I'm currently 12 months into a 36 month auto loan, but at 24.90% and $367.45 payments it sucks. I applied on lending tree at the request of a friend, got one denial, one approval and one pending. The approval is for 48 months at 17.99% on about $7k refinancing.

About the vehicle, Sale value is at 12k, trade-in is 10k. This is by KBB the refinancer I spoke with and by penfeds refinance app so pretty sure it is accurate. I currently owe just under $7k. It's an 01 4wd with 68.5k on the ODO.

My credit has improved, went from low 500's at approval to 650-680's possibly a little lower. TU 2 PR's for 300 combined from 2003, plus one pd collection from 2002, Experian has the same PR's no collections, and EQ has 1 paid collection from 2002, no PR's.

While my credit has improved my truck loan is my oldest line at 1 year and I have 7 revolving. 6 of which were opened in June. 1 store card, 3 prime, and 3 sub. Utilization at about 10-11%

If I refinance at the 17.99 I could still pay it down in 24 months, but the extra money would be nice to have with lower payments. I guess my question would be, is it better to try a trade-in rather than refinance and which is actually the hardest to achieve. I hope to have an answer from the other refinancer tomorrow. I haven't commited to anything yet. Just don't want to waste unneeded inquiries.

Thanks for any help you can give me. I'm in Illinois if that factors into advice or not(Other than move somewhere else).

take the refi for the lower rate, but only for 24 months.

would be what I would do.

Thanks for the quick reply, that's what I was wanting to do but my brother kept insisting I trade it in. Figured I'd throw it on here for my final answer. I'm hoping to get another offer, maybe lower, just glad I got one to fall back on.

Now my next question, would there be a big difference in taking it for 48 months and paying it off in 24? Payments would be 212 and I'd pay 350 monthly, possibly more when gaps in bills hit. 24 months would make the payment right at that amount. Does it reflect differently on CR's?

except in reality you really wont do that. It's human nature.

It would IMO, be a mistake to take the refinance out for more months than you are currently obligated.

Nope. Your CR will show an installment loan for 48 months, regardless of how much extra you pay to get rid of the loan earlier.

If you did pay it off earlier than 48 months the "MR" field will contain a rolling 24 month history that will reflect the last payment date which may or may not be 48 months total.

On a creditor version of your credit file.