Should I Buy FRS R-Titled From Hail Damage?
 

There is a black FRS with a Rebuilt Title for sale in my area for $15,000 with only 13,000 miles. The car looks brand new and was salvaged from a severe hail storm. The Shop did paintless dent removal and the car looks great. Would this be a good purchase at this price? I will try and talk the price down. And do you guys think a loan would be possible on this purchase?

-Thanks

So the hail storm is what caused it to be a rebuilt title?

If you are not worried about resale then jump on it!
Not like there would be any structural or mechanical damage.

Not bad at all assuming everything else is in good order.

As others have said....

If you are not worried about resale and just want to drive the car til the wheels fall off AND

the hail damage is the ONLY reason it is titled as a salvage

and the car looks flawless

THEN....BUY IT!

Must have been antarctic hail to have to been the sole cause of a total...

something doesn't add up. how the hell can a car be totalled by insurance for hail damage that could be repaired by paintless dent removal...
did deeper my friend, dig deeper

Did the hail cave in the roof, hood, trunk and glass? Any body work get expensive but hail damage?

Insurance usually doesn't work like that. Usually with estimators if there's a large enough dent, they usually write up the estimate for new part + labor. It's possible that hail damage did total out the car.

Maybe the hail impact set off airbags...lol :eyebulge:

What people often don't think about...
A heavily damaged car, due to an accident, costs a ton in parts, labor and paint work to repair. Therefore it's difficult to ask less than retail for a damaged car, even with a salvage title.

This case seems somewhat different. If the damage was able to be repaired without paint and parts, though seldom the case, the shop repairing it could allow only labor time, and be able to sell the car, much cheaper than retail.

As others have said, do more honest research on this car. If no paint work or if light paint work has been done (typically the sides, or one side of car will have been damaged as well in hail damage), then consider the price a deal. Yet certainly a car to keep forever, and don't expect retail price when you sell it, as others will also be skeptical.

As for insurance estimate for repairs after hail damage...I'd guess, these days, estimates for such damage could easily be upwards of 10,000 dollars. So this car could have been a total as far as insurance company was concerned....damaged above 75% of it's pre damaged value.

And keep in mind, you can probably find a 2013 FRS with low mileage, and a clear title for $18,000 with a little searching and possibly an airplane ride to buy it.
Wow, just looked cars.com. There are one's out there for 15k ...with a little looking around...as I tell others, don't be afraid of an airplane ride, once you've done thorough talking on the phone.

You can take a loan out on anything :3

Goodluck with haggling!

Thanks for all the replys guys. I will definitely be searching deeper into its title. I am looking at a few different FRS so hopefully will be joining you guys on the forums soon.

there was a 2013 (last year) that I was looking at that had also been totaled from hail. Up in the midwest, we see some crazy weather, including golf ball sized hail and larger. I probably should have bought it, because now I'm just a creeper on the forum saving up for a house instead of enjoying the FRS. Sucks growing up.

Damn haha yea maybe i will learn from your mistakes lol. Hopefully you come across another good deal some time.

If I had a 2 stall garage at the time, it would have definitely been bought. Like others have said, if you plan on holding on to it for a long time and there isn't any permanent damage, I'd jump on it if its a few thousand less than it would have been if not totaled. BUT, definitely dig and try to see if there are other hidden reasons why it might have actually been totaled.

Yea I will be digging haha. Hopefully I find it was just from the hail storm. Already contacted my insurance provider with the VIN to see what kind of coverage I'm available for. Now to hope I can get a $4000-5000 lone with no problems.

Also, any rebuilt/reconstructed/salvaged title (anything "branded" title) carries NO warranty at all from Toyota once the title has the brand. The car is strictly as-is.

That 13,000 mile car that's only 1-2 years old and was totaled by hail has zero factory coverage at all, and very very few aftermarket companies will offer some kind of warranty on it.

Blow the engine at 18K? 58k? Oil leak?

No help from Toyota on that one, not even from a customer goodwill standpoint. The car was declared a total loss at some point and Toyota will make no exceptions to that rule.

Your only covered components will be anything covered by the federal emissions warranty.

Take that into consideration before you buy. If you plan on going heavy with the power adders, heavy body mods and don't care about a warranty anyway... go right ahead.

Yea I would probably cause a void in warrenty if purchased clean title anyway. But I do here what your saying. I did see online that in some cases power-train warranties still exist on cars totaled from hail damage. I will look more into this though. Also the dealer I'm looking to purchase through specializes in Paint-less dent removal and their cars have an option to be bought with a 5 year 100,000 mile warranty.

I've worked at a dealer that purchased some "Hail Damaged" cars. I saw them before the repairs. There is NO WAY that I would buy one. Most people think of hail as small pieces of ice...Thats not enough to total a car. Think softball sized chunks of ice hitting the car at over 100mph. Even the dashboards were broken... the A/C system was full of broken glass from the defrost vents....they looked like a roided out linebacker went after them with a baseball bat. My personal opinion is keep looking...IMHO

penny hail= terminal velocity of 35 mph, quarter hail = 50mph, golfball hail = 66mph, baseball hail = 85mph and softball hail = 117mph.

Yea I can imagine lol. I requested before and after pics. But even so it looks brand new and you no the engine was kept safe. For the price it may be worth a shot. Also i can purchase the 5 year 100,000 mile warrenty for $1000 and its transferable. I also contacted a toyota dealership to see if the drive train warrenty is still valid. They said they will look into it and let me no soon.

Here is how the car looked before they purchased it at an auction. The company i am possibly purchasing it through has a real good reputation. The damage does not appear to be harsh. He rated it a 3 out of 10 on how hard it was fixing compared to hail damaged vehicles he had fixed in the past http://i1160.photobucket.com/albums/...ps6aaa0de3.jpg

Remember that mechanical can always be repaired, replaced or upgraded. The concern is the bodywork and electrical systems. If the car flooded at all, you might end up with nagging electrical problems as the connectors corrode. Adjustors often have paint thickness gauges that would help you check if it had paint or bondo work done to it. DO NOT take the sellers word for it. Verify!!! And Good Luck!!!

I work as a service writer for a large Toyota dealer. I can tell you first hand that if the title is branded, the warranty claim will be denied UNLESS it's one of the few federal emissions components - ECU, Catalytic converter, etc. The balance of any basic or powertrain warranty will not be honored at all after it's declared a total loss.

If a dealer submits the claim without checking eligibility in TIS, it'll bounce and the dealer will be charged back for the repair. The dealer may then come after you for the balance of the repair. If you give a dealer a vin, they can check in a matter of minutes. PM me the vin if you need to and I can run it tomorrow when I get to work.

I also see every side of aftermarket warranties... call that warranty company, ask if their coverage is in effect for salvage/recon/branded titles. If you get a positive answer, get it in writing. I've seen a customer pay $3800 before for a powertrain warranty that eventually blew a head gasket. The company declined the claim because the customer didn't pay an additional $650 for the "seal and gasket" coverage on the warranty.

Buyer beware, obviously.

Yea that is true. I was glad to see just the rear window collapsed. Much less electrical issues that would start from the rear if flooded then right over the radio area. Im still up in the air about it, but its promising that they trust their work enough to offer a 5 year warrenty. Hopefully the toyota dealer gets back to me soon to see if toyota will still cover its warranty partially. Thanks man!

Awesome great advice. Ill pm you the vin number! Thanks a lot for the help

Just saw the pics...dosen't look too bad...the headlights are intact the rear window is busted out.... that would take a big enough impact to also damage the body work, but the the body doesn't look too bad... look the car over for signs of flooding....high water mark, grass or debris in the suspension, radiator, engine bay. Just be careful.

Yea they said headlights and tail lights required no work just used paintless dent removal on majority of the car. I will look it over really good when I go to check it out (hopefully next week). Ill take pics to

This just doesn't look like a hail total. Not enough damage evident to total....unless it's a flood car. From what the pics show $2k would be more than enough to fix it. There's another 10-12k worth of damage that needs to be accounted for to total it...Just saying.

Yea guess I will see. Lets hope the VIN number shows. haha

PM back. Just discovered I can access TIS/NSH from home and pulled it up for you.

Also, I agree with @Caspeed. Something's fishy there. There should be no way that car was totaled from those pictures. There's maybe $2-3 k of hail damage through PDR from what I can see there. ~600 for rear glass.

We have sold new cars that were hail damaged and repaired (no water damage as they were on the high ground) with a state required damage disclosure to the customer before... we took a hell of a loss on the cars, but they were nowhere close to totaled.

If the car books out at $16,000 fair market value, you're looking at needing something like $13k in total damaged to write that thing off.

Hell, a roof panel is a few hundred bucks, fenders a few hundred... if you gave it all new roof, fenders, hood, trunk, bumpers and paint I'm still struggling to get to $10k.

There's something missing here. I would have an independent inspection of the car specifically looking for signs of flood damage.

@Rally -- This car was retailed in PA and saw several service visits there. Is it still in PA? If so, are they sitting on it with a certificate of salvage, or do they have the reconstructed title work done already?

Replied! And yea its very fishy. The company that did the work has repaired many hail damaged cars and they have good feedback. I wonder whats up with this.... And the car is in Delaware now so it didn't move far.

Totaled cars are often moved from state to state to clear the title. I've seen totaled cars that were welded up from 2 cars front to rear but still had a clean title. We had to disassemble the interior to find the joint.

The thing different with this car is that it's vin says it was just salvage in October 2014 2 months ago. And supposedly a clean serviced car before that. So frustrating.. Maybe the pics are really bad quality and there was worse hail damage then looked hahaha

You have to look at risk vs gain. You would be saving 2-3k over a good used unit. Is it worth the risk?

You could ask the service manager at your local dealer to look at it for you. You will have to pay maybe $100-$200 to cover a tech's time to look it over but it's money well spent if they find a problem.

Even though I ran dealership service departments. When I was looking at a 911 a few years back I took it to a Porsche specialist that found several thousand $ worth of repairs that the car needed that my techs and I would have never found. Best $100 I ever spent.

Yea I completely agree. I have seen clean titles in the 16k range with decent miles. I'm going to consider it and possibly check it out since I'm close. If I can get it even cheaper I'd be more interested and have a specialist look at it. I'll be keeping my eyes open on all deals under 16k

The reconstructed title will be ready within 10 days I was told. And it's now in delaware

for comparison's sake, I just traded my FR-S in. It's currently sitting on the lot at the dealer for $18,000 with 46k on the clock, and comes as a Certified Pre Owned vehicle with a 100k power train warranty.

I still think something is a bit off. I also would tell you if you buy it, do so with zero expectation of a factory warranty by the time the new title is issued on that car and it updates.

I would absolutely ask to have the vehicle inspected. I would recommend to take it to a good independent mechanic, or contact a Toyota dealer and ask for them to have it inspected as if it was going through the Toyota/Scion Certified Used Vehicle program.

Yea I hear ya. Ill really have to look into having someone check it out. If I can talk the price down that would definitely leave some money room to have it inspected.

I looked at the vin number again and it was actually in May 2014 and when i searched hail storm in Pa this came up. http://lancasteronline.com/news/loca...a4bcf6878.html Seems like lots of cars were totaled for the sake of to many cars needed to be fixed and all the shops were flooded and keeping them in storage wasn't worth the payment of insurance companies so lots of cars severe and not so severe were totaled. Also the insurance companies would of had to supply a large amount of rental cars.

And this link states that any car with a broken window involved in the PA hail storm was deemed totaled ! Im really liking this now haha
http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/ind...hip_selli.html