The Best Car Finance Blog In The World

The ‘recession/credit crunch’ is already cutting fairly deeply and now is a time to think very carefully about the financing of your next car. Not only should you take care over the type of finance that you use but you should also take care over the supplier. In the last week I have heard of three dealer groups that have gone, locally we lost Sidlow, mainly VW, Audi, Seat and Alpha as well as Barkers Citroen and another VW Audi dealer, Dane. This has been bad news for those who paid deposits and initial rentals to these companies, Read more »

Now is the time to take great care with the funders, dealers and brokers, both online and offline, that you use to fund your next car. Things are getting tough and having lived through the last recession I know many of the tricks and scams that they all get up to in order to secure life saving orders. Cars are expensive items and great care should be taken over the selection of suppliers. I’ve been in this industry for over 25 years and I am Read more »

Fuel is coming down, the sun is shining and the banks are lending again. Well 2 out of three can’t be bad! I think the email from the Government to the banks must have got lost in cyberspace somewhere or maybe they sent it in the post without a large letter stamp attached. Either way I am still waiting, as are most in the finance industry, for the glimmer of light that suggests that Chancellor Brown oops I mean Darling did the right thing for us common people or whether things will continue to deteriorate. The annoying thing is Read more »

A report from the Finance and Leasing Association (FLA) showed that their members financed £5.6billion of consumer expenditure on new cars in 2007 and a third of total expenditure on cars throughout the year. Interestingly, new car finance was named by FLA consumer finance members as the most important use to which consumers put their funds, with used car finance the 4^th most important Read more »

Whilst there appears to be a great deal of doom and gloom about, the latest new car sale figures issued by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) to the end of June shows a modest drop of just 1.6% over the same period in 2007. A lot of that was due to the sharp action of the manufacturers to discount cars into Read more »

The 1st October sees the introduction of new regulations that ensures that customers with hire purchase or conditional sale agreements are reminded specifically of their rights to voluntary terminate (VT) the agreement when 50% of the total amount due has been paid. The Consumer Credit Act 2006 states that Read more »

Companies have already started to cut back on their transport costs, as of course consumers have also, in preparation for the difficult times ahead. Sadly the problem here is not a need to downsize or purchase cheaper cars etc. it is really a need to understand the finance tools that are available. Various types of leasing could save businesses a fortune. Taking on a tax efficient purchase scheme when the company is making no profits against which they can write off depreciation and interest is pure lunacy. Losing the Read more »

OK now I’ve filled you with doom and gloom let me give you the good news. Whilst this new superleasing company (Lloyds/TSB Lex) will dominate the market, because of the scale of their operation they will have to concentrate more on the large fleets rather than the SME and consumer sectors, thereby increasing competition amongst the smaller players. As a result contract hire companies such as Leaseplan, Lombard, Masterlease etc will concentrate on model specific deals. Whilst the superlease company will arrange Read more »

On the subject of scams there is a lot of evidence of  an old favourite amongst the more unscrupulous brokers returning. It was used a lot in the last recession and will no doubt be used even more as we have the added ‘bonus’ of a credit crunch as we move in the direction of another recession. It’s based on the deal that doesn’t exist, the sort of thing that dealers used to do a lot in the past by advertising a really cheap car to undercut all the local competition then telling the customer Read more »

I have been quite frustrated this week as a result of the plight of a lady who has a major problem with a finance company. As a court case is pending I cannot comment on the details but suffice to say that I am doing everything to help. The lady had a arranged a car through Gwent Fleet Management of Abergavenny who are now under investigation by the police but as a result of their actions the lady now has a battle with a finance company called Mallard Finance, who are, Read more »