Buying a new car with savings plan 'plan de ahorro'

[herevv]

Lately, my Instagram feed has been flooded with plan de ahorro car ads, and I’m not sure why.
The down payment (or cuota extraordinaria) and monthly installments, cuotas look really appealing. I checked out a dealership recently and tried to understand the plans with my limited Spanish, but I feel like I need to do more research.

Has anyone here bought a car through a plan de ahorro before?
I’d really appreciate hearing your thoughts, especially how the payment system works and what to look out for.

Also, does anyone know of a car dealership that offers service in English?

Thanks in advance!

 

[nikad]

Lots of scams with those. Be careful.

 

[LuckyLuke]

IMO, don't. The "plan de ahorro" is literally just a layaway plan with high interest, with a lottery attached to it. It's not a lease program, it's not a financing program, and it's not an installment plan either because you don't get any keys until you have paid most if not all of it (unless you win their lottery). Imagine having a savings account that you put money into every month to buy a car. Easy right? Protected by the bank. Interest free. Emergency comes up? You can take some of that money out. Now imagine, you decide to give all that to a rando company instead. Is it safe? Can you take some out for an emergency? I haven't even gotten around to the complications of paying in pesos, dollarized quotas, interest tied to galloping inflation indexes, etc.

 

[herevv]

Really important points and warnings, thanks! When I was at the dealership, instead of saying the price would be adjusted for inflation, they simply gave me a payment plan. Does this plan later get updated each year based on inflation? and they claimed that after a 30% down payment, they would deliver the car to me directly, no lottery or draw involved.

 

[ArgentinaVet]

Stay far, far away from any "plan de ahorro".
Back in 2016 I was able to finance about 50% of the price of a new truck at 15% interest over 24 months. GM has (or had) their own finance arm that basically had no requirements as long as you could come up with about the half cost up the vehicle up front. The major car companies have legitimate financing options available but be prepared to pay a significant down payment.

 

[LuckyLuke]

Really important points and warnings, thanks! When I was at the dealership, instead of saying the price would be adjusted for inflation, they simply gave me a payment plan. Does this plan later get updated each year based on inflation? and they claimed that after a 30% down payment, they would deliver the car to me directly, no lottery or draw involved.

As ArgentinaVet mentioned, in-house financing by the dealership is an actual finance plan in that they will give you the keys providing you meet the required deposit. Just be aware, some the financing is virtually pointless. Offers when I purchased in 2023 were along the lines of "70% deposit with 30% remaining balance payable in 12 quotas.". Regardless, be very careful with the fine print on adjustable rate interest. I would not enter anything that didn't offer a fixed interest.