0% coming back?

[FaceGarden]

Hey everyone,
I am looking to buy a sky, and i JUST missed the zero percent deal by a day by the time i finally got serious about it. The dealer said the deal may come back when the current one expires, but at this point i'm realizing that dealer's don't know jack about this stuff. How likely is that deal to come back? I pretty much can't afford a sky without it... :-/
-Taylor

[enkymion]

I was in the same boat. If it weren't for 0%, I wouldn't have one.

[Gerry]

No one outside the tight circles inside GM would know that. And retailers will not know of an offer until the day before. As to whether it will come back for the Sky depends on inventory and the need for incentives to move cars. I think they moved a lot of inventory on the last go round.

[FaceGarden]

Hmm... I guess i'm wondering how often GM offers that kind of deal?
-Taylor

[RickyD]

I am sure it will be back very shortly. With gas prices as high as they are and since the past 0% was only what, a few days! Plus they really didn't sell what they wanted to.Yes it will be back. Probably before the end of the month. If not then next month for sure.

[enkymion]

0% on my Sky makes me hate paying interest on my Civic.

[MidniteBlues]

Well, I will say this. The competition saw how successful GM was in moving huge inventories. Guess what, they are copying it. Everyday day now, local paper, 0% financing...even for 2009?? yea they might do it again...we will see when, especially if gas stays high and our stupid congress don't open up the drilling EVERYWHERE>>>

[FaceGarden]

Well i hope so, because i started looking at all this assuming zero percent financing, so i could string the payments out to 72 months and the car would almost pay for itself with gas savings. With interest, 72 mo. is terrible tho, so i'd have to do a shorter loan, and then the car no longer becomes silly cheap and i have to really decide if i can afford it. :-/
I liked it more when it was a no brainer, i hope zero percent comes back!
-Taylor

[sooner]

I sure hope they bring back the rebates as well. I missed a deal on a base sky with automatic (Chili Red) by a day. Counting my $1000 of GM Card rebate and the $3000 from GM, I was getting $5800 off sticker.

[SKY Spy]

I would just say this...

Don't hold your breath for 0% for 72 months. This happens only when GM does the 72 hour sale once per year and the 72 month sale LAST year didn't include the 0% for 72 month. So it had been 2 years since they did this...

BA...

[MidniteBlues]

WTH I would not be financing ANYTHING for 72 months anyways to be honest and a car? not likely. I usually if I can like to pay it off ASAP and get the dam title for the dam thing eventually.. But thats just me, I hate car payments, CC payments, the only thing I'll except is my house payment.(no choice ). And that I do relunctingly...15 years loans MAX only if possible.. That way, at my age,, (MB looks around) it'll be paid off before my signature becomes untrue.. and I'll be on the other side of the dirt and have a very bad day..

[FaceGarden]

Yeah, that's probably true... I've only ever owned used cars, paid for in cash, so i'm not real familiar with taking out a lease. I figured with zero percent interest i'd just make the payments as low as possible (by doing 72 mo) and if i had extra cash i'd pay more as i could. The nice thing is that at zero percent for 72 months, the car only costs a bit more to own than what i'm saving in gas (i calculated i'd save about $200/month in gas, and 72 month financing with no interest and a decent down payment = $350/month payment + $100/month added insurance cost = $250 total extra cost per month if you factor in gas savings.) I may have to just suck it up and work out bigger payments.
It all sounded so nice!

But then, how many months will they do zero percent for? Like 48? 36?
Thanks, i'm a total dummy when it comes to financing!
-Taylor

[MidniteBlues]

Actually and in reality it all depended on how good your credit is. In my case, since I have gold plated credit rating (they love me when I walk in and run a credit check) they come back salivating hehe Back on topic, from the little research i did, when those plans were offered you could select anything you wanted. The lower the months, the higher the payments (obviously) but you could selected from 12 to 72 months in reality..

[FaceGarden]

Yeah, hmm, that's interesting. Well then it seems to me if interest wasn't an issue, you'd want to stretch the payments out as long as possible - money loses value over time because of inflation, so it's easier to pay $350 in a few years than it is to pay it now (because that same dollar amount is actually worth less in a few years). Plus, money you hang on to can be invested instead of just given away. For example - if you wanted a 36 month loan, it would make more sense to get a 72 month loan, so the payments are half as much, and then each month invest the other half in something that appreciates value, like a reliable stock, or a CD account or something. Then, after your 36 months are up, and you've paid off half of the car, and you've invested the other half of the car's value in an account that earns interest, you can pay off the rest of the car with the money you put in that account, and keep the interest it earned to yourself!

At least, that's how i see it, when no interest is involved...

My other question is this:
I found a certified pre-owned '08 redline in the color combo that i want with about 4k miles on it from a woman who decided she'd rather have an auto. I can get it for $27k, which is pretty good, but i know that with the '09's coming out, new '08's are gonna be discounted a lot soon too... Should i offer them even less for the used one? Like $25k? Or is $27k good? Or should i wait and see if a zero percent deal comes back? And if zero percent does come back, do you think it will only be for '08's?

I really want to wait and see if the zero percent financing comes back, because then i can get a 72 month loan and just have silly low payments, but i'm worried that it won't and i'll have missed out on a good deal on the used one.

Or if i wanted to play it safe i could buy the used one, and then trade it in if they do zero percent, right? But how much would i lose if i did that? Or is that not so bad of an idea?

Turns out i have a lot of questions, but you guys are really helpful and i appreciate it!
-Taylor

[Jay_Sin]

Originally Posted by MidniteBlues

WTH I would not be financing ANYTHING for 72 months anyways to be honest and a car? not likely. I usually if I can like to pay it off ASAP and get the dam title for the dam thing eventually.. But thats just me, I hate car payments, CC payments, the only thing I'll except is my house payment.(no choice ). And that I do relunctingly...15 years loans MAX only if possible.. That way, at my age,, (MB looks around) it'll be paid off before my signature becomes untrue.. and I'll be on the other side of the dirt and have a very bad day..

Well congratulations on being able to pay off a $30,000+ car in less then 72 months. Not all of us make that much money. Maybe we could provide you with a cookie or something?

[sooner]

If they DO happen to offer the 0% for 72 months or $3K in rebates and you don't plan on taking it out for the full 72, it would seem you are much better off to take the rebates. I suspect that GM is banking on people trading in the car, wrecking it, or paying it off early so the full benefit of their 0% offer isn't realized. If you only plan to finance for 3-4 years, I suspect the interest you would pay on a low rate conventional loan (I have 2 lenders who are below 4.5%) over that time wouldn't be $3000 so you are money ahead to start with a lower financed amount. In all likelihood, the interest wouldn't be more than $2000 so you'd be ahead by $1000. Also, if you had to sell early on for any reason, you have a lower loan balance to work from.

Everyone's situation is different. It's a wash in my situation so it would make sense for me to take the rebates. All I can say is if they offer 0% and you want to go that route you should take full advantage of the General floating you FREE MONEY for 6 years. Otherwise, take the rebates and run.

Now, if only they offer it again...

[ParrotHeadNation]

Originally Posted by Jay_Sin

Well congratulations on being able to pay off a $30,000+ car in less then 72 months. Not all of us make that much money. Maybe we could provide you with a cookie or something?

i plan on paying it off in less than a year and im 21......

[Bogie]

Think on the economics of paying for a $30K car with cash versus a 72 month 0% loan.

Pay in cash, and you own it. Got Title. It's yours.

With the loan, you can take the $30K and invest it, while using it to make the payments (you can even automate the process). Even at a CD rate, you will have several thousand dollars in your pocket at the end of the 72 month loan period.

[enkymion]

Yup. Stretching it out is wiser with no interest.

[MidniteBlues]

Originally Posted by Jay_Sin

Well congratulations on being able to pay off a $30,000+ car in less then 72 months. Not all of us make that much money. Maybe we could provide you with a cookie or something?

From you I don't need a thing, keep your cookie & sell it, sounds like you need the money. No need to be sarcastic ...

PS: its not a matter of how much money or how long financed. A car won't be worth shlt after 72 months.. Doesn't make much sense to owe $15,000 on a car worth $5,000 now does it?

[FaceGarden]

So i looked at GM's stock price.... tumbling "Like a Rock" (pun intended... i know that's just chevy, but it's all the same). Good news for us though, as you'd think that would make them want to do 0% financing again to sell more cars, right?

Also, any advice on the pre-owned sky i mentioned? Should i offer them $25k? Or hold out for zero percent on a new one? I'm still not sure exactly how much i would lose if i bought this one now, then traded it right back in if they go back to zero percent. Thoughts?
-Taylor

[FaceGarden]

Originally Posted by MidniteBlues

PS: its not a matter of how much money or how long financed. A car won't be worth shlt after 72 months.. Doesn't make much sense to owe $15,000 on a car worth $5,000 now does it?

As people have said, that isn't true at all... You were going to pay that $15k eventually, whether it was right away or not, so it doesn't matter how much the car is worth, but the longer you hang onto that money, the more interest you will make on it. Its always better to pay later if you're not paying interest on the loan. That is, of course, assuming you could always afford the car in the first place. The only reason why owing $15k on a $5k car is is bad is simply because you have a lot of risk, since you can't just sell your car to bail yourself out. But over the course of ownership, so long as you can afford it, if you invest your money instead of paying off the car with it immediately (with zero percent interest), you will basically have paid less for the car with all the interest you made on your investments.

-Taylor