re: When should you buy a car with cash vs financing at 0%?

quote:

---

I don't know about auto financing specifically, but in general 0% financing for X amount of time generally means that you actually pay all the interest as soon as that X amount of time is up. For example if you do 0% financing for 4 years but it's a 5 year loan with 2.99% interest then the entirety of that 5 years and 2.99% interest is paid during the 5th year. It's all a marketing gimmick. Now, you can pay the car off by the 4th year and as long as there are no penalties it works out as actual 0%.

---

No that's not how 0% car loans work. You are thinking of "same as cash" type loans for furniture and stuff like that. Car loans are just 0%. But you are right about the incentives.