View Full Forums : Buying a used car? It may have been in a flood recently...


Stormhaven
09-20-2005, 12:23 PM
Interesting article from the <a href="http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-0509090350sep09,1,2094553.story?coll=chi-business-hed&ctrack=1&cset=true">Chicago Tribune</a>:<b>Flood relics to hit the road
Buyer beware: That used car might be a Katrina survivor</b>

By Jim Mateja
Tribune auto reporter
Published September 9, 2005

If you shop for a used car several months from now, you might want to give the carpet an extra close sniff.

You could be purchasing a dried-out casualty of Hurricane Katrina.

Whether acting as entrepreneurs or scam artists, wholesale car dealers soon will be scouring the ruins of New Orleans, Mississippi and Alabama for flood-damaged vehicles. They will obtain the cars for pennies, refurbish them and then sell them to buyers, some of whom won't be told of their purchase's waterlogged history.

Chicagoland is a target for such damaged vehicles with its large population.

"Whenever there's been a natural disaster, Chicagoans have had to beware," said Jerry Cizek, president of the Chicago Automobile Trade Association, which represents more than 700 new-car dealers in the area.

For example, days after Mt. St. Helens erupted in 1980, cars still soiled with volcanic ash arrived here on trailers as entrepreneurs prepared to peddle them.

Though Cizek expects most vehicles will be damaged beyond repair, there are estimates that 250,000 to 500,000 of the 2 million vehicles in the Gulf Coast floods will be salvaged.

The problem is not necessarily the practice of refurbishing the cars; it is whether the cars are identified as being salvaged.

It begins when insurance companies rule cars a total loss and make settlement payments to dealers or private owners. They, in turn, sell the vehicles cheap at auction, after which the car's title is branded as a "flood" or "salvage" vehicle.

But some opportunists will take those vehicles to different states that don't require the cars to list its previous condition on the title. With its history wiped clean, they are moved again, ending up for sale in places such as Chicago.

"Only about half the states [including Illinois] require a flood or salvage brand on the vehicle title, but some don't require the branding and some don't carry forward the brand when it's resold in another state," said Doug Greenhouse, director of environment, health and safety for the National Automobile Dealers Association.