Awhile back before I found my Jet lathe I applied to Bolton Tools to get a lathe. I was approved for $8k. Then they sent me the contract after I called an insisted they do so.
I would have ended up paying 85% more than the lathe cost. Needless to say I didn't buy it.
Get the numbers from them, don't take no for an answer. They will lead you on and then push you to buy.
Thanks for the heads up. I did decide against Bolton, thinking that the 3rd party finance company they use did seem pretty shifty. Glad you confirmed my suspicions.
Some time after I applied (couple of days maybe), someone called me from an Arizona number, guy's name was Trace, and I can't remember the name of the company. He said I was approved and I needed to talk to Bolton to finalize my quote.
I asked how much the interest rate was, and he said it would depend on how much the actual amount financed. I asked him to run the numbers on the maximum approval amount and he claimed that he still couldn't give me an interest rate without a finalized quote from Bolton. That was a red flag. I walked away.
A few days later, another call from Arizona, this time a woman. She was following up to see if/when I was going to contact Bolton and finalize my quote. I told her I had serious reservations about not being able to get a straight answer on my interest rate before moving forward. She started talking over me before I was finished explaining why I was leery. She repeated what Trace said (multiple times), I guess trying to relieve me of my concerns by force. I felt like I was a political figure being interviewed on an opposing party's talk show. Very pushy. She's probably the person who calls you when your payments are late and threatens to impound your gear or sue you, and she probably has trouble shifting out of the REPO gear and into the SALES gear.
Anyway, it was a big turn-off followed by an even bigger turn-off, to an idea that I wasn't even strongly committed to. It didn't take much for me to walk away.
