S
Susan_OR
Guest
I'll try to make this as brief as possible...my husband and I were thinking about buying a truck and went to our credit union to talk to a loan officer. The rate sounded reasonable so we applied for a pre-approval. I asked the loan officer what the fees were associated with the loan and she said there was a "$55 dollar loan processing fee". She asked us whether we wanted that taken out of our savings account or added to the loan balance...stupidly, we authorized them to take it from our account. At the top of the application form it said in bold letters "$55 dollar loan processing fee". It didn't say anything about it being payable whether or not we got the loan from them and nothing said it was non-refundable. The officer didn't tell us anything verbally either. There was never any mention, written or verbal, that the fee was for the pre-approval. I work for a Mortgage broker and am so accustomed to pre-approvals being a free service that it never occurred to me that they would charge this even if we didn't get the loan from them. The market is so competitive that it just isn't necessary to pay a fee like this...so many ppl offer it for free. I never would have accepted the pre-approval from the CU if we had known they would charge this. The dealership was able to offer us a lower interest rate so we took the loan from them and completely forgot about the credit union's pre-approval. Well, they took the $55 out of our account. The only explanation the loan officer would give me on the phone was "that's the way it is". They also didn't give us a copy of anything we signed that day and wouldn't give it to us even after we requested it. This just doesn't seem legal to me. Is it? Does the Truth in Lending Act apply to auto loans under $25,000? Or does it only apply to loans over $25,000 that affect real property? Is there somewhere on the net that I can get a copy of the printed rules and regulations concerning auto loans? Thanks in advance for your opinion....
~Susan
[This message has been edited by Susan_OR (edited April 16, 2000).]
~Susan
[This message has been edited by Susan_OR (edited April 16, 2000).]