A sure fire way to bag an expensive loan is to accept the first deal you are offered. You wouldn't do that with any other major purchase and you should look at a loan as a major purchase - after all it will cost you a significant amount of money - especially if the loan is a large one.
The safe way to go about choosing a loan is to do some research, check interest rates from a range of providers or use a specialist loan broker to do that work for you. Then select a competitive arrangement that suits your needs exactly - the size of loan, repayment term and the right amount of flexibility to suit your circumstances. No point in signing up for an ultra cheap interest rate then getting hit with a huge upfront fee.
Review a range of deals that you know you will be accepted for and compare the loans against each other to find the best one.
Of course you should compare interest rates but make sure you compare like with like - interest rates are only comparable if they are for the same sized loan, over the same repayment period.
Next compare any charges or fees. These usually come in the form of upfront fees, charged as the loan is taken out and termination fees which can be fix or variable depending on the conditions of the loan.
Some loans will charge heavy fees if the deal is terminated earlier than planned. This is a fairly common situation, so make sure you compare those conditions carefullly.
Getting a choice of loans should be relatively easy - after all there seem to be hundreds of companies advertising loans. But if you think the best way is to apply to multiple companies yourself and see what happens, then perhaps you should think again. First of all that will take some time and secondly there is a risk that your credit record may be adversely affected if you make multiple credit applications over a short period of time.
Perhaps a safer way is to use one of the more comprehensive internet comparison sites or even easier make a single request to a loan broker and let them do all the hard work.
