Totaled Truck...CARFAX
My previous truck was totaled several months ago. After the insurance settlement, it was towed away. Today I found it on a used car lot (not dealer) but it appears to have been repaired although I do...
Forum Discussion
thomasmnile wrote:
True, Carfax don't know what they don't know. Remember the furor over flood damaged cars from Louisiana in the used car market in the wake of Katrina in 2005?
Those that weren't scrapped were marketed as used, maybe with salvage title/salvage certificates, maybe not. I recall consumers gave Carfax a lot of heat over that, often fueled by consumer reporters at local TV stations that fixated on the story. Carfax info. is only as good as its sources. Even an educated buyer that does due diligence on a vehicle purchase isn't assured of a good purchase if the seller didn't comply with the legal requirements of their state on this issue.
Same thing happened here after the Memorial Day Floods last year. There was major flooding from the coast to central Texas up to Oklahoma. Thousands upon thousands of cars were underwater over that weekend. A lot of people ended up buying these flooded out cars from private sales or rinky dink used car lots. A lot were upset because they pulled the Carfax reports that didn't show any flood damage. Carfax can't show what isn't reported to it. It's no substitute for a good mechanic. A lot of these cars went straight to Mexico, but they'll be back one day and Carfax still won't know about the previous damage.
