Episode 37 Breaking Down Borrowing

Listen as our interns speak are joined by Beth Mobley and Randa Morris, Loan Officers in our Danville branch. Tune in as they share expert insights on credit scores, the loan application process, and what new or prospective borrowers need to know. 

Learn more about our loan options at Central Kentucky Ag Credit

Transcript

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[00:00:01.280] - Caleb Sadler
Welcome to Beyond Agriculture, the podcast that takes you beyond the scope of ag. And into the real life stories, conversations. And events taking place in our community. Who we are and what we do is beyond agriculture.

[00:00:28.820] - Weston Wolf
Hi, I'm Weston Wolf. I'm Kamryn Olds and we are the interns with Ag credit this summer and today we are at our Danville branch. We're here with Randa Morris.

[00:00:40.060] - Randa Morris
I'm a loan officer here at the Danville branch.

[00:00:42.260] - Beth Mobley
And I'm Beth Mobley, also a loan officer here at our Danville branch.

[00:00:46.340] - Weston Wolf
So today me and Kamryn will kind of be heading this podcast off and we'll be talking about some of the first initial questions. A lot of the first time applicants have when it comes to starting the loan process and whatnot. So we're kind of going to be talking about like down payments and credit scores and whatnot and what those requirements would be. But I guess to start us off, Kamryn, do you want to go ahead and ask the first question for sure.

[00:01:14.020] - Kamryn Olds
So at first we're going to talk. A little bit about down payments and closing costs. So what are your traditional down payment requirements?

[00:01:23.230] - Randa Morris
Most of our loans we require 20% down. So that's 80% of the total value of property or total purchase costs or depending on the loan type. And the collateral, usually it's 20% down. What counts as a down payment? Like what could you use for that.

[00:01:43.880] - Beth Mobley
So down payment can be in the form of cash, true cash, or it could be in the form of equity and other things which could include real estate already owned that has no liens, or if we're looking at equipment and cattle, we can also look at chattels for additional security. So collateral and down payment are going to be dependent on the loan type too. So we don't want to do a real estate loan and take cattle as collateral. We want to be having a loan and collateral for the same purpose. Typically. What if these first time borrowers don't have enough cash or equity? What are some programs?

[00:02:21.330] - Randa Morris
Different places have different programs they can utilize for agcredit. The biggest program we can utilize for that is the FSA Guarantee program through the USDA. That's basically them partnering with us. And it might be a situation. It covers a couple different things. But for first time home buyers, probably the biggest benefit for them is that it can lower the down payment requirement to 5% or anything between that and our 20% normal requirement and we can extend that term to 30 years. So not only does it give the benefit of a lower potential down payment, it Also lets them maybe extend that term out a little bit longer than our traditional term and which might help them on the monthly payments.

[00:03:03.140] - Beth Mobley
That's correct. And then there's some instances where we can actually do 100% financing. Obviously it's credit dependent, collateral dependent and borrower dependent. But they're especially on some of these lot loans that we've seen where people are trying to secure the land now to maybe build a home on in the future. We've got some special programs where we might be able to do up to 100%. But that just means that the repayment term has to be shortened down less than our typical 20, 25, 30 year term on land.

[00:03:33.230] - Randa Morris
And there's also the situation that we'll see sometimes with people that might be buying land at a discount from a relative or a neighbor. So normally it's you're restricted to the purchase price, but in that situation you're obviously getting a big discount because you know the person and there's equity they built into it. They want to kind of pass that equity along in the form of a lower purchase price. So in those special cases you can sometimes do 100% based off of yeah, their loan amount is only going to be this amount, but it's worth this much on the market. Usually it's because there's a lot more value in the property than what it's being purchased for.

[00:04:08.040] - Beth Mobley
I think Randa makes a really good point. A lot of our borrowers are working with family members or other close knit partners in the community. So if they don't necessarily own the collateral or they don't have enough collateral, family members or like partners can pledge collateral to help further collateralize the loan. But so say that you're buying a farm but you don't have the down payment needed. Maybe grandpa has a farm that's free and clear. He can put that up as additional security for the grandson or granddaughter's loan in lieu of actually having that cash down payment which doesn't work for every situation. But there's some family members that, or community members that that works really well for. And we're happy to work with all kinds of unique credit situations.

[00:04:53.680] - Weston Wolf
Is that kind of like a cosign situation?

[00:04:56.160] - Beth Mobley
Kind of. Sort of. So a cosigner is actually a legally liable party to the loan. In that instance, it's only a person pledging collateral. So they own it and they're saying okay, well here's this that you can take a lien on. But they're not necessarily financially obligated on the loan itself.

[00:05:13.680] - Weston Wolf
Okay, I didn't know that was an option. That's interesting.

[00:05:16.080] - Kamryn Olds
So do you all want to go in a little bit more detail about. What are the closing costs and what that type of fee is?

[00:05:23.190] - Randa Morris
So closing costs is dependent on loan type and loan amount. So the more, the larger, more complex loans might have a little bit more of a fee because there's a lot more work that goes into them and a lot more requirements dependent on whether it's a farm or a home or construction or something of that nature. But most of the costs are due to items that have to happen in order to get the loan closed or to service the loan. So your biggest ones on real estate especially is going to be appraisal and title work and then you have different fees for recording fees with your county clerk, whether that's mortgage or deed or mortgage modification. Beth, I'm forgetting many of them right now.

[00:06:09.190] - Beth Mobley
So I would consider I credit a not a fee heavy association. And that's part of our cooperative model. We're trying to put as much of the money back into our borrowers pockets as we can. So one unique fee to us is our stock fee. So we're a cooperative owned by our member borrowers. So in order to have loans with us, you purchase stock, typically it's 2% of their aggregate loan balance up to $1,000. So usually that's your upfront fee. So if you've never had an Ag Credit loan, you have an upfront stock fee. It gets returned once the loan is paid off. But it is a closing cost on the front end of it. But outside of that it's just like Randa said, most of them are pass through fees and they go for items and services that have to be completed in order to close the loan.

[00:06:54.380] - Randa Morris
So every loan will have an origination fee. But if you're buying a tractor from your neighbor, there's probably going to be your origination fee, your stock fee and a fee to file a lien with the Kentucky Secretary of State. Very low fees compared to a lot of other things. But if you compare that to real estate that you have those previous ones we just talked about and it kind of the more complex the deal, the probably you're going to have higher fees.

[00:07:20.600] - Beth Mobley
Right? So out the get go you really need to be prepared when you're talking to your lender, whether that's Ag Credit or a traditional bank in town or FSA, you need to know what your down payment requirements are going to be. So again, ours are typically 20% down or 20% equity in the collateral on a monthly pay. Obviously annual pays, it may be up to 25% down. And then also what your closing costs are, because maybe the down payment is less or more at one location, but the closing costs are more or less too. So those are all things to take into consideration when you are looking to obtain a loan. Again, whether that's through Ag Credit or through a different lender.

[00:08:00.360] - Weston Wolf
All right, well, that is some very good information on down payments. But let's jump into the dreaded credit score. So let's start off very basic. What is a credit score?

[00:08:14.750] - Randa Morris
Credit scores is something that obviously is very important, but so few people actually fully understand it. And especially so for younger borrowers that we come across because it's not something that's necessarily like taught in schools. It's, I think it's assumed, it's common sense, but it's not. There's a lot of things that go into a credit score and why it's important. And it basically is just a history of how you've used credit in the past. It shows anybody you've ever had a loan with that's reported to these credit bureaus what the loan amount was for, what the purpose was, what your term was, what your payment was, and your payment history. So if you've ever had a missed payment on one, it's going to show up on there. If you've had your credit pulled a lot or anytime you've had that done, it's listed at the bottom of that report, too. So it gives a lot of information. And the importance of that information is it shows your repayment history because that's an important thing for lenders, because we want to know how you've handled credit in the past, because that's a big signifier of how you'll handle it in the future.

[00:09:17.810] - Beth Mobley
Randa is right. Your credit score, it's a unique numerical figure that demonstrates an applicant's credit worthiness. So just like Randa said, if you've made all your payments on time and in full, your credit score is typically going to be higher. But if you're habitually late on payments or you've got maxed out credit cards, or you've let a vehicle get taken back because you couldn't make the payments, that all shows up to a loan officer on the credit history. So for better or worse, and there's actually, is it five categories that actually are built into the credit score itself. That includes your repayment history on outside accounts, your amounts owed, Versus the credit or. Yeah, the amounts owed, the length of your credit history, how much new credit you've applied for and your credit mix. So what types of open credit you have. So all of those things are in the credit report and are mixed in to get your actual credit score, which ranges from 350 to 850 I think is kind of the mid range. So the higher you are on that scale, the to a lender that says that you've handled all your past and present obligations as you should, the lower you are on that scale, it means there are things on your credit report that really need to be addressed before a lender is going to look at taking a credit risk on you.

[00:10:37.250] - Randa Morris
But credit scores are something that are very difficult to establish and build but very easy to ruin and lower. So it's I always warn when we have younger borrowers that come in that maybe don't have much of a credit history or apply and haven't had any at all, I always kind of tell them, hey, now's the time to make a little bit smarter choices. Because if you have a bad start, it's really, it takes a long time to rehabilitate that and fix mistakes that may have happened in the past.

[00:11:10.390] - Beth Mobley
And there's some simple ways that you can start establishing credit. If you don't have credit at all, that can be to have a co signer. So somebody that's got established credit, you can be on a joint account with them. So their credit history and your credit history kind of build together. You get the benefit of them having something that's been well established and well maintained, well taken care of. While we're not endorsing it, you can also get a credit card. Typically you want to have a low limit, something that you can pay off monthly with a zero balance. That way you're not paying any type of interest expense. While we're not fully endorsing that, that's usually one of the quickest and easy ways to help build credit. And then outside of that, secured loans. So a lender is going to be more apt to allowing you to obtain a loan if you have something to collateralize it with as opposed to doing some type of unsecured credit.

[00:12:03.930] - Randa Morris
Yeah. And all that does is it's one of the things you got to have credit to get credit, even if that's frustrating for a lot of first time borrowers. But it establishes that not only can you access credit, you can use it responsibly. So if you do attempt this strategy and you get a car loan with a co signer or you get a credit card and you miss payments, you run up a high balance and only pay the minimum and allow that balance to stay out there or miss payments on that. It's not having the intended effect. It's going to have very negative consequences on your credit and credit history.

[00:12:42.070] - Beth Mobley
And a lot of times people don't even know what's on their credit. They're like, why don't some people know what their credit score is? They know it, but some people like, I have no idea. And there's different ways to check your credit before you have to pull your credit, before a lender actually reviews it for, for a loan application. And the government gives you free access to the three credit, three credit bureaus annually. There's a website that you can access to get on there and you can see everything that's on there for each of the, each of the credit bureaus that report. It shows you what accounts are open, what accounts are closed, balances, payments, how you've handled those. It also has any kind of negative things that are also might be out there that you may be unaware of. That includes collections, whether that be medical or utilities. We see where some medical collections are probably the number one thing that we see that people are unaware of. They're on their credit and can adversely affect their score. Maybe old utilities like cell phones, trash collection, little things like that. And then it also shows more significant things such as foreclosures, bankruptcies, things that have been settled for less than the minimum balance charge off accounts charged off.

[00:13:50.890] - Randa Morris
Accounts could become collections eventually if handled correctly.

[00:13:53.890] - Beth Mobley
Right. So it's always good to check that at least once a year so you know what's on your credit before anybody else does. Even if you're not applying for a loan or if you're getting ready to apply for a loan. Because sometimes once the credit's pulled and the loan officer says or the credit analyst says, oh well, your credit score is 500. You've got all these late payments, medical collections that maybe you weren't aware of. Maybe you co signed on an account for somebody and they quit making the payments. So there's all kinds of things that you may be unaware of before you apply for a loan. But it's one of those things like Randa said, sometimes it's too late if you don't take care of it in the beginning.

[00:14:29.190] - Randa Morris
I'm sorry, I felt like I started that out very negatively. But it's an important thing to know if you're working with a credit History or trying to establish one.

[00:14:37.590] - Weston Wolf
Yeah, for sure. I definitely think it's a point to say that your loan officers, when you ask for a loan, that they can see your credit history and that you should be definitely making your payments for whatever loans you have beforehand before you come to get another loan.

[00:14:51.830] - Randa Morris
Consider this.

[00:14:54.070] - Weston Wolf
Yeah, so I think that's definitely a good point to throw out there. But so how does you guys kind of answered a little bit. But how does your credit score impact a loan decision?

[00:15:06.540] - Randa Morris
It's the big one of the main or initial signifiers of repayment ability and repayment capacity. Because again, if you've proved you can handle loans in the past on your credit report and your credit history and you don't have missed payments, it's a good sign that your behavior is going to continue that way in the future. So of course we don't just look at that for a lot of our loans, but even the ones where we look at financials as well and other aspects of the credit package, it's an important signifier of your behavior and how you'll continue. And if it wasn't, it wouldn't be used by so many lenders.

[00:15:43.270] - Weston Wolf
Yeah, yeah.

[00:15:44.070] - Beth Mobley
And it also helps us gage the risk associated with a potential loan. So obviously if your credit scores are low or mediocre, maybe again, there's some periodic late payments, but nothing too drastic. Maybe you had a 30 day tick on a small credit card or you know, but there's only one thing or one derogatory mark on your part. It signifies to the lender like, okay, well they're probably worth taking the risk on for this loan, but maybe that affects what interest rate you get. Or if you've got multiple ticks on your credit report, maybe you don't qualify for the minimum down payment, you have to put additional cash down. Credit, credit score, credit history can play into other factors of the whole loan process. Again, the interest rate itself, maybe the repayment term, the down payment, that's required.

[00:16:30.290] - Weston Wolf
Right. And so leading into that, what credit score do you think somebody would need? Minimum, maybe credit score, Someone would need. To get a loan.

[00:16:41.010] - Randa Morris
That varies by institution. We don't necessarily have a very specific. You have to have this credit score and it's the magic number. You have it, you're approved, you don't, you're not. Because we look at so many other things in just the credit score. Even for our more simpler credit models, we look at the credit score, but we also look at a lot of things on that report. So if you have a Decent credit score, but you have a lot of collections, a lot of charge offs, a lot of credit pools. It looks like, hey, his credit's been pulled at a lot of places recently. Why is he not getting a loan with them? It might be a signifier that maybe he wasn't approved there.

[00:17:18.340] - Weston Wolf
Right.

[00:17:19.380] - Randa Morris
So we don't necessarily have that magic number, but usually we say around 650 is kind of. That you might be doing good if you're getting closer to that 700. But 650 is really toeing the line.

[00:17:34.420] - Weston Wolf
Right.

[00:17:34.820] - Beth Mobley
I kind of use 650. Again, there's not a magic cutoff or a magic approval level. And like Randa said, every institution has different standards. But that, you know, 700 is kind of the mid range. That means you're doing pretty good. 650. Maybe you've just have some new accounts, you're working on building that credit history. Maybe there's nothing bad on your report, you just don't have much credit at all. So that also can impact your score. But I think more so with some of our younger borrowers is they just don't have a score at all. So, you know, while we would love to see 850 or 900 on every application that we get, there's some people that render a no score. And at that point we have to look at other financial factors in order to approve or review their loan request.

[00:18:18.960] - Randa Morris
Yeah, age of credit is all. I'm not sure if we talked about that too much, but for like college students or young farmers, that age of credit plays such a big part in that score. I know, like, I think when I had my Credit History for six years, I got a car loan when I was 18 just because my mom knew it was important for me to get a credit history established. Once that age of credit turned 6, my score shot up significantly. And it's not necessarily maybe a fair item, but it just kind of shows that you've had this history, you've established it, you've kept it going. But we'll see that as a big thing for younger borrowers. And also we see people who in their 30s and their 40s, when they were in their 20s, did not understand credit and did not use it appropriately. And they know now and they're doing better, but they are still working to rebuild their credit and, and basically fix the mistakes of their past. Maybe when they were 20, they had to have the nicest, newest truck, took out a big truck loan for it, had some issues paying that back. They're still working to Rebuild their credit for that. So that's still something that we can see that on their report. Like okay, yeah, you had some issues a couple years ago, but we see that you've improved upon that. So that's why we don't say necessarily it's a credit score specifically because there's so much more to your report than just that number.

[00:19:42.950] - Beth Mobley
So I've got a question for you all. Do you all know what your credit score is? You don't have to say it on. On air but are you aware of your credit.

[00:19:50.550] - Weston Wolf
Yeah

[00:19:51.190] - Kamryn Olds
yes, I am

[00:19:52.070] - Weston Wolf
I am too.

[00:19:52.870] - Beth Mobley
Yeah. So that, that's so for us that's a good indicator. But sometimes when you say, okay, well do you know about what your credit score is? And some people are like, well I have no idea. Well, that means maybe they don't use their credit enough or maybe they have never had credit, they've never applied for a loan, or maybe they've got bad credit and they just don't want to tell us. Yeah, so. And sometimes having bad credit, it's a no for now. But it's something that, where we can give them some homework to work on after they leave the office. You know, especially if they've maybe there's one or two things on their credit report that need a little assistance. Maybe they've got some credit cards that are near the credit limit. We say, hey look, you really need to work on reducing that credit card debt. That's going to help some of your debt to income ratio down the road on getting your loan approval. Maybe they co signed on a car loan or maybe they've got some student loans that were deferred that have come out and had a couple late payments. So there's different things that we can look and see why credit scores may be below average and we can kind of let them kind of walk out of here with their heads held high saying, look, it's a no for now, but here's some homework for you.

[00:20:58.320] - Beth Mobley
Come back and see us once. Maybe you've addressed some of these things on the credit report.

[00:21:02.400] - Randa Morris
And this might be a little backtracking from what we've been talking about. But you don't just have one credit score. There's three credit bureaus. Among those credit bureaus, there are so many different scores that you could have different models that are used by different institutions. What we pull is your credit, even if they're pulling all the same information, isn't necessarily what the commercial bank down the road is going to pull. So we have people that will pull their credit and we'll give it to them. They're like, huh, that's 10 points lower than this other place. Or that's 50 points higher than when I had it pulled last week. And so just be aware of that as well. Different places use different models, so it might be, hopefully it's not too much of a difference, but there is going to be a little bit of a difference depending on who pulls your credit, what model they use. So you might say, I have an 8. I hope you have an 800 credit score. I have an 800 credit score. Another place might pull that as a 760. Doesn't necessarily say that you're worse in those other people's eyes. It's just the model they use.

[00:22:04.010] - Weston Wolf
So down payments and credit scores, they're very important in the loan process. And obviously a lot of people have a lot of questions about it when they're first. When they're first starting out filling out that loan application. So what are some other. What are some other things that people have questions on when they're first initially talking to you about getting a loan?

[00:22:26.330] - Beth Mobley
So I think that first phone call, like you said, is, you know, how much money do I have to have down? Is there a minimal credit score? And then what's my rate and payment going to be okay, if I get this loan, what's it going to cost me? So, and all that's really dependent on the loan that they're applying for. So if you're applying for a real estate loan, you know, we're looking at a longer repayment term because it's typically, typically a higher dollar amount that's being borrowed, as opposed to maybe a cattle loan or a vehicle loan or equipment loan, which, you know, has a shorter repayment term because the useful life of the asset is it's going to depreciate a lot faster than real estate collateral. So I think that's some of the questions that we run into is like, okay, well, what's my rate and payment going to be, which is dependent on the collateral. So maybe you've got your 20% down, maybe you've got 25%. Maybe, maybe you've got 50% to put down to a lender. That means the loan is less risky because it's very well collateralized. So maybe that means you get a better interest rate, a better repayment term, which means for you as the borrower, maybe you would have a lower repayment overall over the life of the loan.

[00:23:29.480] - Randa Morris
Yeah, and we get a lot of calls that even if Somebody doesn't have specifically those other questions. They're just shopping around for rates. Maybe they already have a loan and they're just looking to refinance. They'll call. We say, what's the rate today? We need a little more information than that. Like Beth said, purpose, idea of the term, collateral, all that's important. If we can help you, we're going to try to do the best rate we can given the circumstances. Nobody wants to charge a high rate. We can only work within the terms and rate model that we have. And those terms are also going to be dependent on the loan type and everything. Beth said earlier, we can't secure real estate with cattle on that other side of things. We can't put cattle on 20 years because what's the life of a mama cow? Not that long for them to be actually producing and able to pay that loan back. So there's a lot of factors that people might not think goes into our end of things because ag loans and farm loans are so specific compared to a lot of your more standard non commercial, non commercial.

[00:24:39.070] - Beth Mobley
And I think one thing very unique to agcredit is that one thing we do for our member borrowers is we have note modification opportunities. So while we close your rate today, especially on real estate loans, when you're locking something in for 20, 25 or 30 years, you know, over the life of the loan, if you're locked in at a 7 or 8% and rates drop like they did a couple years ago, most people are going to want to refinance that. Something really unique to Ag Credit that we offer our borrowers is note modifications where we actually proactively review our accounts, typically on a daily or weekly basis based on the rate environment. And if that rate has dropped below what we closed your rate at, as long as it's a loan that's eligible, we can actually reach out to you and say, hey, Randa, we closed your farm loan, you know, last year on this rate. The rates dropped. The rates dropped 50 basis points. We would love to lower and relock that rate for you. So that's something that makes us very unique. And it's part of that cooperative model where we really want to pass the savings and benefits that the cooperative can receive onto our borrowers.

[00:25:42.430] - Randa Morris
Yeah, I don't think we've mentioned much the difference between fixed and variable.

[00:25:46.030] - Beth Mobley
That's true.

[00:25:46.590] - Randa Morris
Yeah. So most of our stuff is fixed unless it's a line of credit for operating purposes. So if you're a crop guy, you know that you're Going to be buying your inputs in the spring, harvesting, selling stuff in the fall. A line of credit on a variable rate is probably going to be more pertinent for you. But some other places have variable rates for real estate. So every place has a different thing they can do. Most of our stuff is fixed for long term loans and then you have the option, like she said, to do note mods or if you want to pay down early. We don't have prepayment penalties. So these are questions that no matter who you go through, you want to ask term rate prepayment, Nobody. A lot of people don't think about the prepayment penalties. A lot of places have them, which understandably so. But it's just one of those unexpected costs that isn't really upfronted in your loan. They might mention it at closing, but it can cost you such a percentage of the, I think the loan about amount you have left to pay that down early.

[00:26:52.450] - Kamryn Olds
Going over repayment, what are repayment terms?

[00:26:57.250] - Beth Mobley
So repayment terms are going to be the, the length of the loan and then the payment frequency of the loan. So I think we've touched on it. A real estate loan is typically going to be longer term, you know, 10 years or more. It's typically going to have a monthly payment if that's your income stream. But if you're a part time, full time farmer and a quarterly, semiannual, annual payment works better for you based on your cash flow, we can look at setting up different frequencies to align with when your money is coming in. So if you're buying a farm to farm it full time, you may not have a monthly W2 income like Randa and I or that you all do. So an annual payment would work better for their cash flow. And then again, like we touched on, the length of the term is going to be dependent on what they're applying for and then what the collateral is. We're not going to do a 20 year cow loan because the depreciation of that asset is done well before the loan has matured.

[00:27:50.140] - Randa Morris
We'd love to see the 20 year old mama cow that's still producing.

[00:27:53.300] - Beth Mobley
In this market, she'd probably still bring good money, Randa.

[00:27:55.740] - Randa Morris
But like you said, we have so many different types of customers here. We do have the farmers that are actively producing and need that annual payment that's due in the fall whenever they actually sell calves or sell crops. But we also have the rural home loan that they're paying it based off their monthly salary and they want a monthly 30 year payment. And that's the way we're going to set it up on.

[00:28:21.620] - Kamryn Olds
How will they know what their payment is?

[00:28:25.620] - Beth Mobley
So that's when everything kind of culminates to your head. So we've, we've looked at the down payment and we've determined that your credit worthiness is good, depending on the size of the loan. We've obtained financial information, we've done a cash flow analysis, we've reviewed your collateral, we've reviewed your credit score, and at that point we can say, okay, your payment can be this, based on the length of term, the interest rate that you qualify for based on all these other factors we've talked about today.

[00:28:53.650] - Randa Morris
Whether it's monthly and annual.

[00:28:54.890] - Beth Mobley
That's correct, yeah, yeah. So whether you need a monthly payment, annual payment, or something in between, whether it needs to be a fully amortized payment, Maybe it's an interest only payment, depending on your situation. So all the things that we've discussed today, in addition to other things that we didn't even touch on, they all go into what is calculated into that payment amount and how that payment is going to be repaid over the life of the loan.

[00:29:18.940] - Beth Mobley
Like, have you, have you all ever applied for a loan?

[00:29:23.420] - Weston Wolf
I have a truck loan.

[00:29:24.740] - Beth Mobley
They go. Okay.

[00:29:25.820] - Weston Wolf
Yes.

[00:29:26.300] - Caleb Sadler
It better not be one of those expensive truck loans.

[00:29:28.380] - Weston Wolf
No, it's not. It is not, it's not that.

[00:29:31.140] - Caleb Sadler
My biggest warning.

[00:29:31.980] - Weston Wolf
Yeah, no, no, definitely.

[00:29:33.780] - Beth Mobley
So in your, in your process for trying to get your truck, I mean, did experience some of the same things that we talked about?

[00:29:40.280] - Weston Wolf
Yes, I did. Yeah, it was a big, I mean, I was nervous. I was I guess 20, well, 19, about to turn 20. Very nervous when I was first initially buying it and because the first one I bought was cash, so didn't have to deal with that at all. But yeah, it was nerve wracking. And of course I'm, I wasn't that informed on like financial stuff at the time and I'm figuring all this out sitting there at the car dealership. But I did know what down payment I was prepared to pay and I knew what my limit was gonna be on a truck. Like, I knew I wasn't gonna go crazy. I knew what I could afford. And because I'm always working part time through school and whatnot to make my payments. So yeah, I knew what I could afford. Now when it came to interest rates and, and all that, I didn't really know what I was talking about at the time. I kind of kicked myself a little bit. I wish I would have known more, did some more research, but it is what it is. But it's good information to know now.

[00:30:47.640] - Weston Wolf
And if when the time comes where I'm gonna take out another loan, not necessarily a truck loan, I will know what to do. And this little chat that we've had so far has been extremely helpful in that, in that regards to someone who hasn't went through everything. I know I'm coming up to my last years of college, but yeah, it's definitely informative and I think this is, this is very important stuff for everyone to know and yeah.

[00:31:18.830] - Beth Mobley
Oh, I've had fun.

[00:31:19.790] - Beth Mobley
I've had fun. I mean this is something we talk about every day with every person. So it doesn't matter if it's an established full time farmer from one of our local communities or if it's somebody brand new moving in from out of state that wants to buy a home. Everybody crosses the same bridge when they're applying for a loan. It's just a matter of maybe they just need some additional information. We don't have to get as much on smaller requests as we do on larger requests, but everybody's kind of in the same boat and it's good for applicants to be prepared before they even meet with their lender or to have their questions kind of lined up for what they want to ask.

[00:31:52.320] - Weston Wolf
Right.

[00:31:52.800] - Randa Morris
Yeah. And like even obviously this is our jobs, but we're also, we have our own loans on the, as the customer side of things. And even though I was working here, I worked at a bank prior to this as well. Any time I've gotten a loan, I've still been anxious trying to figure this stuff out. So it can be a little unapproachable. But the more information you have when you like this, that you know to answer the, or ask these certain questions. Whenever you speak with a loan officer or shopping around and trying to find what fits best for you, the more information you have, the more confident you're going to feel in your decision. And that like you said, you had some regrets maybe based off if you knew this, maybe you'd done something different. We want to try to prevent that regret and just empower yourself with the information and hopefully that will ease your mind a little bit when you go through the process.

[00:32:40.310] - Weston Wolf
And that's really the goal of this episode specifically is to really get that information out there and to make everyone's life just little bit easier. Because hopefully every person who comes in to get loan listens to this episode.

[00:32:54.860] - Randa Morris
Can't wait to see how you try to edit this down to 20 minutes.

[00:32:57.780] - Weston Wolf
I know. Yeah. We'll see how it goes.

[00:33:00.140] - Randa Morris
No way.

[00:33:00.860] - Weston Wolf
Yeah. But we thank you guys for being out, for being willing to do this and answer our questions. I really do think it's going to be very helpful for some future applicants. But yeah, thank you guys. Thanks for having us.

[00:33:15.580] - Randa Morris
Thank you.

[00:33:16.380] - Weston Wolf
Yep.

[00:33:17.900] 
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