My son almost bought a used 2k10 Ram like mine, but Lexus bodyman/friend of his says considerable evidence of several areas of repainting, says whole left side from rear passenger door on back, also hood rear bumper & bed show signs they've been off. Several areas of light overspray as well. Estimates major work possibly in excess of $4k has been done.

A CARFAX report comes back clear. Is that possible?

Is there any way to prove the prior damage & repairs?

How would any remaining warranty be affected?

Thanks!!

 

depends... if it was repaired at a dealer then they should be able to pull it up. Ford calls it Oasis (show's ALL work done to the vehicle at any ford dealer) I forget what Dodge calls there program. If it appears to have serious work done and they can't prove it, I'd just stay away all in all.

 

Not all work is found by Carfax. If there was no police report there's nothing to be tied to the VIN. Also, if they had a small body shop or a friend do the work, nothing says it has to be reported. Also, no insurance claim, no report tied to the VIN.

 

very true mega hemi...

 

Thanks. That's kind of what I thought (about CarFax) - no report = no record. Strange tho with as much work as the Lexus guy spotted (and we have no reason to doubt him, he's been in the bodywork biz for 12 yrs) I saw the truck after lunch today. It looks & drives good. It's sitting on a Toyota lot. ("just got it in" so they say) You can feel the overspray in a couple areas on the hood and on the right A-pillar & top of the Rt front door frame, also some evidence even I could see of some body putty on the bed just below the rail cap..... not really bad, but noticeable if you look at it the right way, so it's obviously been in a paint shop somewhere. The bumper bolts are also not back in exactly the original locations. The only thing his Lexus buddy says is likely the rear bumper has been replaced or removed at one time or another for some reason. The Lexus guy says to cross this one off the list. What's attractive is they're asking only $18,000 for it with 24k on the clock. It's a 4.7 like mine but kind of a pretty maroon color.

 

I think that's a little high for a 2010 w/ 24k..I got a 2009 5.7L 4x4 Big Horn Edition in April last year (2011) w/ 7,800 miles on it, Car Fax was clean and the dealer report all came back clean other. Dealer was asking 29,500 for it and I talked them down to 24,030 OTD tax tag and title. If he was still interested I think he'd be able to get it down more than that if the paint job is that visible.

Whats funny is here in NJ the Toyota dealer a few miles from me has a maroon colored one w/ the 4.7L never looked at the cost though. It's been on there lot for a few months now.

 

Carfax isn't anywhere close to 100% reliable. I've seen it both ways, vehicles that obviously had major work done right down to frame straightening and have a totally clean report and vehicles where I have known the owner since they bought the thing, know it was never even been in so much as a fender bender show up as having accident(s) on the Carfax...

 

I think my son is a little disappointed, but he decided to let this one go.

As for CarFax accuracy, one thing very important is if your state has an annual vehicle inspection program like Texas, always verify that the current mileage they write down on the OBDII emissions report is accurate otherwise CarFax will flag it as having an odometer discrepancy. Getting this corrected is a very arduous task, so always check your paperwork before leaving the inspection station.

And by the same token, if leasing and you have a fender-bender or your car gets broken-into, you may want to think twice about turning it in to your insurance co. and/or letting your dealer make the repairs. You may actually be money ahead to pay for the repairs out of your own pocket and take it to a small independent body shop to keep the little incident just between friends. Otherwise the leasing company will deem this (even though perfectly repaired) as causing diminished value and ding the crap out of you at end-of-lease turn-in.