Is it worth paying down a vehicle loan?

[Rooflesstoofless]

Um, so you have us$9,000 capital at your disposal? Are you affording the monthly car repayment at the moment?

Yes, and no problems with affording the monthly as it stands. I was going to buy myself a motorcycle but my wife's Saturn was taking a big shit and reliable transportation for the wife and kids outweighs my want for pseudo-baddass-on-a-bike dreams.

I appreciate your insight on the issue. I pay cash for everything I own and buy used vehicles for cheap since my job will rot them from the inside out within a few years. So I'm pretty damn ignorant on the issue.

[chrisberb]

Yes, and no problems with affording the monthly as it stands. I was going to buy myself a motorcycle but my wife's Saturn was taking a big shit and reliable transportation for the wife and kids outweighs my want for pseudo-baddass-on-a-bike dreams.

I appreciate your insight on the issue. I pay cash for everything I own and buy used vehicles for cheap since my job will rot them from the inside out within a few years. So I'm pretty damn ignorant on the issue.

Like some have mentioned, IF your loan doesn't have any penalties for paying off the loan early, i'd throw some extra money towards it, because (if the numbers you gave are somewhat current) almost half of your 335$ monthly payment is interest. Usually though, you have to stipulate "apply to principal" if you can, because otherwise the overpayment just gets applied to the interest that you'll accrue over the life of the loan.

[Gheld]

Eh, you probably should ignore a majority of people in this thread.

The real answer is that it depends.

If you can put that money somewhere else that will give you more than a 10% return or if you have debt that is higher than 10% then you should do one of those two options first.

The logic is this:

Paying down the loan will save you 10% interest for that $9000. But if you can earn 15% interest on that $9000 you'll end up with more money overall than if you paid down the loan. Similarly if you have $9000 in credit card debt at 20% interest, you pay that down first.

That's usually the best path forward when deciding what to do with debt. However if you have issues with your credit score or are overburdened with debt (and somehow magically your car loan is your highest interest rate) then you might want to consider it for other reason than the return on the money spent.

Hope that makes sense.

15% interest on a 9000 dollar investment?
15% secured interest would be enough to ask what you've been smoking.

The best rate I've ever seen offered on a guaranteed investment is 3.2% , and that was a 10 year non redeemable certificate.

If you want anything higher you have to take risks. And if you don't completely own all of your assets.(Still paying a mortgage and car loan) high risk investing is just asking for trouble.