Yeah not much sympathy for them...The couple should really facepunch themselves. Hard.
Whoever signs a 25% loan should not be allowed to make any decisions in life anymore. Ever.
Wow. So many posters here are being so hard on the people themselves.
Ask yourself what you would do if you needed a car to commute (naturally bike, public transportation, blah blah - give them the benefit of the doubt and assume it's too far such that this is unfeasible - they could move or quit and try to find a new job), had bad credit due to a foreclosure.
Your car breaks down, and you are told if you pay 25% interest for a year, they will refinance your rate to something reasonable. Do you say no, and then do... what?
Or do you suck it up, say "this sucks, I know this is a terrible interest rate, etc." but scrape by?
I'm all for facepunching them if it showed their house with a 50" TV, they have the latest iPhone, etc. But just given what we have, they were people living too close to the line, got sold on something, and their biggest mistake that I can see is not getting it in writing (which they couldn't have gotten anyways, as I'm sure the dealership won't guarantee that, in case their credit gets even worse in the meantime).
No one has any sympathy for that?
In a different life I can imagine myself in their shoes, and I feel for them.
The question, though, is why they thought they needed a $21K car. I have bought cars on a credit card a couple of times, and IIRC none cost much over $3K.
If you read the article, the dealership forced them to choose a more expensive one, because they wouldn't finance them for a cheaper one.
I believe them that they were told they could refi after a year. I doubt they made that up, then went to the hassle of contacting the dealership, the bank, and eventually the news with their made up story. They made what they thought was, even though on it's face a bad decision, the best alternative of a bunch of crappy ones at the time, thinking it would get better in a year. Sucks.
Plenty of credit cards have this same interest rate, those tend to be much more deserving of a face punch, IMO, if they're using it for (non grocery) shopping.