How much down payment that is appropriate depends on how much of a payment you wish to have. The thing to understand is that the more money you can put down, the more desirable you will become as a client to the lender, which gives you more room to negotiate such things as interest rates.
You’ll need to figure your expenses, putting too much down and leaving yourself short is asking for trouble. If something unexpected comes up and you have to have money, you might have to do it at the expense of your car payment which will then affect your credit rating and also affect your ability to pay in the future. Catching up is a lot harder than staying caught up.
So make sure you figure out how much money you have, how much you would like to be paying in monthly payments and how much money you need to have on hand in case of emergencies. Once you have all of that, then you can negotiate with the lender. Find out how much different down payment amounts will affect your monthly payment and available interest rate. Remember, you can pay extra each month and have essentially the same effect.
