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I'm new to the US and trying to build a good credit history from the beginning.

I've just purchased a new car (an hour ago) from an Toyota dealer with a loan from them. I received an alert now from Credit Karma said I just have got several new hard inquiries, all from Toyota:

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Now my credit score goes down for 15 points. Is it normal to have multiple hard inquiries in this case? Are there duplicated ones? Do I need to dispute them?

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  • Nothing to dispute based on that information
    – CQM
    Sep 29, 2015 at 21:17
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    Note that a 15-point decrease is pretty small. This is not really something to be concerned about.
    – BrenBarn
    Sep 30, 2015 at 5:53
  • Very normal when dealing with Toyota's financial services department. They really should tell you exactly how many and what banks they're sending your loan request to though. I would have told them to "stop, I'll go directly through my credit union", if I had known this up front.
    – RubberDuck
    Oct 24, 2015 at 19:02

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(I'm a bit surprised that nobody talked about the impact of multiple inquiries on a loan, since OP is concerned with credit building. Probably an answer as opposed to a comment is justified.)

Is it normal to have multiple hard inquiries in this case?

Yes. In fact when you shop for auto loan you are expected to have your credit score/report be pulled by different banks, credit unions, and/or the financing arm of the car manufacturer or the dealership, so that you can hopefully get the best rate possible. This is especially true if the dealer is requesting quotes on rates on your behalf, as they would probably use a batch process to send out applications to multiple financial institutions all at once.

Are there duplicated ones?

Yes, and a bit unusual - CALVERT TOYO (your dealer) pulled your report twice on the same day. Presumably they are not getting any new information on the second pull. Maybe a fat finger? Regardless, you should not worry about this too much (to be explained below).

Do I need to dispute them?

I would say "don't bother".

The idea behind hard inquiries lowering credit score is that lenders see the number of hard inquiries as your desire for credit. Too high a number is often viewed as either "desperate for credit" or "unable to qualify for credit". But as explained above, it is very common for a person to request quotes for multiple financial institutions and thus to have multiple hard inquiries in a short period of time when shopping for loans. To account for that, the credit bureau's model would usually combine hard inquiries for a same type of loan (auto, mortgage, etc.) within 30 days. Hence a person sending quote request to 3 banks won't be rated higher for credit than if he were to request quotes from 5 banks.

Therefore in your case your credit profile is not going to be different if you had been pulled just once.

Also, on credit score...

my credit score goes down for 15 points

I'm assuming you are talking about the credit score provided by Credit Karma. The score CK provided is FAKO. The score lenders care about is FICO. They are well correlated but still different. Google these two terms and you should be able to figure out the difference quickly. You can also refer to my answer to a different question here: Equifax credit score discrepancy in 1 month, why?

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  • That's the most comprehensive answer I've got through all the StackExchange networks! Thanks for your effort on writing this!
    – Jeffrey Zhao
    Oct 16, 2015 at 2:04
  • @JeffreyZhao You're most welcome. Hope you enjoy your new ride!
    – xiaomy
    Oct 18, 2015 at 23:31
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Each goes to a different agency. Yes, it is normal that the lender queries more than one agency.

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  • But all inquiries are to TransUnion, but thanks to you, I found another inquiries to Equifax.
    – Jeffrey Zhao
    Sep 30, 2015 at 3:50
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    @JeffreyZhao that's weird. In any case, multiple inquiries over short period of time are usually considered as "rate shopping" and affect the credit score as a single one. 15 points drop is consistent with that, that is a drop I usually see after a single query. It will bounce back in a couple of months.
    – littleadv
    Sep 30, 2015 at 7:47
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This is normal with the dealer's financing.

To add more details to littleadv's answer, what happens is when you get the financing through the dealer, at first, they will try to do the loan on your behalf with local banks in your area. This is why you see several hard inquiries; one from each back. If none of these banks wants to take the loan, then dealer's financing entity will take the loan. This was my exact experience with Hyundai.

In addition, don't get surprise if you start receiving letters saying that your loan was rejected. The dealer will send the loan requests simultaneously, and some of the banks might deny the loan. This also happened to me, and I have been owning my car for around a year. Still, make sure that the letters matches with the credit inquiries.

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  • But they're not queries from the banks. They're from Toyota Financing Service (TMCC) and the dealer (CALVERT TOYO).
    – Jeffrey Zhao
    Sep 30, 2015 at 0:36

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