I will agree, it's not CarFax's fault when unscrupulous dealers wash titles through several states to make them come out clean. For that I blame
- Unscrupulous dealers
- States
- Congress that consistently makes noise about a national database, but never does.
- People who get upset after hurricane season when they buy bad car, complain, hear Congress make noise but not do anything, then vote the same people back in.
- CarFax, for not being more up-front about what they cover. (because they want to make money, which is their purpose)
- And people who unplug their odometers from their transmission. I've known more than one person.
In other words, we get what we pay *and vote* for. ;-)
CarFax only works when vehicles are bought and sold honestly, and that's all they promise. Here's some more info--if you want to get your money back, you have to do a lot of work and prepare to be disappointed. A washed title that doesn't go back father on the odometer than the previous title? Not covered. (psst....want to buy a 1993 Amgio with 25,000 gently driven miles on it?)
click here for the whole story Ron Pasquale got a clean title to the used Lexus RX 300 he bought in March 2004. Soon afterward, he discovered that the vehicle's odometer had been rolled back. And soon after that, he learned that the 2002 sport wagon, for which he had paid $29,700, had been wrecked and rebuilt in Georgia.
The vehicle history report he bought from Carfax Inc. didn't identify either problem. But when Pasquale asked Carfax to honor its buyback guarantee, he was told he didn't qualify.
Bureau of Motor Vehicles officials in Ohio, where Pasquale had purchased the RX 300 from a private seller, told him state laws that govern dealership sales do not cover "casual" sales by individuals. Now Pasquale is suing Gino Bracaloni, who sold him the RX 300, in an Ohio court. He alleges that Bracaloni knew of but did not disclose the odometer tampering. One problem, Pasquale says: Process servers can't find Bracaloni to serve him with the lawsuit.
Pasquale's ordeal reflects the twin dilemmas of odometer tampering and title washing. The practices cost dealers and consumers billions of dollars a year, industry experts say. "I'm not going to drop it," says Pasquale, 56, an auto parts salesman from Nashville, Tenn. "I can't live with myself if I let the guys off the hook. They'll just do it to somebody else."
Some states issue clean titles to vehicles that have been wrecked and rebuilt. The industry opposes sales of those vehicles as undamaged. Since mid-2004, Georgia has required a title to state if a vehicle has been rebuilt or salvaged.
The National Automobile Dealers Association has lobbied without success for a federal law that would similarly mark the titles of wrecked vehicles. Such a designation would carry forward when a vehicle is sold across state lines.
Pasquale says the RX 300 he bought was advertised online as having 10,800 miles on its odometer. But when he took the vehicle to a Lexus dealership in Nashville to get a spare key made, a check of the RX 300's vehicle identification number disclosed a mileage discrepancy. That launched Pasquale on a quest to investigate the vehicle's history. He traced the RX 300 to its original owners in New York, to its wreck and repair in Atlanta, to the Lexus dealerships that serviced it and to the two salvage auctions that sold it.
Pasquale says the Lexus dealership where the car was towed after the wreck in August 2003 told him that the vehicle's odometer registered 29,870 miles when it crashed. The title Pasquale got for the RX 300 listed Lenherr Motors, a used-car dealership in Zanesville, Ohio, as the vehicle's owner, his lawsuit alleges. Yet Pasquale concedes that he believed he was buying the vehicle from Bracaloni. The dealership's owner, Rafik Mirmohamed, says he never bought or sold the vehicle or had it in his inventory. Mirmohamed says Bracaloni, a friend of Mirmohamed's brother, improperly used the store's name to buy the Lexus from a salvage auction.
.....
Carfax offers to buy back any vehicle for which it researches a history that does not identify problems such as odometer rollback or major collision damage.
But a state department of motor vehicles must have issued a salvage or junk title or received a damage report, Carfax says. Pasquale's Lexus doesn't qualify for the guarantee, says Chris Basso, a Carfax spokesman.
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CarFax's Follow-up / Rebuttal
-----------------------------To the Editor:
In reference to "The twisted history of a used Lexus RX 300," (April 18), Carfax would like to clarify the terms and conditions of the Carfax Buyback Guarantee.
The article said that Carfax offers to buy back any vehicle for which the Carfax Vehicle History Report "does not identify problems such as odometer rollback or major collision damage."
The Carfax Buyback Guarantee
does not cover odometer rollbacks. What it does cover are the title brands "exceeds mechanical limits" and "not actual miles" issued by a state department of motor vehicles. (My note: Which only occurs of you roll the miles back prior to mileage listed on the current title, then re-title it.)
In addition, a salvage, junk or rebuilt title issued by a state department of motor vehicles is included under the terms of the guarantee, not general "major collision damage" as implied by your article.
The guarantee covers most incidents in which a state department of motor vehicles issues a branded title that Carfax fails to include in the Carfax Vehicle History Report at the time the vehicle is purchased.
Our database contains information from all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
