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Tips for Buyers with Bad Credit | Lafayette LA
Tips for Buyers with Bad Credit in Lafayette, LA
A bad credit score can make purchasing or leasing a vehicle from a dealership quite stressful. If it’s your first time, this stress can be even more intense. However, it’s our goal to lessen this stress for our customers in difficult credit situations. Here at Giles Nissan Lafayette, our finance team has helped many customers with less-than-ideal credit find vehicles that suit their needs. We often learn that these customers haven’t tried — or don’t know how — to improve their credit, so we’ve created the following list of tips for all our customers in a bad credit situation. Take a look to learn what steps to follow if your credit is poor but you need a new or used vehicle from our dealership. Of course, don’t hesitate to reach out to us or drop by our dealership if you need any more help from our friendly and knowledgeable finance experts.
Check Your Credit Score Beforehand
Checking your credit score may be unpleasant, but you’ll be better prepared to handle your financial situation if you fully understand it. Lenders and dealers will check your score and history in order to decide whether to give you a loan, so you need to take a look at your credit in order to be prepared. For auto loans, scores above 700 are good and can help you secure a lower interest rate. Your score is influenced by the length of time you’ve had other credit accounts (such as credit cards and loans), the number of accounts you have, and how consistently you make payments on those accounts.
Improve Score + Fix Credit Errors
Have you checked your score and it’s below 700? It may be worth trying to improve it before applying for a loan. Our finance team has worked with a wide range of credit histories and scores before, but in general, it’s a good idea to improve your score before signing up for a big loan, since you might get stuck with a high interest rate due to your bad credit score. One way to improve your score is to check your credit report for errors. If you see information that doesn’t look right, you can dispute it and get the error corrected. Resolving errors can potentially lead to a notable increase in your score! Other ways to improve your score include paying past-due bills, avoiding late payments moving forward, paying off credit cards and using less than 30% of your credit limit moving forward.
Make a Budget + Get Pre-Approved
If you haven’t already, decide how much you’re willing to spend on your new ride. Lots of things will factor into this decision, such as how big of a vehicle you need, what you’ll use your vehicle for, how much you have saved (and can put towards a down payment) and how long you want to make payments on the model before it’s paid off. Add in insurance payments and an estimation of annual repair and maintenance costs, and you’ll have a decent idea of how much you can comfortably spend on a vehicle. Then you can easily get pre-approved for credit on our website.
Here’s the Plan:
Big Down Payment + Shorter Term
Were you pre-approved for credit? That’s great! You’re getting closer to owning the perfect vehicle for you. Visit our dealership and take some test drives, and then once you’ve made your choice, you can talk with one of our experts about financing your vehicle. If you can make a large down payment, you’ll be glad you did, as it will take less time for you to pay off your car in the long run. We also recommend agreeing to a loan term that isn’t longer than 60 months. Everyone’s situation is unique, so your loan agreement might look different, but if you can, try to pay off your auto loan early — you’ll help your credit score a lot!
But What If I Got Denied?
Don’t panic — there are options available to you. If you know and trust someone with good credit who is willing to be a co-signer, you can move forward that way. If not, you may have to tackle your current debt to improve your score. It takes a lot of patience to bump up your credit score, and it may take months or even a year to get there. But don’t be discouraged — working on your credit score is well worth the effort. Remember that our experts are happy to discuss your options in more detail if you’d like.
At Giles Nissan Lafayette, we work with customers from a variety of financial situations. If you're worried about what kind of vehicle you can afford, come visit us at our dealership located at 6137 Johnston Street, Lafayette, LA 70503. We proudly serve customers from New Iberia, Abbeville, Youngsville and Broussard.
