Hurricane

I have no idea what you are talking about. I was agreeing with his comment that a dealer misrepresenting something would be a huge red flag, damage or no damage.

crunch527

For me it comes down to what am I willing to take on at the other end of the deal...doesn't matter if its a house, boat, car, etc...

Case in point is the fact that this car went into auction circulation...therefore my assumption is that the last dealer to take the car in on trade didn't want the headache and took the car to auction...essentially the dealer and the previous owner "punted"...not that its necessarily a bad car but it has been wrecked...

However, if Porsche will still CPO the car, it really comes down to the price and whether or not you are willing to answer the same questions for the next buyer (risk)?

Good luck!

NoGaBiker

He said he begged to differ with me and offered his reasons for doing so. You "+1"d his comment, leading me to believe you agreed with it. So I included you in my incisive rebuttal, for good measure.

I think we can all agree on the incredibly non-controversial position that if a dealer lies and says a damaged car is not damaged, that's a no go. No idea, honestly, why anyone would bother to post that, or agree with it. But I'm happy to stipulate that it's a good idea to avoid dishonest Porsche salesmen/dealers. I think it's also pretty wise to not give your SSN to Nigerian Under Secretaries of Finance who ask for it on the Internet.

Quadcammer

Porsche cpo means diddly squat. Do a thorough PPI on any car you buy, cpo or not.

MrTim

This has happened to me. It really, really PO'd me and cost me $2k in travel expense. Which at that time in my life was a lot.


Never ever buy a long distance car sight unseen, IMHO. The second time this was about to happen, the dealer came clean after we agreed on terms and I probed a little more about something that prompted me to think it had had paintwork. It wasn't car fax listed as a damaged vehicle.
it turned out to be a near total repaint, went through chain link fence and hit light pole in parking lot.
Still bought it, very low production desireable vert. the price reflected this.
I held on to this car for 6 years and made money when I sold it last year.

Tpup

I can tell you that Carfax is not worth much either. I purchased a clean car fax Lexus GX a few years back. 9 months later Carfax added that the car was in a head on collision with a tree.

Personally I would not purchase any car that had a paint repair. It's just to hard to tell what's real and what's BS.

siitech

I am glad at least in my case the dealer send me the carfax report which shows---"vehicle invloved in a sideswipe collision with another motor vehicle"---even though I was told it was a no accident car in the first place. The sales said sorry that he did not notice it at first, I guess I would give him the benifit of doubt. Anyway, If not for the carfax, I might have flown to Chicago area for nothing, so I am thankful for it.

It is frustrating to find a 911.1S with the right color and options for me, as I am picky and I am kind of strange for a 911 buyer, I would like to find a white or GT silver, black interior, but no SPASM and no glass sunroof. Must be low mileage too. And I do not want a really basic car without Bose and some other items. It just not that easy. I am thinking I may end up ordering a 991.2 eventually. Anyway, I am driving a base 991.1 that runs great, so there is no hurry.

ace37

I sold my 997 GTS with an accident disclosed - I was on inappropriate tires and hydroplaned into a ditch. Stupid in a lot of ways, but I learned a lesson.

The dealer did an in and out for a private sale as I was buying a new one and it saved me a fair bit on state taxes. The dealer asked about the accident saying they could potentially offer to certify it if the buyer wanted to pay the cost. I showed them the accident repair order and he said too many panels were repainted/blended. I forget if he said the limit for CPO was two or three, but it was from my SA's memory anyway - he didn't look it up.

Of course, if the dealer had picked the same car up at auction and their inspection somehow managed to miss a repainted panel while inspecting the car, who's to say it wouldn't have been CPO'd and sold with nobody the wiser. And Porsche would honor the CPO warranty, so that much is good. But I agree with the others, an inspection is key, and if the price and condition are a good match, the car is a good buy for the right buyer, accident or not. But any accident, trivial or severe, reduces the buyer pool and the market values some degree.

flyheli

interesting read... I just picked up a 2013 C2 for the price of a Boxster S because it has a rather extensive history. it had 2 repairs (around 13k each) and also got keyed at a shopping mall parking lot which resulted in a Porsche certified complete paint job for 20k(!). I still got another 18 month CPO warranty which gave me enough piece of mind to pull the trigger.
I don't know exactly what kind of repairs those were since my dealer told me that they were done at a different dealership. Any thoughts?

NoGaBiker

Good for you. At the end of your tenure with the car you'll know whether this was a good idea or not. You have 18 months to figure out if you want to keep it out of warranty -- that should be plenty of time to reveal everything you need to know about the mechanicals. And you have room to sell it for a very, very attractive price down the road.

Time is on your side, though. I can about guarantee that buyers will be less concerned about an 8-12YO 911 that was hit twice in the first couple of years and has had one owner since it was 4YO, than people are about a 4YO car that's been hit twice.

Gary JR

My understanding is when a police report is filed the car is then in the national accident database and there goes your resale value. If police are at the scene of an accident I would certainly ask for no report on my bent fender. Neither would I make an insurance claim.

titanflyer

To the original post, this is more of a question than a statement... if you buy a CPO perfect car, and have a small fender bender, or even a fairly major accident, is the CPO cancelled? I mean if I go to sell my car again after a year of ownership that I had an accident that would normally not pass CPO, what does that do to the transferable warranty of CPO?

phow

As someone that worked previously in law enforcement, I can tell you that not all police reported vehicle collisions will make it onto a carfax report. Damage estimated value and location (private or public) road can change the way a collision is reported to the state. This is the same database that insurance pulls from when determining your policy rates, etc.

For example, my brother was recently in a small not-at-fault collision that left his front bumper cover damaged. The report was written up for public roadway with an estimated value of under $500. The report was submitted to the state and went through the normal insurance claims process. Obviously my brother was concerned about possible diminished value due to the accident eventually being on his carfax. My suggestion to him was to pull a driver's abstract from his local DMV in 60-90 days after the accident and if the collision wasn't noted, it wouldn't show on the carfax. 12+ months later and the accident is not noted on carfax or his driver's abstract report.

^ I give the above story to show that carfax history reports may not always be entirely accurate. Whether a vehicle has an accident history or not, I recommend a third party PPI with both an independent dealer and body shop for out of state purchases. This will give you more information than you could ever gather from reading a 4 page carfax report.

Obviously it may not be a concern today or tomorrow but it's worth thinking about resale/trade-in value for the future. You will have a harder time private selling a vehicle with an accident history and any dealer will also use the accident as a major negative when trying to trade-in the vehicle. My personal opinion is that the vehicle you are looking at was involved in a minor collision. The collision was bad enough to trigger an accident report on carfax but not bad enough to not be CPO'd. Only you can decide if you are comfortable with this scenario.

Gary JR

What is a PPI?

phow

pre-purchase inspection