Used credit cards for car down payment, received good benefits

[pythonlover]

Bought a new car and was required to make down payment of 7.3L. I used Axis Atlas and DCB Metal. I was ready to partially bear the MDR because I had calculated that the benefits would be good. But when I told the sales person about that, surprisingly he didn't say anything about MDR. I had thought that I would have to negotiate hard, but was not needed at all.

So my 2 primary cards are DCB Metal (limit 5L) and Axis Atlas (2.5L). I had already spent around 1.5L on Atlas. Hence, I paid the due amount 1-2 days before down payment and Atlas limit renewed to 2.5L. Paid 4.9L through DCB Metal and 2.4L through Atlas. Before making the final payment, I blocked all transactions on Atlas and made a small transaction on dealer's PoS machine. Then I called Axis customer care to ask about MCC, which was 5511 (car and truck dealers). All this process took 10 minutes and then I paid the whole amount.

Received following benefits :

DCB Metal

1. Got 4,90,000 / 150 * 5 = 3266 * 5 = 16330 base RPs (Already credited).
2. Fulfilled 4L quarterly milestone => Will receive 10000 RPs.
3. The card renewal is due in August and I had hardly reached 3.5L spends on it. So now I reached 8L milestone and hence there will be no renewal fee => saved ₹11,800.
4. Total benefits = ₹38,130 (assuming 1RP = ₹1).

Axis Atlas

1. Got 2,40,000 / 100 * 2 = 4,800 EMs.
2. Completed 3L milestone and Atlas (I had already reached 2.5L, but would have been difficult to reach 3L as renewal is due shortly) => received 2500 EMs for completing the milestone.
3. Considering each Accor point worth ₹1.8, total benefits received through Atlas was worth ₹26,280.

Total benefit was worth 64,410 (sort of 8.8% returns). All of this was net benefit because I did not had to share MDR. Good deal.

 

[Aditya12]

For someone having cash in hand, another alternate plan is to invest the amount in FD and get auto loan for the maximum amount.
Rough example:
* 7.5L auto loan for 5 years requires you to pay around 2L interest.
* The same 7.5L kept in FD for 5 years returns around 3.5L interest (lot more if invested in large cap safer MF).

Net saving at least 1.5L (over 5 years).

 

[gautamcool]

For someone having cash in hand, another alternate plan is to invest the amount in FD and get auto loan for the maximum amount.
Rough example:
* 7.5L auto loan for 5 years requires you to pay around 2L interest.
* The same 7.5L kept in FD for 5 years returns around 3.5L interest (lot more if invested in large cap safer MF).

Net saving at least 1.5L (over 5 years).

To generate 3.5L interest from 7.5L investment, 8% yearly FD interest rate is needed assuming 0 income tax
For people in 30 percent bracket(likely most ppl here) , required FD Interest rate shoots up to 11.4% per year
Even small finance banks/NBFCs dont offer this

 

[TripleAce]

Bought a new car and was required to make down payment of 7.3L. I used Axis Atlas and DCB Metal. I was ready to partially bear the MDR because I had calculated that the benefits would be good. But when I told the sales person about that, surprisingly he didn't say anything about MDR. I had thought that I would have to negotiate hard, but was not needed at all.

So my 2 primary cards are DCB Metal (limit 5L) and Axis Atlas (2.5L). I had already spent around 1.5L on Atlas. Hence, I paid the due amount 1-2 days before down payment and Atlas limit renewed to 2.5L. Paid 4.9L through DCB Metal and 2.4L through Atlas. Before making the final payment, I blocked all transactions on Atlas and made a small transaction on dealer's PoS machine. Then I called Axis customer care to ask about MCC, which was 5511 (car and truck dealers). All this process took 10 minutes and then I paid the whole amount.

Received following benefits :

DCB Metal

1. Got 4,90,000 / 150 * 5 = 3266 * 5 = 16330 base RPs (Already credited).
2. Fulfilled 4L quarterly milestone => Will receive 10000 RPs.
3. The card renewal is due in August and I had hardly reached 3.5L spends on it. So now I reached 8L milestone and hence there will be no renewal fee => saved ₹11,800.
4. Total benefits = ₹38,130 (assuming 1RP = ₹1).

Axis Atlas

1. Got 2,40,000 / 100 * 2 = 4,800 EMs.
2. Completed 3L milestone and Atlas (I had already reached 2.5L, but would have been difficult to reach 3L as renewal is due shortly) => received 2500 EMs for completing the milestone.
3. Considering each Accor point worth ₹1.8, total benefits received through Atlas was worth ₹26,280.

Total benefit was worth 64,410 (sort of 8.8% returns). All of this was net benefit because I did not had to share MDR. Good deal.

Hearty congratulations for your new car and the RPs / EMs.
Cheers 🍻
May I ask which car you bought?

 

[pythonlover]

T

Hearty congratulations for your new car and the RPs / EMs.
Cheers 🍻
May I ask which car you bought?

Thank you. It is a Thar Roxx.