If you are self-employed you may have concerns about how you can get a car loan. The first thing you need to know is that not every dealership has a program for people that are self-employed or own their own business. You need to find a dealer that has a lender that works with self-employed people and knows what the lenders expect. New Start Auto Loans has many dealers that deal with many different types of financing. To prepare to get an auto loan while self-employed or when you own your own business, you will need to gather up proof of your income. Proving your income might be the most difficult part of your finance process. If you are employed through a business you will likely get a check stub, if you are self-employed, however, you will need to prove your income another way. If you have been self-employed for several years, you will probably just need to show your last two years of tax returns. Hopefully, you haven’t found excessive deductions so that your income is almost nothing.  Keep in mind that banks are going to use your adjusted gross income not your net income. If you had $200,000 in income but wrote off $185,000 you can only prove $15,000 for the year and will only qualify based on that.  If you are reading this, are planning on getting a loan in the future, and are self-employed, please keep in mind that finding extras to write off may reduce your taxes but it may reduce your income so much that you won’t qualify for a car loan.

If you have bad credit or no credit and are looking for an auto loan you may have found a car dealer that has a special finance program. Once you give the finance manager your information they’ll ask you to bring in some documents.  Is this just to prove you are who you say you are? Banks need those documents for specific reasons and require them to get you financed.  Yes, of course, they need to verify your identity, with new laws in place and identity theft at an all-time high you should be glad that someone is looking out for you rather than getting mad because you have to prove you are who you say you are. So they asked you for your most recent check stub? This is to show the lender how much you can afford. They have a lot of experience in calculation this and may be doing you a favor when they set a maximum payment per month.  Phone bill? Why a phone bill? If the lender needs to get a hold of you they want to make sure the phone number you provided is your phone number.  If you give them someone’s phone number that does not belong to you they can rest assured that if you are late on a payment, they won’t be reaching you. Utility bill? This is to prove you actually live at the address you provided. People have asked, why can’t I just use any piece of mail? Just think about it, how likely are you to set utilities up in YOUR NAME at a house you don’t actually live at? Finally, references, usually a lender will want about three to six references. These references are needed to reach you if you move or change phone numbers. If the bank sends out your next payment book and it comes back because you moved they will need to reach you somehow and so they will call the references.