Should you buy a car with a salvaged title?

Answer 1

It is a good idea for some people if you can do your own work and know what was originally wrong with the vehicle. If you will need to take it to a shop for everything that goes wrong, a salvage titled vehicle will be very expensive to operate.

Recognize that many lending institutions will not loan money on a salvage titled vehicle, and if you are ever in a collision you will not get full value for the vehicle.

Answer

It all depends on why it was salvaged in the first place. Since cars are totaled/salvaged when repair costs exceed 50-75% of the car's value (depending on what state you're in), an older car can be totaled for simply cosmetic reasons since they're worth less and easily totaled - even $2k in body work will total an otherwise mechanically sound older car like a '95 Volvo or Honda . Now a newer car that's been totaled is a problem since it could have sustained over $15k in damages and that's major. It all boils down to why it was totaled, are there before and after pictures and are the repairs top notch. If it's been totaled due to flood damage RUN! These are problematic cars that are not easily restored and may have a lifetime of quirky electrical problems.

Buying a salvage/reconstructed car is no different than buying any used car. Do a Carfax, get a pre-purchase inspection, make sure the frame's straight and if it all checks out and you like the car buy it BUT don't pay more than 60% of the value of a comparable car with a clean title since that's all it's worth and plan on keeping it for a while to get your money's worth out of it since resale is harder.

And contrary to all the bull you hear, you can get insurance on it from most companies but since it's worth less they will pay out less if it's totaled again or stolen so don't pay too much for it! I own a reconstructed car presently (I bought it off Craigs List and the branded title was hid from me until I went to register the car) but it's the best car I've ever owned and I only paid $1800 for it (once I found out it was branded the cheesy-sleazy guy refunded me some money) and spent another $1000 to bring it up to top notch mechanical standards (major tune up, new belts and hoses, rear brakes). A great deal and it looks and drives fine with no problems after 20,000 miles, so if it's a good car that checks out I can think of no disadvantages to buying such a car!

Consider this: a one year old car gets rear ended and sustains $5K in damage. It gets repaired and gets to keep its clean title because it's worth $12K. A ten year old car with the same damage would get a salvage/reconstructed title because it's only worth $4500. A clean title, therefore, does not mean a clean car. At least with a salvage title you know some truth about the car and can go from there.

The naysayers will disagree of course, but do your homework, be smart and save some moolah.