Pre-Qualifying

[2xaround]

DH and I are still shopping for a RV and have begun to wonder if it makes more sense to pre-qualify for a RV loan or just wait until we find what we're looking for and then work out the financing details?


What has been your experience with this?

Thanks.

[SuicideSaints]

We came prequalified but the dealer offered some very incentives to let them do the financing. The financing options came back the exact same as what we were prequalified for through my personal bank. It does not hurt anything to come prequalified and then see what the dealer can offer.

[Salt Shaker]

I always get pre qualified on everything. I know my percentages and credit scores. It can save a lot of haggling time.

Many salesman try to base everything on payment. Their job is to take as much money from your pocket as possible.

I always start the conversation as I am pre qualified and want to talk bottom line not finance rates and monthly pmts. I'll cut you a check for the right deal today.

Let's say you have a pre qualified rate of 6% and a credit score of 740. When you are with the finance guy he should be able to tell you based on that info if he can beat it. If he can't it will save having your credit pulled again. The down side is many quotes are good for 30 days...so if you order something or just starting to shop and it takes longer than 30 it can result in several credit pulls.

Salt

[DreiHunde]

Originally Posted by SuicideSaints

We came prequalified but the dealer offered some very incentives to let them do the financing. The financing options came back the exact same as what we were prequalified for through my personal bank. It does not hurt anything to come prequalified and then see what the dealer can offer.

x1

[whj77372]

I always pre-qualify and then when they ask about financing I never tell them what rate that I have and about one half of the time the beat the rate. Many times it is with a local credit union that they know has money to lend and it would be hard for us to know that. Good Luck

[fx2]

We had our financing lined up through our credit union. When at the dealer they weren't able to beat the rate so we had the draw up the contract, we emailed it to our credit union and they overnighted the check to the dealer. We signed the contract and left a deposit late Thursday night and picked it up that Saturday, finance guy had the check in hand from the credit union after we finished our walk through. The nice thing was we were able to negotiate using the bottom line vs them trying to show us payments. I am in finance for a living so I already knew where we'd end up payment wise.


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[geotex1]

We always shop pre-qualified as it affords us to know exactly where our credit score is and what the best possible rate we can have from either our credit union or personal bank, and I also compare funding via a home equity loan. We then let the dealers work up their best possible financing options and sometimes they do better, sometimes not, but we know we did the best we could with this approach.