Affordable Tacoma

Looking for affordable ($13,000 or less) Tacoma in good shape within Georgia (I’m near Covington but I’m willing to go most anywhere within an hour or two from here). Looking to finance but I don’t have any credit, I’ve never financed before, does anyone know of some place where I may be able to find a deal that would work for my situation?

 

Welcome to TW.

Honest, non snarky advice:

• Start building credit. Get a credit-builder card, hire a credit attorney (they aren't as expensive as it sounds), get. that. credit. up.
• Keep the car you have for as long as you can. If you can't, look into buying a cheap used car. If you can't do that and absolutely, positively, 100% NEED a truck RIGHT NOW...
• Get a used Ranger or Frontier. No snark, Tacomas are expensive. Used Tacomas are stupidly overpriced. They are not good for someone with no cred. If you try to buy something for 13k, it'll break you. Tacomas that are one foot in the junkyard are going for those prices these days. It's insane. But that price won't last forever. It will correct eventually.
• Wait for interest rates to drop, by then you are hopefully in a better rating category. Get that Tacoma then. Patience, grasshopper.

 

Solid. I had a chapter 13 around 2000 and started over, it takes time, now have an 825+ score. Bought a Ranger and it went to almost a million miles before my first Toyota.

He's correct, you should be doing this already. If you're rejected on CC's, get a prepaid card and work with it for a while. Get financing for a small item like a stereo from Wal-Mart or Fred Meyer or something, pay it off. Once you get a card, use it but pay it off before the interest charges hit (they are RIDICULOUS, even with good credit the interest is between 21 and 25%.) The key here is charge it, pay it, keep the balance low and do-able, don't go all lottery winner and max it out. In a year you will see credit improve.

As for financing, companies will almost never finance used vehicles more than a few years old. What you might do is the dealer you're buying it from can find you a loan, this is actually the only real work they do because it's hard to get someone a loan with no or poor credit. They usually pull it off. Beware though, the interest rates for autos are REALLY low right now, but for a "high risk" loan interest is way higher, half your monthly payment will be toward interest.

How I got around that after my BK was to get a junker old dodge (a tank!) for $800 half cash, half over 2 weeks, drove it for 6 months, traded it on the Ranger. Lived with the high interest for another 6 months, traded it on the Toyota. At that point the credit score had started to rise. Now I have companies falling all over themselves wanting me to borrow money. While it's tempting, I learned a lot from bankruptcy and the answer is almost always no.

 

How old are you? I’m assuming lack of credit is because of age?

 

OP didn't give much to go on. He could be 16. Could be new to the country. Could have been raised by wolves.
Do you have a full time job?
Any history of regular (monthly) payment to utilities?
Do you have any accounts with financial institutions?

 

One of the regular conversations in our house is amazement at people we know in their 40's and 50's who don't have credit or know how to manage finances. You'd be surprised.

 

Please don't leave people here hanging. You asked for advice, so post a few things that will help us give you better advice. Some of the comments here have suggested what they need. Age, immigration status, bankruptcy or just never established credit, etc. And you can edit the original post to include these things, but a direct reply to a comment is great too.

The best truck you can get for long term use and low price will possibly have a branded title. But people avoid them because they think they might not be repaired right, and because banks don't like to loan on them. And insurance companies have some odd rules and may not cover them in similar ways to an unbranded title. But the trucks, IF they are repaired well, will go just as far with exactly the same reliability as a truck that was never in an accident. I'm driving a 2nd gen '012 with less than 100K miles after driving it three years and never having any kind of mechanical issue, and I bought it totaled and repaired it in my driveway with common tools in about four/five hours.

And there are the occasional sweet deals you can fall into if you are patient and have the cash to jump on them. The truth is, the more cash you have, the more likely it is that you will be able to spend less and negotiate a good deal. Credit to buy a depreciating asset is almost always a losing proposition.

Good luck...

 

+100 to this. absolutely.

a ranger can be everything just as reliable as a tacoma, but they're worth $1,000-15,000. the bottom price would be for a low/mid(1990-2009) model year, single-cab, 4cyl, 'sport' bed--which is narrower, all the least desirable options. high end is last 2 model years(2010-2011), manual trans, 3.0/4.0 motor, extended cab models, where even the worst-shape tacoma's tend to be $6,000+.

no joke, when i started looking at tacoma's in 2017, in my area there were 3 similar 2nd gen tacoma's with 280,000+ miles, all looked like they went through a war, and the cheapest, the frame was starting to fold between the body and bed, but they were still asking $8,000.

most banks won't offer loans for a vehicle over 5 years old. there's plenty of "buy here pay here" lots that will offer you individual financing, but normally do so at astronomical interest rates, and some are shady enough that they don't report it to help you build credit either. they generally prey on those that are desperate with no other options.

 

Sorry I forgot I even had this forum as a resource. Also yes, to those asking, my lack of credit is due to age, I’m pushing 21 and have never financed anything. But I did get lucky and got a decent deal on a 2006 Tacoma Xtra cab. I brought it home to day and have chosen to finance it for 6-8 months, making the payments with a credit card (the Chime Credit Builder does not charge interest btw) so that I can build credit through both financing the vehicle, as well as through using the credit card. After those few months of building up credit I will refinance to get the interest lower. I’m very excited about having the opportunity to own this new truck.

 

A bank would easily give you a loan for higher than that.
Don't know about current APR's though.

Requires proof of income.

A successful car loan is part of life and building credit.

on a separate note, as it is not entirely needed to finance a car
other ways to build credit
use it, show a history of paying
like buying some little shit here and there on the CC instead of debit, that you can afford
and paying it off

however, banks respect things like car loans
they will ask you, is this your first car loan
as it is a factor. Folks who have had more than one, get authorized for higher amounts later. Now should they use that? Probably not.

I have known people without a job be authorized a high amount. They did not go buy some expensive new POS the next day, because that would be unwise.

Current APR's are said to be high. That's regardless of your own history.
Even folks with lengthy and good history are being quoted ripoff APR's and as a result, not taking it.
I personally thing 6% or less is good, and higher is not.

it will reflect on your history if you apply for anything
so instead of applying every so often
you can just line things up and apply for a bunch at once
such as applying for a car loan with different banks, to see what they're offering, compare, and take the best deal

sometimes, dealerships themselves offer better finance rates, and use a different bank
but they usually charge a higher price for vehicles than private party. They try to profit flipping every vehicle.

 

while it's great to have a vehicle loan as part of your credit history, it really works out to be a small blip in the larger scheme of things. your overall credit rating has a lot more to do with having a line of credit, using it, and making on-time payments. they also tend to award better ranking to people that create a balance every month--you can still pay it off every month to avoid interest charges, but the system is specifically looking for/creating an established history of paying on time, every time, and one can't do that without using it.

when i went to get approved for my mortgage, they specifically looked at the loan amounts of previous vehicle loans, as well as my credit cards average balance, date paid, and ratio of amount of each credit cards limit used. it's most important in all of these cases that 'a' payment is made every month towards the balance. a minimum payment each month counts as a positive scoring, even if the balance isn't paid off...

i would highly recommend looking into some store credit cards. my target card has been one of my best credit cards in terms of ease of getting with minimal history (it was my 2nd credit card, first was a chase card with a $250 limit and obscene interest rate), they've also been one of the few that automatically up the limit to extreme levels. they extended me to a $15k limit only 3 years after getting it--not important to me, but important for credit score. it's now a target visa card, so it's good everywhere else as well, which can be important should something catastrophic happen far away from your normal support system.

it's really easy on a vacation trip that a vehicle breaks down, gets stolen, or wrecked. i know at least one person in my personal friends/family circle that each one of those things has actually happened. of course, it's a horrible idea to be using a credit card to be living above your financial means, but used properly to ride out the storms of life, with an actionable plan to pay off, can be a godsend in bad situations.