View Poll Results: Would You Buy A Salvage Car?
Never, I Only Buy New!
13
25.49%
Never, I Only Buy Certified Pre-Owned!
12
23.53%
Never, I Only Buy Used!
14
27.45%
Maybe, Depending On The Reason!
20
39.22%
Maybe, Depending On The Price!
7
13.73%
Yes, I Will Save Thousands!
6
11.76%
Multiple Choice Poll. Voters: 51. You may not vote on this poll
Would You Ever Buy A Salvage Vehicle?
05-10-11, 08:58 PM
#31
Some salvaged cars aren't bad and are great deals monetarily, but I would never buy one. I don't keep my cars forever so ease of resale is important. It is also sometimes a headache to insure. A lot of times they are really not that much cheaper price wise either.
05-10-11, 10:44 PM
#32
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Where would I be able to find a Salvaged car than, if the auctions require you to have a dealers license?
05-11-11, 11:00 AM
#37
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Very true. If you go through enough states, you may be able to "wash" the title clean. Each state has a different salvage/reconstruction standard.
05-11-11, 11:35 AM
#38
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I bought a salvaged car when I moved from the suburbs to a rural area. I had a 80 round trip daily commute and got a one year old Olds Achieva, four cylinder, five speed. It had front end damage and I bought it from a collision shop. They started working on it after I bought it so I knew what was damaged.
I got it for $10,000 with 10,000 miles - saving around $3,000. I ran it for seven years/ 175,000 miles before junking it because the cat converter fell off and the alternator quit and it cost more to replace them than the car was worth. The car had original struts and water pump too. I changed oil every 5,000 miles, replaced brakes and tires. Nothing major ever happened to it until the end.
I got it for $10,000 with 10,000 miles - saving around $3,000. I ran it for seven years/ 175,000 miles before junking it because the cat converter fell off and the alternator quit and it cost more to replace them than the car was worth. The car had original struts and water pump too. I changed oil every 5,000 miles, replaced brakes and tires. Nothing major ever happened to it until the end.
05-11-11, 02:36 PM
#39
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There are intermediaries that can bid on behalf of you for a fee. I've dealt with one before but it was a horrible experience (partly my fault). Try the copart website for more information.
Very true. If you go through enough states, you may be able to "wash" the title clean. Each state has a different salvage/reconstruction standard.
Very true. If you go through enough states, you may be able to "wash" the title clean. Each state has a different salvage/reconstruction standard.
The copart website looks cool, I'm definitely going to be checking in on it.
05-16-12, 03:16 AM
#41
Super Moderator
One of the guys who works for me ONLY buys salvage cars. His dad is in the auto body business, so he can usually get them repaired to like new for relatively cheap. In fact, he just bought a 2011 Ford Fusion Hybrid with 16k miles for $12k, after months of searching for the "right one". He expects it to cost between $1500 and $2500 to repair the damage, and then he'll be on the road in a nearly-new car for less than $15k.
05-16-12, 09:52 AM
#45
Lexus Test Driver
My girlfriends old car was a salvaged title simply because it was "stolen". But what had happened was the first owner needed cash and i guess he/she decided to garage the car at a friends home and claim it as stolen. The car wasn't found in reasonable time of course, so insurance paid out. Unfortunately for the first owner, insurance did end up finding the car a couple months afterwards (not sure what happened to the owner) but the car was put up for sale as "Salvaged" even though nothing was ever wrong with it. GF got the car for cheap compared to the market value back then, she put a good 60k on it before she sold it and we never had any issues. We got a fair price for it, not as good as KBB of course because you have to disclose that it was a salvaged title.
EDIT: Also as mentioned if you just need certain parts then why not. If you every visited a junk yard to get something for your car, you are not too far off.
I know that it used to be a hot market for car thiefs. They would buy a salvaged car that they wanted to steal lets say a LFA
and then steal a LFA and swop parts and you have a brand new LFA thats legal to drive. I know now that VINs are now in basically every part of high end cars now a days but thats how it used to be done.
Last edited by xsh0tya; 05-16-12 at 10:05 AM. Reason: Adding a little something.