{"id":102,"date":"2026-08-28T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-08-28T09:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/template-preview.com\/wordpress\/avavamotors\/2026\/08\/28\/apr-terms-and-down-payments-explained-simply\/"},"modified":"2026-08-28T09:00:00","modified_gmt":"2026-08-28T09:00:00","slug":"apr-terms-and-down-payments-explained-simply","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/template-preview.com\/wordpress\/avavamotors\/apr-terms-and-down-payments-explained-simply\/","title":{"rendered":"APR, terms and down payments \u2014 explained simply"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"has-drop-cap wp-block-paragraph\">Three numbers decide what a car loan costs you: the rate, the term and what you put down. Change one and the other two move with it. Here is how to read an offer in a couple of minutes.<\/p><h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The rate (APR)<\/h2><p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The annual percentage rate includes the interest and the lender&#039;s fees, so it is the fairest way to compare two offers. A point of APR on a five-year loan is worth far more than any free floor mats.<\/p><h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The term<\/h2><p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A longer term lowers the monthly payment and raises the total you pay. Past five years you also risk owing more than the car is worth for a long time.<\/p><h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The down payment<\/h2><p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Every dollar you put down is a dollar you do not pay interest on. Twenty per cent is a good target: it usually unlocks better rates and keeps you ahead of depreciation.<\/p><h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The one number to compare<\/h2><p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Ask every lender for the total cost of the loan \u2014 everything you will pay, start to finish. The lowest total wins, whatever the monthly looks like.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>How each lever changes your monthly, and the one number to compare offers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":103,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_avava_byline":"S. Kim","_avava_car":0,"_avava_notes":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[38,42],"class_list":["post-102","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-finance","tag-buying","tag-finance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/template-preview.com\/wordpress\/avavamotors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/template-preview.com\/wordpress\/avavamotors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/template-preview.com\/wordpress\/avavamotors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/template-preview.com\/wordpress\/avavamotors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/template-preview.com\/wordpress\/avavamotors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/template-preview.com\/wordpress\/avavamotors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/template-preview.com\/wordpress\/avavamotors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/103"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/template-preview.com\/wordpress\/avavamotors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/template-preview.com\/wordpress\/avavamotors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/template-preview.com\/wordpress\/avavamotors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}