E5+ program.

The Standard E1-E4 program has changed from 18.45% to 16.95%.

The Stripes E5+ program has changed from 17.45% to 15.45%.

This is a 3-month trial for MILES to see if lowering their interest rates results in increased loan originations.

It is possible to get lower interest rates with MILES if you have a large down payment. MILES is not designed for soldiers with good credit. It is designed for service members that cannot get better loans elsewhere. Typically, MILES customers would qualify for interest rates in the twenties if the MILES Program did not exist.

If you do not have perfect credit, you need to read this article.

The government is considering creating a consumer protection agency that would seek to regulate lending for car loans, home loans, credit cards, and so on.

Some of the ideas sound great, in theory. Lower interest rates on auto loans and credit cards, sure. Who wouldn’t like to have a lower car payment, right? Read More…

The last few weeks of summer usually signal the highest gas prices of the year.  Luckily, we still have not come close to the $5 per gallon we saw in 2008. Read More…

It seems that the government is going to increase CARS (Cash for Clunkers) allocation from $1 billion to $3 billion. With the speed that people have gone through the first billion, the government believes that passing the additional $2 billion will have the same affect on auto sales. As someone that works at a new car dealer, I can say that that probably will not be the case. Read More…

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All the news channels have been happy to report that Cash for Clunkers money is already gone. Is it true? The answer is, “Sort of”.

The government has not paid out all that money…yet. In fact, the government has probably paid out very little of the $1 billion. Dealers were not able to Read More…

After a several month hiatus, United Auto Credit Corp. is back to lending for people with bad credit and bankruptcy.

Their basic guidelines require that applicants have 24 months continuous employment with no more than 2 employers. All bad credit on applicants bureaus needs to be within a fairly tight time-line and have been a while ago, unless it is included in a bankruptcy. UACC even does open bankruptcy auto loans.

As of June 1st, Prestige Financial Services is once again lending for people that have discharged bankruptcies and even for select applicants that have Read More…

According to several sources, General Motors will be filing for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy as soon as Monday, June 1st, 2009 Read More…

It seems like every vehicle manufacturer is now offering insurance against losing your job if you buy a new car. First, Hyundai offered the ability to give your car back to the dealer/bank if you lost your job. Then, once other manufacturers say how much the gimmick boosted sales, they modified the terms for the better Read More…

All signs point to a 3rd quarter recovery in most of the US. I have even heard some grumblings about auto lenders starting to loosen the lending requirements. I don’t know if these grumblings are just rumors, or if they actually have some truth behind them. When things do pick up, we are ready. We have ways to help all of our customers get approved now. Just wait until we have even better auto loan options.

Ford Motor Company is getting more and more publicity for being the strongest of the American auto makers. Check out this video.

Does America have Total Confidence in GM?

General Motors came up with a new plan for cutting costs, and may just be able to keep the White House writing checks a little while longer so the company can stay afloat. The plan calls for GM to close over 40% of their dealerships and eliminate the Pontiac brand Read More…

Fireside has become the next victim of the economy. It is too bad because just recently they had changed their lending structure to a more dealer friendly model Read More…

Violence between repo men, car owners on the rise

Check out this article in Yahoo News. There is some very good information here on the state of our economy, and the desperation of some borrowers that cannot pay their bills anymore.
Being a repo man is a very difficult job, but if you can handle the dangers, it appears to be one of the only industries growing right now as vehicle repossessions continue to rise.

In Bad Economy, Life Is Good For Repo Man

CapitalOne Auto Finance recently started requiring dealers to provide the lender with proof that the vehicle is licensed with CapitalOne as the lienholder BEFORE funding the auto loan. Not only is CapitalOne requiring dealers do this to fund the auto loan, but they are doing it without asking for it on the approval, and they are not sending out funding notices that display the requirement. It is almost like a requirement that is only communicated verbally. Does it violate the dealer agreement that CapitalOne has with its dealers? I would not be surprised if several dealers had their lawyers re-review the CapitalOne dealer agreement over the next couple months to make sure.

Why it is bad for the dealers?

When someone buys a car from the dealer, there are several documents that need to be filed with the state. The vehicle needs to be titled, and an odometer statement is pretty standard. Dealers title the vehicle after lenders fund the deal, and pay the dealers for the contract. Dealers have to wait for the funding of the deal because it is not uncommon for auto lenders to return deals to dealers without funding them. Sometimes the customers employment does not verify, sometimes it is residence, and sometimes it is for some other reason. If the dealer actually licenses the deal with the state and the lender is listed as the lienholder, what happens if the lender does not fund the deal? The answer depends a little bit on who you talk to. Some people say that the customer could end up owning the car, some people say the loan would then be the responsibility of the dealer to collect, and some people just think it is a giant paperwork nightmare for the dealer’s title department.

Why is CapitalOne doing this?

Due to the downturn in the economy, many car dealers have gone out of business. When dealers close down, they do not generally dot all the “i’s” or cross all the “t’s”, and it costs money to do things like license vehicles, and put warranties on the vehicles. A lot of lenders lost a lot of money because of business relationships they had with dealers that went belly up. When the vehicle is not titled with the lender as leinholder, and the lender cannot collect the money from a dealer that went bankrupt, it is a financial and legal nightmare for the lender.

I can understand why CapitalOne is doing what they are doing, but I feel they are going about it all wrong. It would be a little different if they had actually required the dealers to sign an addendum to the dealer agreement, or if we had some sort of documentation that shows an accurate list of all the requirements to fund a deal, but as of right now, we do not have it.

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The main site area of WashingtonAutoCredit.com will soon resemble the new blog design.

We hope you like it.

As always, if you need an auto loan, give us the chance to help you buy the car you need.

We have been serving Western Washington since 2003, and recently started accepting applications from the entire country and filtering them through our affiliate network to help you be able to buy a car, even with bad credit.

In a welcome, and unexpected, phone call today I was informed that we will still be able to offer those in an open (undischarged) bankruptcy auto loans through Prestige Financial.

Last week, Prestige pulled out of Washington and Oregon completely. Upon further review, Prestige decided they would stay in the state on a limited basis. They are going to be working with many fewer dealers than before. They will also only be lending to those that meet their underwriting requirements which now include an open bankruptcy.

Prestige is the only lender still around that offers bankruptcy auto loans with no down payment required. Over the past 5 years, WA Auto Credit has put between a third and a half of our auto loan customers with Prestige Financial.

Prestige Financial Services, the nation’s leading provider of auto financing after bankruptcy, stopped approving new auto loan applications on January 22nd, 2009 at 4:30 PM PST. All applications approved by Prestige Financial are still valid and have until the 13th of February to be funded.

This event is just the latest in a series of bank restructuring that has taken place over the last 12 months. Other auto lenders that have either stopped doing business in Washington or gone out of business completely include: Triad Financial, Zions Bank, UACC, CitiFinancial, Wells Fargo, ACC, and 6th Gear. It seems that more will probably follow.

Prestige is owned by Lary Miller, Owner of the Utah Jazz NBA team. He owns severall auto dealerships, mostly in Utah. It seems that Prestige is mostly still in business just to serve those dealerships. Unfortunately, the only loan programs for open bankruptcies that still exist require down payments of 10% or more. The days of open bankruptcy auto loans with no money down are over in most states…for now.

Washington State Employees’ Credit Union (WSECU) ended its sub-prime loan origination department last week. While the move was not completely surprising, what is more interesting is that Wachovia (who was backing the subprime auto loans for WSECU) is still doing business as usual.

WSECU had been tapping into the secondary market very strongly. It is probably because of their over aggressive lending practices that they had to close the door on that department at this time. Unfortunately, many people who qualified for WSECU’s subprime auto loans will now only qualify for higher interest rates on loans that need higher down payments.