I Don't Trust Carfax
 

Posting here because I am known to this 991 forum and want to share a very concerning experience.

I had interest in a DB9 during the early part of this year. I scheduled a test drive in mid April and was called the morning of the appointment by the selling dealer to cancel. I was told that the car was in a accident the day before during a test drive. I passed but I continued to follow this car for a few weeks because it was in my saved list. About two weeks after the accident, the Carfax was updated to include the accident. This was the end of April or early May. I never viewed this car again. Today, I was sent an email by Carfax telling me there was a new listing for a DB9 with a clean Carfax. I checked it out and it was the same car, the same dealer and the reported accident was now omitted. I am aware that not all Carfax reports are not always complete but this is the first time I have seen an accident deleted from a previously published report.

It’s all business. Carfax doesn’t guarantee accident reports, only title reports. So they aren’t losing anything by not showing an accident. Smart buyers usually use a paint meter and other methods to vet a car.

Wow. Most people think that if the Carfax says it’s clean, it probably is. Not the case. I bought a car that had a significant front end rebuild, complete with the insurance claim. Carfax said it was clean. I discovered this while trying to service the vehicle under warranty at the dealer. The dealer did the right thing by not servicing the vehicle due to repairs that were previously made incorrectly, and then the dealer also reported the damage to Carfax.

Some dealers involved in these transactions do what they can to avoid letting Carfax know. I feel that somehow Carfax is also complicit because it doesn’t appear they are doing what they should to protect buyers. “It’s all business” alright - it’s a bad business when the people you service and your actual product are the opposite of what you think it is.

We also need laws. For one, allow folks to go after sellers who become responsible for hiding this sort of thing. For another, all Insurance claims should be documented and reported. Body shops could report damage.

No one should trust carfax. They are an interesting data point that is often incomplete.

A CarFax is just a single puzzle piece in the car buying due diligence process. Smart buyers don't make a final decision on only one puzzle part.

True. Some prefer AutoCheck over Carfax.

https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/rennlis...46fb99538c.png

^ thruth!

Sellers do not have a duty to disclose collision repairs if the work was properly done and there are no hidden defects. If there is known defect the seller must disclose or it would be fraud.

https://rennlist.com/forums/991/1146...-possible.html

And its sold.

Carfax is a scam at best. All money related and the only one who benefits is the dealer.

We had a car that the rear bumper got scraped in a parking lot. The car was new, I was not there, so we filed a police report just in case. Less than $500 in damage. No report to the insurance company was made. 99.9% of the scratch came out with compound and was a scuff. The car was brought to BMW, they looked at it, said all good, no damage.

Ten years later, at the same dealer, they offer 10K on the trade. Fine. Then they run a car fax and come back and say the car had a rear collision (referencing this incident) and they could only offer $5500. I email them a copy of the service record, show them the remnant of the tiny mark on the original bumper with original paint still on the car. The dealer states that while they agree that the car is fine, the blemished carfax makes the car worth less to a buyer.

I call carfax and ask if they can remove this from the car's record. I send the docs. Nothing.

Eventually I got the trade value/combined new car purchase deal to a point I was at peace with but at the end of the day, this issue cost me $.

Meanwhile, fast forward to last week, shopping for a CPO pickup truck for my grandfather, they are showing me trucks with clean car fax reports with resprayed front bumpers, evidence of touch up on doors, dinged chrome rear bumpers. But a "clean" carfax.

All BS.

How would you feel? If you bought a car that was in an accident, the seller knew, they knew the Carfax didn’t show it, and you discover it later? Then you go to sell your car and now the Carfax has the damage on it? Now, your market shrank by 2/3rds, and you eat thousands of dollars?

While all your responses are on point, no one addressed that Carfax published an accurate report on the accident damage and then removed it. This is pure collusion with a high volume selling dealer.
I am going to invest in the best paint meter $$ can buy before my next purchase.

This just proves that any electronic tracking system like CarFax is subject to abuse by bad actors. What makes it worse is that I am pretty certain many more people still have cars unnecessarily stigmatized by Carfax, than cars getting a break from non-reporting or fraud.. Carfax is not a reliable helper for retail sellers & buyers.

Kind of makes you wonder how we ever managed to buy & sell cars before Carfax.

USAA member accidents do NOT show up on Carfax. It's a security risk in reporting accidents insofar as revealing home addresses, etc of heads of state etc.

I was hit hard, ironically, by the then head of the NTSB. The Carfax never reflected the accident.

I stopped trusting Carfax there and then.

this is what you need to do
 

The paint meter does not lie. If you put the specifics of the vehicle here i will forward to my contact at Carfax with this link. Having worked there as a data aquistion manager, they are not perfect by any means but a starting point in your investigation. I do believe they have the largest source of data providers. I have not heard of a dealer being able to get something removed and im quite sure there would be an interest on their part in how this happened.