WSJ: Desperate for sales, Ford courts riskier borrowers to sell F-150 pickups

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Ford Courts Riskier Borrowers With Lower Rates for F-150 Pickups

Unusual end-of-quarter sales promotion addresses affordability for shoppers with weak credit histories

WSJ

By Ryan Felton

Ford is racing to sell more F-150 pickups this quarter by offering lower interest rates to buyers with the weakest acceptable credit histories.

The deal available until the end of the month will allow consumers with shakier credit profiles to pay the lower interest rate offered to those with stellar credit records.

Ford is courting these low-credit customers as it looks for a strong close to the quarter for its best-selling pickup, which starts around $39,000 and goes to almost $80,000. Like most automakers, Ford has been largely absorbing the costs of tariffs on imported steel, aluminum and auto parts to keep plants humming and sales volumes high, even as it cuts into profits.

“We wanted to provide the opportunity to those with credit ratings that may not be perfect the opportunity to have the best rates available,” a Ford spokesman said. The program isn’t expected to continue beyond the end of the month, the spokesman said.

Subprime borrowers—those with a FICO score below 620—are less likely to make payments on time in an economic downturn, which is why lenders normally assign higher interest rates to them. The labor market has been softening, with unemployment rising to 4.3% in August. And the percentage of borrowers with auto debt more than 90 days past due is at its highest since the peak of the Covid lockdown, according to the Consumer Federation of America.

The risks of lending to subprime car buyers has also been amplified in recent weeks, after auto lender Tricolor Holdings filed for bankruptcy following fraud allegations. Many of the more than 100,000 borrowers who received loans from Tricolor lacked a Social Security number or credit history.

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The average monthly loan payment in August approached $750, with an interest rate at 6.4%, according to estimates from industry-research firm J.D. Power. At the same time, loans with extended repayment terms of 72 and 84 months are becoming commonplace, in part to keep monthly payments manageable.

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Ford F-Series pickup sales dropped 3.4% in August from a year earlier, but they are up nearly 13% for the first eight months of the year, according to company reports. Ford doesn’t break out F-150 sales from other F-Series models, such as the larger F-250 Super Duty.

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Under Ford’s promotion, borrowers with weaker credit profiles would get the same interest rate from the automaker’s finance arm on new F-150s as someone with a top credit score, according to a Sept. 19 memo seen by The Wall Street Journal. Subprime borrowers paid an average rate of up to nearly 16% in the second quarter of 2025, compared with roughly 5% for higher-credit borrowers, according to an Experian report.

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