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Not saying yours is the case. But a lot of people who may have had a fender bender so to speak opt not to go through their car insurance for fear of rate increase. Therefore a cash settlement is agreed upon with no notation in the vehicles history, no report. A cash repair job is done at an auto body shop that logs no service completed into any files, as it's a cash deal. Owner of vehicle doesn't report anything nor does the auto body shop. Therefore services such as carfax are not notified and the vehicle is left with a clean car history. Later on instances may arise showing there was repair work done that is not documented and the current owner is left scratching their head thinking "but the history is clean".
I've heard it done a lot.
A Carfax is a tool. A good tool. Added to many other tools.
Mandatory for any that wish to buy a used car if they have any questions or concerns.
Yes, there are some who know everything. God Bless them.
Oh my!
How did the car business and buyers ever survive before Carfax came into the biz?
There's absolutely nothing in a Carfax report that alters the present condition and useable service life potential of a used car at the time of inspection and purchase by a buyer.
A competently performed pre-buy inspection by a knowledgeable tech with working familiarity of the vehicle in question is far more valuable.
If you rely upon inferences that a car "must be a lemon" because it changed hands a lot, or that a Carfax report doesn't show accident history, or reveals a portion of a maintenance history … or any other aspect of these reports, then you're deluding yourself that you have meaningful information about a car to make a buy decision. The car is the car is the car and can be revealed upon a competent pre-buy inspection. Or by a post-purchase appearance of problem areas … or by post-purchase good performance … no matter what you think was informative relevant information about the vehicle from a Carfax printout.
I've seen people pass on buying a car at a reasonable price due to something they thought was "bad news" on a Carfax report … only to see another buyer take the car and get excellent service out of it. As well, I've seen cars that showed "OK" by Carfax that upon inspection were pure junk and shouldn't have been on the road at all.
It's no different than buying livestock based upon the breeding papers … I've seen many $100K+ horses with fabulous breeding lines show up with serious defects revealed by a vet inspection, x-rays, and knowledgeable pre-buy rides/evaluations. A flexion test for the legs can tell a lot about a horse in a minute or two, for example. Looking at the teeth can tell a lot about the health/age/well care a horse has received. Hoof condition is very revealing, too … top line horses can founder just as easily as grade horses. Ya can't ride the papers when all is said and done … be it a horse or a motor vehicle.
And . . . that is another tool to be used by any potential buyer including a vehicle check by Experian or Carfax.
Thanks !
Equating that physical inspection by a knowledgeable tech with the report from Carfax is the height of ignorance about car buying. Especially when buyers cut corners in the process by relying solely upon the Carfax report rather than a physical inspection.
I've advocated for years on this forum that EVERY vehicle under consideration for purchase be given a pre-buy inspection. Why? because I've seen way too many new cars on MSO's … never titled … that have sustained accident damage between the day they were built and the day that they were being delivered to a customer. Stuff that is likely to not ever show up on a Carfax report, too.
The only value I see in a Carfax report is the self-serving marketing of Carfax purporting to provide a valuable buying resource. It simply doesn't provide any such information. Nor, as others have pointed out on this thread … is Carfax reliable and complete in it's information database/reporting.
If you, however, think you're getting value from a Carfax report and make your purchase decisions based upon their service … well, knock yourself out. Enjoy the fantasies.
PS: I appreciate that you wish to belittle the car pro techs in the industry … but here's the real perspective as to the miniscule relevance of a Carfax report:
When the day comes that a vehicle comes into the shop with a problem, the Carfax report is of no importance in diagnosing or repairing the problem. The car presents itself. In my shop, for example, I rely upon manufacturer's and aftermarket provided service/repair information to diagnose and properly repair a problem Carfax? pffftt.
Not saying yours is the case. But a lot of people who may have had a fender bender so to speak opt not to go through their car insurance for fear of rate increase. Therefore a cash settlement is agreed upon with no notation in the vehicles history, no report. A cash repair job is done at an auto body shop that logs no service completed into any files, as it's a cash deal. Owner of vehicle doesn't report anything nor does the auto body shop. Therefore services such as carfax are not notified and the vehicle is left with a clean car history. Later on instances may arise showing there was repair work done that is not documented and the current owner is left scratching their head thinking "but the history is clean".
I've heard it done a lot.
I will not let a repair shop fix any of my vehicles if they report to Carfax. All that does it hurt your pocketbook later if you try to sell it.
Also, when buying vehicles I have seen some pretty big discrepancies with Carfax, too. What seems like a major repair based on the generic, non-descriptive Carfax notes ended up being a minor repair after getting copies of the repair orders from when the work is done. Seen that work in reverse, too.
Carfax is a decent tool but many places still don't report to it, and for those that do it can be garbage-in garbage-out sometimes. Carfax can only report what their dealers tell them.
To the OP - you bought a used car. It's not out of the realm of possibility that it has a couple kinks in it. No big deal - if you got those taken care of and like the car then move on with life and enjoy it.
An aftermarket windshield in itself means nothing more than the windshield has been replaced.
As someone else said there are variables when it comes to what a dealer chooses to retain for resale. It makes complete sense that dealerships under the same ownership would swap vehicles to keep good balance of vehicles on their lots. If you follow a used car for sale at a dealership on line it's pretty common to see transfers of vehicl3s that aren't selling at one place moved to another.
People cross shop used Lexus with new Toyotas all the time. I just was in the exact same situation buy a brand new Toyota or a 3 year old Lexus at about the same price.
I understand the concern you have being that it has already required a repair but it's likely nothing more than largly unfounded fear of the unknown.
Years ago I traded in a Solara I had only owned for about a year and a half with a stuck caliper...I didn't trade it in because of the brake issue, I traded it in because its specific purpose in my household no longer existed and I didn't want to deal with the repair. Nothing
was wrong with the car otherwise.
Best carfax I have ever seen (on a 1-2 yr old $93,000 Mercedes):
Vehicle hit by train.
A week later I was trying to show someone the carfax and the train part was deleted.
This happened with a car my wife had, well sort of.
She got rear-ended and the car had around $5,000 worth of damage. We filed a police report and had the damage repaired through insurance, so it was reported to Carfax and showed on the report. When we went to trade it in the dealer asked about it, as you would expect, and asked for a detailed account of what happened. He took all that information down and had us sign our names on the statement he had typed up. I guess they took that to Carfax and had the report amended to make it look much less serious.
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