Hello all, I am new to this board. I guess my obsession for the EVO 8 finally got me to sign up. I LOVE THIS CAR! AHHHHH!

anyways, I read a thread about the age of the Evo 8 owners (great thread by the way). I saw a few 20 yr old YOUNG men owning these without their parents help. now, call me spoiled since my dad bought me my Integra GSR used a little while back for $15000 and I would NEVER be able to pay it off full like he did.

im 21 by the way going to UC Davis and graduating in 2005. i work part time but i am basically dependent on my parents for tuition, housing, etc. so to see a few pther guys in my situation owning this car without their parents help just makes me wonder how. but i remembered monthly payments arent that hard for some.

so i guess my question is, when buying your EVO (or any new car for the matter), is it better to pay for it in full or is it better to put a down payment and go monthly? im sure its different for different people.

what did you do and WHY?

IF you wouldnt mind sharing such personal info, this 21 yr old would love to hear your reasonings. thanks guys

 

If you can pay in full thats better, but if you can't then make payments.

 

If you've good credit and can get a good APR (below 5%),
I'd say go for finance (NOT lease)...
Don't go for ****s like "0% APR for a year", 'cuz the APR after that 1st year will be like..>11% no matter what your credit is..
And by financing, you can dramatically boost your credit IF&ONLY IF you pay every each single payment ON TIME (at least 1~2weeks before the deadline).

However, on the other hand, if you don't plan to keep this car for a long time & enough cash, then juz pay everything in full, after all, you won't have to worry about the APR that way.

**tip on financing:
Somtimes has offers like $2000 instant cash back, but it will only work if you pay cash.
In that case, you may choose to finance the car not using the financing plans offered by .
Instead, go to other banks (eg. BOA, WaMu, etc) and get a car loan (with a fairly good rate of coz), don't worry if the bank offers a rate that's slightly higher than does, 'cuz you may end up paying less with those 2k rebate.

my .02

Good luck with your car shopping.

 

Considering how cheap the interest rates are today (I got 4% on my Evo), It may be better to finance and pay off other stuff.
Money is dirt cheap to borrow, take advantage of it. Just don't get in over your head.

 

make sure to do finance the car..
you should ask your parents to co-sign for you~

hence, you are using their credit to get finance the car..
then.. when you start to make a payment..

you can build up your own credit..
so you can buy your next car with your own credit..

of course.. with high APR.. it is waste of money..
but with low APR and short period of time.. about two years?

it is good to start your credit get going..
got it?

 

Even if you have the money in my opinion you should never pay in full or even leave a big deposit. Your money is better left in the bank. Even if its collecting 1% interest it's much better than having no money at all especially when you need it or when you're out of a job. Paying a loan also helps you establish credit and looks good when you need to buy a house.

I honestly don't know your situation but $30,000 is a lot of money and with today's economy and with graduates not finding jobs your taking a big risk taking out a loan for that much. If your dad is willing to help that's great but remember insurance is not cheap on this car either. And parents that buy this car for their kids and keep them under their insurance have to be totally insane because god for bid the kid gets in an accident they can sue the parents and take their freaken house(yeah that's what insurance is for but it only covers you past a point, if you parents are worth a lot they will go after them). Controlling your impulses and saving the racing for the track is very difficult in this car.

Are you commuting to school, do you keep a car on campus, do you have a clean record, do you have a stable job, do you plan on moving out of the house, can you even get insurance on your own for this car, will the car be in your name and your dad cosign, who will be paying for maitenance, gas, tires, clutch? Those are just a some questions you must ask yourself but if the money is your dads then basically its his decision.

 

I would love to be able to ask this question so matter-of-factly . I think that for the majority of us, it's not really an option, but wouldn't it be nice if it were. By the way, earning interest from 30k in a bank account means **** if you're paying an APR on a loan. You earn some interest in your bank account only to pay it back out (and more than likely in a larger amount) in your loan. I'd at least put a sizeable chunk of cash on the car (while saving a decent amount for a rainy day, if rainy days even exhist in your world) and finance whatever's left over. If you ARE going to just buy the car outright, to make it look better on your credit, get a loan initially and then pay off the loan as opposed to just paying cash for the car since a loan paid off looks good on your credit report as well.

 

I'm 22, and understand the value of building credit, but I must say I agree with Liandrin11. Unless you need to build up credit, I would pay in full. "Thats what I'll be doing" The previous suggestion from Spanked was a valid one, yet in the current market I fail to see how it would be savy to keep the money (say $30,000) in a savings acount earning only one percent interest. I mean at 1% the $300 dollars that you would be repaid in interest anualy is that important to you by all means go for it. IMHO, if one pays in full when negotiating the deal for the car, they will likely get back that 300 + dolars in savings/discount off the MSRP that they would have earned in the bank anyways. just my .02

 

thanks guys for the adult info =) i have been slowly building my credit for the past 2 years with one credit card. made all of my payments on time and the limit was raised to $1000 from a measely $400 limit. (hey, its a huge thing for me! haha) but yeah, i stayed away from those huge credit card limits they offered me ($7,000 limit on a few) cause I dont want to put myself in a situation where I CAN be $7k in debt. like a few of my friends.

ill see what reality holds for me. in the mean time, i appreciate your guy's input. any more opinions would be appreciated.

EDIT: i just reread some of your posts and i looked over some stuff. i am not really looking into buying an evo at this second. hell, i would BARELY be able to pay for my own rent if my parents didnt help me out so i doubt I would add car payments onto my list anytime soon. I was curious on which payment plan was better cause hey, i will be graduating in a few years and within a few years of working, im sure i could fork up enough to get me a nice little toy. but who knows what the future holds. just wanted to see what you guys did and why u did what u did. i never knew how payment plans worked except for paying in full.

 

The other thing to keep in mind is that your EVO is going to depreciate heavily in the first few years you own it, anywhere from 30-40% typically. You have to factor that into the cost of ownership.

Let's say you have $30,000 in cash and are trying to decide whether to pay for your EVO outright or finance it, assuming you're planning to own it for 5 years.

Buying outright, you pay $30,000 cash up front. After 5 years, at which point it's worth $19,000 (maybe more, maybe less), you sell it. Ownership has cost you $11,000 (plus maintenance, gas, etc.).

Alternately, if you finance a $30,000 EVO over 5 years at 5% interest, at loan's end you will have paid about $34,000 total. You will have paid $15,000 to own it.

However, in the financing scenario, during that time (assuming you put 0% down), you will have had that cash to invest or otherwise put to work. If you can earn $4,000 (or more) on that money in the same 5 years (not too tough a proposition, even in this economy), you might be better off financing. This is what people are really saying when they say now is the time to borrow money, because you are locking in a low interest rate during a time when interest rates (and consequently, returns on interest-paying investments) will more than likely start to rise.

I have ignored a few considerations such as inflation which will affect that $4000 figure upwards or downwards, but the general question to consider when debating financing is, "if I finance, can I make significantly more money than I am paying in interest?"

 

funny thing is, i actually understood what u said...damn, being an Economics major FINALLY did something good for me.

 

Liandrin11 go pay in full and when you need money for an emergency or for a downpayment to buy a house or need to fix your car or if you lose your job then tell me what the f you are going to do (unless you have a huge load of money saved). That is not the case for spoolmeup, he is graduating from college and doesn't have a stable job or a lot of money, all he has right now is daddy(nothing wrong with he is still in school and fortunately has parents that want him to get an education).

I am not one to live paycheck to paycheck and if spoolmeup doesn't have a lot of money to begin with and has other debt or bills then paying in full would be very foolish. Interest rates are low and if you can double up on payments and pay off the loan sooner then you won't have to pay so much interest.

I just used 1% as an example there are mutual funds(liquid money), bonds, cds etc that earn more interest then a savings account. You guys have to be kidding me if you think I just keep my money in a savings account earning 1%.