When your car's "good" history, isn't.

#1

A couple yrs ago I bought an '03 X5. I ran it’s VIN thru a CarFax competitor called AutoCheck and it’s history was clean. I’ve had the X5 for sale for a couple weeks now. Yesterday I learned that the X5 had rec’d minor damage 4 months before I bought it. So there I was having bought a car with a good history yet was selling a car with damage on it’s record. It sold last night for less then I’d hoped, unsurprisingly.

I checked out the guarentee’s at both AutoCheck and CarFax and there’s a dozen ways for them to wiggle out of responsibility. And it’s not like they can tell the DMV to move papers faster.

Ways to cover yourself:

  1. You have to “register” your purchase with the Internet VIN outfit to be eligable for any coverage. Also, apparently when you run a VIN thru various services there are often additional guarentees that you can buy to protect yourself from surprises. So if you have decided to buy that '74 Pinto, you might look at whether or not you can throw another $20 at the company and buy some history change protection.

  2. Write into the sales contract something to the affect of “if damage shows up on the history, you buy the car back from me at the same price”. Then you can either go thru with that or use that as a negotiating lever to have them pay you a couple grand or something.

#2

Mr. Junky has a clean Carfax and Autocheck.

However, the front half is a gray 87is and the rear half is a red 85eta. That minor detail doesn’t show up on either reports.

So much for history check. :laugh:

#3

A CarFax or other history report is only as good as the data reported to the service. If a car is repaired and that is never reported, it won’t show up in the history. So a “clean” CarFax only means that nothing has ever been reported. A through examination of a prospect car will usually reveal if there has been damage to the vehicle.

#4

jlevie wrote:

Sure but if you buy a car with a good CarFax but sell it with a bad CarFax, you’re going to take it up the butt no matter how inconsequential the damage might have been.

#5

Sounds like the timing was bad - the repair was done and they turned around and sold it. Four months seems like enough time, but still. Good suggestion on the negotiation.

#6

Case in point, my 1989 325i has a 1987 eta motor in it. Carfax was clean as a whistle. Uggh.

#7

Doesn’t suprise me, I have a buddy who hit a pole with a buick grand national back in high school had the frame replaced (among other things as you’d imagine) and the carfax comes up clean. Pretty much anything paid for in cash I’d gaurantee will not show up plus the older the car gets the murkier its past seems to become. Carfax is a good tool and as long as you treat it as such and not a panacea (as dealers like to) you should be safe.

#8

Ranger wrote:

[quote]jlevie wrote:

Sure but if you buy a car with a good CarFax but sell it with a bad CarFax, you’re going to take it up the butt no matter how inconsequential the damage might have been.[/quote]

except you didn’t. you bought it with a good autocheck and sold with a bad carfax.