Chrysler Capital Santander Consumer USA Ridiculous interest rates, Puts you into a hole you cant get out of Fort Worth Nationwide Texas

There are two parts to buying a vehicle: the actual vehicle purchase and the financing portion of the purchase. Both of those componets require negotiation at the time of purchase. The company sales representative and their finance and insurance department personnel (F&I) are not representing you at the time of sale. They are representing the seller (the dealership). You have to either protect yourself going in - but negotiation and research or bring someone with you that knows how to protect you in the purchase. It sounds like you let them charge you an extra high rate for this vehicle too plus a high interest rate.

The car dealer gets a huge bonus on their commission for having you sign off on a 'premium par' rate. That means a rate that is higher than what the bank will accept. F&I departments try to get as much as they can out of you in the form of extra high interest rates and "add on's" to the vehicle price (like dealer fees, prep charges, various warranties etc). All of this contributes to you being upside down in your vehicle purchase today. Late payments also contribute greatly to the negative equity in your vehicle today.

The time to negotiate these things is prior to signing a contract. The time to get a good interest rate is from a bank or credit union before you go shopping for a vehicle. If you go in without being properly prepared you are likely to get sand bagged in both price and interest rate because that is what the F&I guy is supposed to do - get you to pay the most for the least.

In the future you can avoid this by financing with a credit union prior to purchasing any vehicle and you will have a better rate - unless you let this repo go through now.

To take care of the issue you have now:  the current lender isn't going to reduce their rate. They never do. They have you in a contract. To know for sure why nothing has been applied to principal you need to read your financing contract. I suspect that you have not made your payments on time so the late fees and extra interest (interest is charged daily) is wiping out any of the principal payment that would have been applied.

Your choices are limited to either selling the vehicle private party and bringing cash to make up the difference. Private party sale value is higher than trade or refinance value.  Or refinance the vehicle and bring cash to pay the difference between the amount the new lender will finance you for and the payoff amount.

Or you could get an extra job and apply the income to your debt. Do some research at daveramsey(dot)com to see what to do to get out of a high payment loan. Good luck. (No, I don't work for any dealership, but I understand contracts).