Due to being told I now have to have a car allowance instead of a car, I need to sort something out before the end of Nov

So I’ve applied for a £20K loan at 4 different places [inc my own bank] this afternoon & been declined on all of them
I’ve lived here 22 years & have paid off my mortgage, have a good salary etc. etc.

We’ve always just saved for stuff in the past so not had a personal loan before, I take it a middle aged man with his own house [& a 1/4 share in another], in stable, well paid employment is just too high risk for them?

So I’ve applied for a £20K loan at 4 different places [inc my own bank] this afternoon & been declined on all of them
I’ve lived here 22 years & have paid off my mortgage, have a good salary etc. etc.

check your credit record. Either way its not going to look in great shape now that it has 4x loan applicatino refusals on it….

Try http://www.zopa.co.uk

just ask the government?

check your credit record. Either way its not going to look in great shape now that it has 4x loan applicatino refusals on it….

Sounds crazy to me

TBH – I posted this in anger more than anything else
I’m just going to tell my employer I can’t do it & see what their next move is

Aren’t those Mazda Options type schemes (the personal lease arrangement thingy) tailor made for this situation? I’m assuming if you’re willing to borrow 20K for a car you’ll be changing it every 3 years or so though.
The dealers will do their level best to make sure it goes through on the basis their sale rides on it, whilst banks seem to be really off lending right now.. stupidly high interest rates about.

see whether you can get a car hire purchase based on your car allowance budget? Their credit requirements may be a little more flexible as they will class the car as colateral I imagine whereas a £20k loan from a bank will be a wholly unsecured personal one.

arrange finance through the dealership, are they not falling over themsleves these days to offer great finance deals in order to shift more cars.

Cheers

Like I say – I’m going to bounce it back at work, I don’t particularly want to buy my own car so ………..

your company is giving you money to buy the car, alternatively by a car for a couple of grand and use the allowance to fund new bikes!

your company is giving you money to buy the car, alternatively by a car for a couple of grand and use the allowance to fund new bikes!

Not keen, I regularly drive as far as Eastern Europe so need reliability & comfort

alternatively by a car for a couple of grand and use the allowance to fund new bikes!

That is certainly what I am going to do when faced with a very similar situation in June.

My previous company had ‘rules’ that said car always had to be less than 6 years old and capable of carrying 4 adults after people took the pee with the allowance thing.

If they’re giving you the money because you are an ‘essential’ car user then either arrange for them to rent a car for you when you need or get them to provide a car.

as above – 4 refusals on your record doesn’t look good. I’ve a sneakign suspision that you got refused because you have no credit history so they can’t tell if you’ll default or not.

Why don’t you just get some kind of long term lease car type thing?

Credit rating is not about how much of a risk you are, but how much money they are likely to make off you. Plus, if you’ve never taken out loans then they don’t know how good you are do they? You are an unknown. And lending is pretty tight these days.

Either

a) get a loan from the car dealer – car companies are desperate to shift cars so offer far better loans than the banks do or
b) lease. But if you are doing stellar miles like it sounds like you are, then they don’t work out well.

definately check your credit rating.

you can get a lot of car for under £5k, my 535i cost only £2k and is one of the best drives I’ve ever had – and previously I’ve had many, many new cars.

As for driving to the ‘East’, fly and hire instead – or just take the allowance and 40ppm.

+1 dealer leases

Sign up to experian it should show you your rating, presume you prob aren’t a heavy credit card user either? That helps too. They look for evidence of regular payment.

Alternatively someone could have stolen your identity….

Don’t sign up to any credit checking agency, its just a scam for them to make money as they hope you forget to cancel after the free period. Just request your staturory credit report for £2…

http://www.experian.co.uk/consumer/statutory-report.html
http://www.equifax.co.uk/Products/credit/statutory-report.html

To be honest 20k is a big chunk of money to borrow without any security. And the car won’t be security as it’ll lose 20% as soon as you drive away.

That’s why leasing is going to be best I think. Lease, then fly/drive to Eastern Europe.

Or remortgage for £20k.

Why on earth would you take out a 20k loan to buy a car? You lose an insane amount of money on a new car as soon as it leaves the showroom anyway.

Be careful with any mileage restirctions on HP and leasing agreements.

It is what happens when you borrow nothing and pay off the mortgage. When you do want to borrow something they do not have any evidence to suggest you are a good credit risk as there is no history of borrowing (and paying it back). A sad reflection on modern society.

Why not buy an ex lease car where the depreciation has been lost but it will have been maintained. It will still be new enough to pass for business use. You could get something for half the sum and still have some for bikes too.

A sad reflection on modern society.

Wtf? Banks are not your mates, nor have they ever been!

It’s got nothing to do with society, loans are investments, nothing else. You don’t invest when you don’t know the risk.

This is why I’ll be keeping my offset mortgage going even if I could pay it off.

I’m banking with ‘Slumberland’ from now on.

Is the 20K the total cost of the car? From what I’m hearing about business money lending, they want the customer to put money up front and in a lot of cases want further security.
I think people are starting to realise that banks are businesses first and foremost, and not there to just help.

The less I have to do with banks, the better off I am.

Couldn’t you make do for now and save 15k over the year?

Might be worth looking here as get a good discount and they do finance but not sure about the rate:
http://www.drivethedeal.com

My bank is forever offering me £5000, £10,000+ loans. I always say ‘Have you seen my bank balance?? D’you think it’s responsible to offer me loans of that sort of amount??’ Just silly. Someone with less willpower and common-sense could get in a lot of trouble. Banks should be more responsible when it comes to loans etc if you ask me.

And don’t get me started on credit card companies…. 😯

Yes, I know I have a great credit rating- it’s ‘cos I don’t take out credit on anything ffs!!!!

I would never borrow the full amount on a new car to use for work.

2 friends of mine work for the same company, 1 had a brand new Seat something or other, cost £18k kept for three years doing business mileage and then sold for £7k to fund new car. Friend 2 bought a Citroen C4 about 4 years old for £4k to use for work and uses the £400 or so car allowance to fund his new VW California campervan. Friend 2 approach seems much more sensible to me.

Thanks for the replies/suggestions

Last year I did 40K+ miles so leasing is very expensive

Or remortgage for £20k.

Put my house up for a company car???

Couldn’t you make do for now and save 15k over the year?

maybe

My contract actually says that I get a car so I’m not sure they can easily force me onto an allowance, we’ll see

Put my house up for a company car???

Well that doesn’t matter though the cost of arranging the mortgage is likely to be a bit much.

You probably can’t get a loan because you don’t have a lending history. When was the last time you got a loan for something? With your mortgage paid off probably not for a while. You are fairly stuffed.

Have you tried asking your company? To all the folks who say get a older car – check with your company again since they might have rules about max car age. If you are going to get a car try nearly new at least and minimise the steep part of the depreciation (the expensive part of running cars).

When was the last time you got a loan for something?

never had one – other than a mortgage

When you move from a company car (esp. if fuelled) to a private car (abet with allowance and business mileage) you need to rethink your transport choice.

For example; with a company car I use to drive to the airport and park up – when I took the allowance, I used a taxi. You only get 10k miles pa at 40ppm, and then its 25ppm – no point doing more than 10k pa business miles in your own car.

And whereas previously I’d happily drive abroad and then fly back for the weekend, in my own car – taxi to airport, fly and then hire car at destination.

Money can be made with an allowance and business miles, but you need to be smart with what you buy and how you use it.

Every company I have seen that push high mileage essential car users into getting their own cars, have made redundancies shortly after. There is no way that I would ever take out finance on those terms.

And currently with banks, to get a loan, you have to prove without a shadow of a doubt that you don’t need one.

A lack of repayment history = nervous underwriters = probable decline.

Elfinsafetys comment re great credit rating (because of never having borrowed) is just wrong.

When was the last time you got a loan for something?
never had one – other than a mortgage

That’s definitely your problem right there.

Ask a dealer for a loan quote. I got a loan at 7% in the middle of the financial uproar – banks were offering either 15% or telling me to get stuffed.