Can anyone help? Bit long - sorry!

Emma5000

I'm hoping someone out there will know the answer to this. We went to the bank to get a loan to buy a 2nd hand car, discussed it all with the loan adviser, worked out how much we could reasonably afford repayment wise, etc. Then went to look for cars. Found one we liked, thought about it for 24hrs, then put a £500 deposit down while we went back to the bank to officially get the money. Then the bank decided our credit rating wasn't good enough, so we didn't get the money (we believed it was all done and dusted). So the finance lady at the dealership looked for finance for us as we got told (but only verbally) that our deposit was only refundable if THEY couldn't get finance for us. They can't get the repayments down as low as the bank did (and we're wary of HP etc), but now they're really pressuring us saying that the car is 'ours' so we'll just 'have to' make the higher repayments through their finance!!! (I'm virtually certain this is rubbish as no-one can make you take out credit that isn't suitable - I am right aren't I?) I've tried to tell them all day today that their finance isn't suitable so we'd like our deposit back but I've gotten nowhere.

Can anyone tell me if we've even got a chance of getting our deposit back? We've signed a bit of paper saying we intended to buy the car (perhaps naively) as we had every intention of doing so. And the deposit was put on a visa card - so could they potentially help at all? Thanks if you can help. xx

vaio

First thought is you agreed to buy the car and your failure to obtain finance doesn’t alter that unless the sale was dependant (in writing) on you getting finance.

Sounds like the garage is being quite helpful trying to get the sale to go through whereas I think they could just leave it to you to sort the money or lose your deposit

Emma5000

I agree with your first bit - all we have is the guy's word that our deposit would be refunded if we didn't get credit, no proof. But trust me, they are not being 'helpful'!!! They are trying to bully us into taking credit that we can't afford. xx

vaio

If you agree with the first bit then anything the garage do is being helpful as they could just sit back and leave it to you to either raise the finance cheaper (which it doesn't sound like you can) or lose your deposit

Emma5000

Helpful would have been the first 3 or 4 phonecalls which were genuinely trying to find us some finance - not the 9 I've had this afternoon telling me I 'have to' take their finance when I've already said the repayments are too high for us to afford. Anyway (as I didn't intend to discuss the helpfulness of the garage!!) my original questions were whether they could force us to take their finance, and whether we could get our deposit back as it was only a verbal confirmation that we could. I'm assuming you would say we couldn't unless they were feeling generous. Thanks.

[Deleted User]

Charge back the visa card?

dizzyblonde82

I don't think you have much chance of getting your deposit back but £500 does seem quite high for a deposit - maybe you could negotiate to get some of your deposit back. Banks are really bad at going through affordability and then turning people down - did you think about trying to complete the loan application before looking at cars.

I have just bought a new car and was only asked for £100 deposit.

bigbulldog

I take it the garage did not discuss or you did not ask how much the payments would be with you..ie showing the best and worst case scenrio's depending on what finance company accepted you and there rates of interest.????

Hintza

Deleted_User wrote: »

Charge back the visa card?

On what grounds?

vaio

bigbulldog wrote: »

I take it the garage did not discuss or you did not ask how much the payments would be with you..ie showing the best and worst case scenrio's depending on what finance company accepted you and there rates of interest.????

The garage wouldn’t have discussed finance (or been re-buffed if they had tried) as the OP thought she had the finance sorted elsewhere so would have been effectively a cash buyer as far as the garage were concerned.

On a wider angle, if they were providing finance is there any requirement for the garage need to discuss things in great detail with best & worse cases etc? Or do they just say it’ll cost you £x a month and leave it to the OP to say yes or no?

Any news OP?

vaio

Hintza wrote: »

On what grounds?

Buyers remorse?