Totalled by the owner and not reported (only liability?) and totalled by the insurance company are two different things. If it was never reported then it won't be on Carfax. Which is why you always need a PPI. Plenty of cars have had major damage repaired that the insurance company has no knowledge of.

 

Even if the seller is confused about the S4 designation I wouldn't buy anything from him. I looked at one complaint where someone had the winning bid on an 81 MB SL http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...tem=2429052724 . After the last bid was made the seller added a statement that the milage in his ad was off by about 100,000 miles. When the buyer didn't pay up for that reason the seller's comment was that the buyer didn't read the ad and that he was a deadbeat. Check for yourself. Last bid was Aug 23, Ad revised Aug 24.
(By the way even the spell checker I used before I submitted this didn't like S4)

 

True GMS, but it has a salvage title, so it must have been reported somewhere for the state to have issued it a salvage.