Do you need a down payment to refinance?

Can I Refinance Yet? What to Do?

• Me and my husband got a 2007 Jeep Liberty for him to drive to work and that in October. We want to try to refinance it as we are paying high interest. I believe around 20+%. Right now our loan details are: Balance: $14,807.00 (Less after payment this month-$174.16 towards principal) Payments $406.85 with $232.69 being interest The high payment for one is expensive and at 60 months we will pay a ton of interest. Only questions are we are trying to get our credit fixed through a company and not sure what kind of credit score you need to get a refinance. Also once you refinance it say in a year or so your credit improves even more-can you refinance again? If we are both on the loan-do they take the higher credit when they do the refinance or how does that work? He had a repo. in the past that he paid and I never had a car loan. I think both of our credit scores are about 550-580 or so. Trying to figure out what to do to be able to lower our payments so we have more money for other bills and that and get this paid off sooner or with less interest at least. Please help!

• Answer:

  The problem, if and when you can refinance, will be that the refinance amount will be based on what the car is worth, not what you owe. Typically, with high interest rate loans the result is that you are upside own ........ meaning you owe more than the car's value. This really puts you at an impasse. If you refinance you will have to pay the difference in what you owe the previous lender yourself, no one will buy a car for more than it's worth and you can't get a clear title until the lien against the car is paid. I can only suggest you refinance as soon as possible, the older the car is the less the value, and make extra payments to be applied to principle only, if the lender allows it, to reduce the principle and pay less interest. I hope you are one of the lucky ones and are not upside down in your car loan. BTW, be very leery of the company trying to 'fix' your credit, their reputations and track records are dismal.