[masraum]

I can get great car loans from my credit union. The way these loans work is that I tell them the price range that I'm looking at, and how much I want to spend and they send me a blank check (literally) that says "not good for more than $xxxxxx (how much I told them I wanted to spend). When I buy the car, I pay with the check and I put the VIN on the check. I've bought 3 or 4 cars this way, and it's worked well. The first car that I bought like that was my 911. I bought it from a private seller. It was an older guy who was a bit leery of the check, but called the credit union and was satisfied and took the check. All of the other purchases have been from dealers.

Now, I'm in the market for another car (a miata), but I'm only wanting to spend $5k or so ($4-6k). I've got the cash, but don't want to spend my savings, and can get really low interest rate car loans from my credit union (2%). I know the best thing to do would be wait until I could pay cash without spending my savings, but waiting right now is not a good option.

The problem is that to get a good miata at that price range, I'll have to buy from a private seller. I don't think most private sellers would take the credit union blank check, even calling the credit union. (I probably wouldn't).

I can get a loan that's secured based on the money in my savings, but my wife doesn't want to do that (despite the fact that it's savings and shouldn't be spent anyway), that I believe would enable me to pay cash for a car.

What do you think? If I showed up to buy a $5,000 user car with a blank check from a credit union, would you take it, what would you need to do to be comfortable, what do you think?

My other 2 options through the credit union are 1 loan secured with money that's in savings (2%) and 2 signature loan that I shouldn't have a problem getting (11%)<--ouch!