Is there any advantage for going to my physical bank for an auto loan? (I can apply online @ wellsfargo.com
Probably not. If your numbers are shaky but your personal presence is extremely confidence-building (longtime pillar of the community), then possibly there would be some benefit. If your numbers are great, but you are pierced & tattooed like a Christmas tree, then perhaps the online application would be better.
This is not an expert opinion. But we applied online for our mortgage and had no problems at all.
actually, I just want to know a ball park figure on what kind of rates/size of loan I can get so that I can narrow my car search.
I probably won’t buy for another few months. Would this hurt my credit?
I think what you’re looking to do is get prequalified. It might make more sense to go to the bank for that. When I discussed a car loan at my bank, they told me all kinds of weird things that were impacting me in terms of how much I could borrow. For example, I had about $10,000 in credit limit on my credit cards. Even though I never carried a balance, they treated that like I had a $10,000 balance.
So if this is your first time you may want to go and ask some questions about how they are calculating it, things you might want to do to make your credit look better, etc.