Bad car fax: Bad car?

Alright, some of you may remember a car I was thinking about buying. Ad is here:

http://www.ksl.com/auto/listing/1564430?ad_cid=1

Anyway, I pulled the carfax just in case, and its quite bad from the looks of it. I would probably not be willing to pay more than $7,700 for the car now. Does that seem too low? Take a look at all the places the car has been, and the two collision reports. Lots of owners, lots of red flags.

Basically it goes like this: Owner 1 (corporate) - 1999 bought in Orlando, FL. Listed as a fleet vehicle and sold at auction in 2000. Owner 2 (personal) - 2000, veh. mileage=16,000. Various maintenance performed and then the vehicle was listed as "dealer vehicle, sold at auction". Vehicle is in Texas now, and marked as "sold" at this point. Owner 3 - 2003, veh. mileage=58,000. Car is in New Jersey at this point. Accident reports here... REPORT 1: 2003 Vehicle inspected after an accident or other incident; Damage to front REPORT 2: 2005 Accident reported involving right front impact with another motor vehicle; right front primarily damaged REPORT 3: 2007 Accident reported involving left side impact vehicle ran off road; It hit a curb left side primarily damaged; side airbag deployed Owner 4 - 2007, veh. mileage=68,000. Owner 5 - 2009, registered in Schuylkill Haven, PA. 76,000 on odo. New reports of vehicle in Cincinnati, OH. Owner 6 - Bought car in 2010, in OH. 76,600 on odo. Drove to IN. Owner 7 - Bought in 2012, in Twin Falls, Idaho. Odo now at 87,000. Owner 8 - Bought in 2013, in Twin Falls, Idaho. Owner 9 - Bought in 2012, in Twin Falls, Idaho.

So it seems most everyone owned the car for about a year, except the guy in New Jersey, who owned it for 6. This is where the car incurred all the damages.

Now according to CarFax, the title is still "clean", and no "total loss" or structural damage was ever reported. How is the title still clean if the car has been in so many fender benders?

SOOOO, is this car worth $7,700? Its only so tempting because most of the annoying M3 stuff like cooling system and subrame stuff have been taken care of. Sorry for the formatting here...

I'll give you my $.02.

I don't trust Car Fax after the collision repair shop I used to work for purchased a year old Mustang GT convertible that had obviously blasted a utility pole on the drivers side, essentially shearing off the drivers side suspension. I watched them rebuild that car back to like nothing happened. I had a free Car Fax at the time, so I ran it and it came up that the car was purchased for fleet service and that was it, nothing else.

So take their info with a grain of salt. It's a start, but you don't get all the info.

I had the same with my BMW 318ti. Clean CarFax... had obviously had it's entire passengerside replaced (which was why the floor rusted out along the weld line)

I would personally run. FAST.

Carfax is an amusing tool that means very little. Mostly because the things that are reported don't mean much. My wife had a Tercel that I kinda stupidly had comprehensive insurance on. She got hail damage pretty bad one summer. I submitted a claim, they totalled the car, gave me $3500, and I gave them back $500 to buy it back with a salvage title. It was great for me; I got $3000, kept the car, and there was absolutely nothing wrong with it except looking like a golf ball. But of course Carfax on that car would say "title issues, damaged beyond repair, totaled, pile of junk."

The title is listed as clean because none of the damage exceeded 80% of the value of the car. Once a car is totalled (insurance estimates that it would cost more than 80% of its value to fix it) then it shows up as a salvage title. As you can see from my Tercel example, that could mean nothing or it could mean everything. You have a Bimmer there that has been through the ringer but shows up clean. I had a tercel with some dents that shows up a total loss. There is also the possibility that one of those damage scenarios in the carfax report would have been a total loss, but the person didn't report it. I'm in that situation right now. I have a 96 Impala SS that is rusty, dented, used, and abused. If I submitted a claim on it right now they would total it and issue a salvage title. Instead, I bought new panels and will fix it myself because I want to keep it. It is also possible that the owner of that BMW didn't have collision insurance and therefore never made a claim. They may have instead taken it to a shop and said "look, I have $1000, make it drivable"

The other thing you don't know is how well it was fixed. Its amazing how shops duct tape things together to make a buck.

The other thing you have to consider is resale value. Assuming you buy it and its all 100%, you can ethically sell it as an OK car, but if your buyers check carfax they will have the same questions you do. It will limit your resale from the standpoint that it will limit your buyer pool.

Exactly, take Carfax with a grain of salt. There could be more than what's on the report. Carfax gets the accident information from a large insurance company database, and for varying reasons an incident may or may not be on the report.

However, reading what IS on the report. Seems the car has bounced around some. For some of the short term owners, it's possible they were a car dealer and it was on their lot and then was sent to auction when it didn't sell. But without seeing the actual history/report, it's hard to say for sure. It certainly has been in a few accidents. If none of them were severe enough for an insurance company to declare it a total loss, the title will be clean still...as it should be.

While I wouldn't say run away without looking back, I'd look with a very big magnifying glass and make sure the car is in top shape, body and mechanical.

Carfax and the like go by what is reported. If it is not reported, it doesn't show up. So in other words, whatever is in the report is the best possible condition the car is going to be in; it may have other, unreported flaws. Report services give false negatives all the time, but they rarely give false positives.

If you're looking to make a race car or track toy, and you get the car on a frame rack and it measures out straight and square, that's one thing. If you're looking for a driver, I think you can probably find one that hasn't been the victim of so much domestic violence.

Everyone has it pretty well covered.

Bottom line: Get the car inspected for both structural damage\repairs AND mechanical condition. The sword cuts both ways; You could have a severely mashed up vehicle with a clean Carfax, or like in Curtis' case, a pretty nice vehicle with a terrible Carfax.

For better or worse, Carfax\Autocheck have changed the game just by existing, so if resale value is a consideration, bear in mind that many potential buyers won't even consider looking at a vehicle with accident data on it.

Amusingly, if you dig through the fine print, Carfax only estimates that they catch about 20% of the accidents that occur...

I trust my eyes over CarFax.

My 2006 Miata has a ding for the front bumper. Got it up on a lift, pulled off the undertray and it was obvious whatever happened only happened to the bumper. No new core supports, radiator, paint, bent framerails, etc.

I'm guessing someone backed into the bumper or something and it got a respray.

So the title sounds like it's still clean just the car has been a rolling pinata over the years. I would personally run from it. I can over look 1 accident with a very careful inspection but that many just screams don't look back.

Carfax is pretty piss poor tool to be honest with you. My favorite is the Odometer roll back claims because someone mistypes an odometer reading. My old miata had that. They mis-typed the Odometer when it was brought to Texas from Georgia.

Also, They don't have access to the Texas insurance database the last I knew so never trust it for any car ever owned in Texas at some point in it's life.

Yeah the car is about 4 hours away from me. Otherwise I would simply head over and give the car a good eye-balling. At this point I think I'll just pass. Thanks for all the advice guys.

I work in a car dealership and I even take Carfax with a grain of salt. The best thing you can do is look at the car up close and personal with your own eyeballs.

My carfax was squeaky clean, then the motor blew up 4,000 miles later. Nothing to with the Carfax sure, but it just shows anything can happen.

Get a PPI. That looks like a hell of a buy at the listed price.

8 previous owners would make me nervous...

I'm in the habit of running my previous cars through Carfax when I can (like when a friend is buying a car or something). I had: 1997 Civic: tree fell on it, almost totaled by insurance. Then rear ended a month after getting it back from shop. Neither accidents on Carfax. 2004 Accord: rear ended by a snow plow in a snow storm and pushed into the car in front of me. Airbags went off. Not on Carfax. 2001 Buick that was run into stuff numerous times by my grandmother before she (thankfully) decided to stop driving. Nothing on Carfax.

So for me personally, I'm not sure I trust it.

Kinda agree with the pinata comment. But, it's older so it's going to have been around the block a time or two. Be it miles, maintenance or owners.

I've also learned to take carfax with a few grains of salt. In my experience, it's listed damage and work done that I know weren't done because it said I'd done it while I owned the cars. As well red flags for frauds, again while in my care and ownership. Not sure where they were pulling those data points from, but they sure weren't accurate.

Interesting. I told him I would pay no more than $7,700. I told him if he got desperate enough to consider my offer, to reach out to me and let me know. We'll see what happens. He said he would let me know... Thanks again guys!

My FD RX-7 was purchased as basically a shell with wheels on it, and I built it into a finished car out of parts from literally 100+ other cars (not that there's anything wrong with that). The carfax shows a ho-hum three owner car with no accidents. So yeah, grain of salt and all that.

My brother just hooked me up with a running, but cosmetically very rough Cummins Dodge. He says the Carfax labeled it "JUNK". Not salvage title, or anything. JUNK. I find that very amusing.

Yeah Carfax info aside, looks like the car has still been through 9 different owners. That's a lot of chance for someone to skimp on maintenance. We'll see what happens.