Does this look right for a new car on the lot?

[soundman98]

Originally Posted by JesseG

I wouldn’t blindly trust it, but it’s a helpful tool to use when buying a car. Most people would go through insurance for any type of serious accident, and that will show up on car fax. Minor things maybe not.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

did you read my link? do you consider those things to be minor enough to not need to go through insurance?

carfax is an data aggregator, they compile data given to them. HOWEVER, there are no laws or regulations that any person, agency, or company needs to give them anything. and they can't compile things they haven't been given.

i came across that article after my body shop guy determined a previous car i owned that was less than 5 years old had been severely rear-ended in the 4 years before i had owned it. the repair had been done professionally, and there were no issues, but the car had a spotless carfax report. at the time, i fully believed that carfax knew everything.

had that accident been on the carfax, i would not have purchased the car.

i sold it informing the owner of the complete true history, with the notation that some information was discovered after i had purchased it with a clean carfax. to my knowledge, they never looked at the carfax because my information was more complete.

[JesseG]

Originally Posted by soundman98

did you read my link? do you consider those things to be minor enough to not need to go through insurance?

carfax is an data aggregator, they compile data given to them. HOWEVER, there are no laws or regulations that any person, agency, or company needs to give them anything. and they can't compile things they haven't been given.

i came across that article after my body shop guy determined a previous car i owned that was less than 5 years old had been severely rear-ended in the 4 years before i had owned it. the repair had been done professionally, and there were no issues, but the car had a spotless carfax report. at the time, i fully believed that carfax knew everything.

had that accident been on the carfax, i would not have purchased the car.

i sold it informing the owner of the complete true history, with the notation that some information was discovered after i had purchased it with a clean carfax. to my knowledge, they never looked at the carfax because my information was more complete.

I did not read the article, but I will. There will always be some sort of bias depending on who is doing the reporting. Like I said though, Carfax is just one of the tools you can use when buying a used car (or even new I guess). It can’t be expected to show every possible issue a used car might have. Really a thorough PPI by a mechanic who really knows the car platform is the most trustworthy. And even then it’s possible to miss something. Personally I’ve used Carfax to look for major accidents of course, for service records, and if the car has changed owners several times.

I get where you are coming from though, Carfax has a lot of flaws, and many people mistakenly think it will give you ALL the information on a used car.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[kaputt]

Appreciate all of the responses. It may be a moot point anyway, as the dealer barely wants to come off from MSRP for a car that’s been sitting on the lot for 8 months. I could probably get a bigger discount on a 2020 somewhere else in just a few months time, and not have something that’s sat in the desert sun for 8 months.

They’re throwing in all of the classic BS as well... “It’s a rare color! Subaru builds cars with only very small profit margins”. Lol, give me a break.

I’m going to keep my offer firm and see if they want to discuss further.

[SuperSub7]

Great thread with lots of good info. Thanks for the input on cargurus.

[tarzan_nojane]

Beware of flood damaged vehicles. I came across a vehicle in Oregon that had been last "seen" in Houston 2 weeks before Harvey. It showed up a year later with 60 or so additional miles. There are a number of sales, transfers, and transactions that can occur without triggering an entry in the history that CarFax has access to.

[Flarpswitch]

Check the ID plate on the car to see when the car was built. That should give you some insight. March/April 2018 I went to order a 2018 BRZ, but the dealer pressured me to buy their only 2017 on the lot. I went to another dealer where they had three 2017 BRZ. They had the color I wanted and offered it for $1,000 less than the first dealer. I checked the manufacturer date which said 10/17 and the odometer showed about 4 miles. I figured the car was not laying around much. A friend bought a 2017 MY Honda in the first quarter of 2018. It was built the last quarter of 2016 and has just about 300 miles on it. He got it for the price he offered knowing that the dealer wanted the orphan off the lot.

[Dave-ROR]

Originally Posted by tarzan_nojane

Beware of flood damaged vehicles. I came across a vehicle in Oregon that had been last "seen" in Houston 2 weeks before Harvey. It showed up a year later with 60 or so additional miles. There are a number of sales, transfers, and transactions that can occur without triggering an entry in the history that CarFax has access to.

Weird that Texas didn't get that title right.. they are usually pretty good about it. I doubt it was title washed.. that's a felony and about the only place to do it now is Kentucky.. cause Kentucky. So most likely Texas F'd up on that one. I'm assuming that it was reported as clean title anyways.

I have a flood titled FRS from Texas (Dallas area though) and it's only damage was a hydrolocked engine. Zero evidence of water intrusion anywhere else.

Found the PO on FB and he said he drove it into a flooded street, couldn't stop in time and dipped the noise in.. and then the engine went bang. The titles in Texas are also flagged in DMV systems as salt or fresh water, Florida DMV confirmed it was a fresh water incident.

I would agree that Carfax/etc are just one piece of info when buying a car. I've also had a car that I had an accident in and reported to insurance.. and the carfax is clean. I did not do a police report though which likely would have shown up (car had slicks and slid in the rain into a post - basically no damage to the post but car did sustain damage).

[Stomachbuzz]

Originally Posted by Dave-ROR

Weird that Texas didn't get that title right.. they are usually pretty good about it. I doubt it was title washed.. that's a felony and about the only place to do it now is Kentucky.. cause Kentucky. So most likely Texas F'd up on that one. I'm assuming that it was reported as clean title anyways.

I have a flood titled FRS from Texas (Dallas area though) and it's only damage was a hydrolocked engine. Zero evidence of water intrusion anywhere else.

Found the PO on FB and he said he drove it into a flooded street, couldn't stop in time and dipped the noise in.. and then the engine went bang. The titles in Texas are also flagged in DMV systems as salt or fresh water, Florida DMV confirmed it was a fresh water incident.

I would agree that Carfax/etc are just one piece of info when buying a car. I've also had a car that I had an accident in and reported to insurance.. and the carfax is clean. I did not do a police report though which likely would have shown up (car had slicks and slid in the rain into a post - basically no damage to the post but car did sustain damage).

I recently bought a truck that was involved in a flood in Florida.

I got a really good deal on it. An absolutely stunning 2008 Toyota Tundra, for like 40% less than market value.
Fully loaded, super low miles, everything I was looking for.

I buy the truck, and the interior dome lights don't work. Hmm...
Fuse blown. Aha!
Replace fuse - smoke shows up in the cabin in 30 seconds.
WTF?!
Pull the fuse, it's super hot.

I trace the smoke to the passenger footwell kick panel.
I pull it off, and I see this




Some wires had gotten corroded, heated up, and melted the plug. At some point, they also melted the insulation, and started to short each other out.

At that point, I started to put some pieces together.
"How would this area get corrosion...? Water wouldn't get there unless it was floo- oh..."
I inspected the vehicle very thoroughly. I shoved my nose in all the carpet. I pulled up the carpet. I looked for water lines everywhere I could. I looked for other corroded connectors. The truck was nearly mint.
I couldn't find a hint of anything...except I found one chunk of palm tree bark sitting on steering rack.
Palm tree bark?! But this is Maryland!
Interesting...

I started to pull some more records.
It was a black truck, very well waxed. Heavy tint. Hmmm...
The paint was nearly mint, but the rubber weatherstripping was falling apart.
"Looks like it's from somewhere sunny..."

The CarFax showed the truck was from Florida, but everything looked good.
The title was clean.
An El-cheapo VIN check said the truck was reported flooded and totaled by an insurance company. Sometime in 2017. I checked the date and it was literally 2 days after one of their biggest hurricanes in 10 years or something.

Yikes.

I investigated the Florida flood title branding process, and it seemed very thorough. Florida offers government databases to check VINs to confirm they have not been title washed.
I entered my VIN, and it came back clean.

I couldn't figure it out. Truck drives great and has no issues except those corroded wires, so I decided to forget about it.

[soundman98]

hopefully you re-wired both of those janky connectors!