Savvy Shopper: Auto Dealers Skirt Financial Reform — Where Does That Leave You?
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When President Obama signed the Financial Reform Bill this week, it was missing one key component: increased oversight of auto loans. Obama and some lawmakers had wanted new restrictions on dealers making auto loans by placing them under the scrutiny of the new Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection. After some spirited lobbying by the dealers, auto loans were exempted, even though the bill will more tightly rein in powerful Wall Street lending practices.
Critics had argued that the bill’s auto-dealer provisions would only hurt those it was meant to protect, and maintained that the market is self-regulating. Proponents said that the little guy needed protection against lenders who mark up interest rates and include bogus fees. So where does it leave you, the car buyer?
First, a little background. Most car shoppers focus on the upfront negotiations with a car salesman. But the real terms of the contract are hammered out in the finance and insurance office after a temporary deal has been reached. The finance and insurance manager (also known as the “F&I guy”) posses as a friendly advisor as he or she arranges the loan and attempts to sell additional products and services.
What makes this system so effective is that dealers have access to money from the “captive” finance companies, which are set up to loan money for only one purpose — sell cars. In most cases, the interest rate from the captives is less than from banks and other lenders. So most car shoppers are driven into the dealership system — a system that has been honed over decades.
So while car dealers may be casting themselves as merchants on Main Street, rather than the slick fat cats of Wall Street, sleight of hand may going on in the F&I office. In Confessions of a Auto Finance Manager, veteran F&I manager Nick James talked about how the salesman pressured customers to agree to high monthly payments. Then, the finance manager would “pack payments” — filling the contract with warranties and extra products and services to justify the high costs. In some cases, the customers didn’t even know they were buying these extras.
Is this a system that would have benefited from oversight and regulation? First of all, it should be noted that more than $250 billion in loans per year are written by dealers, so there obviously is a lot of money at stake. The fact that car dealers lobbied vigorously to avoid regulation is another tipoff that something may be going on in the F&I room that would be curbed if reform were allowed.
The best advice we can give to car shoppers is to realize that dealers won an important round in Washington, and it’s back to business as usual for them. If you’re buying a car, the key is to educate yourself about the auto financing process. “Buyer beware” is the car-buyer’s battle cry.
http://blogs.edmunds.com/strategies/2010/07/savvy-shopper-auto-dealers-skirt-financial-reform—-where-does-that-leave-you.html
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