How to check for a flood damaged car ??

Yes, on the door panels, maybe on the seat springs. Also the odor you'll smell it unless there is sooo much air freshner to mask it. Unplug a couple of electrical connectors, see if there is a greenish color. Look for a bunch of new carpet if so pull it back and see what's there. I like to reach around and look up under the dash to see what lurks there.

Roy

Carfax.com

Yup. also, if you want to take the time and trouble to query all fifty states, most BMV's have a website that will show the title history of a car.

john

The National Insurance Crime Bureau has set up a flood vehicle database to help identify vehicles that were repaired through insurance claims for flood damage.

Brian

Yeah, people need to be super careful when buying a used car in the next few years or so. Flooding will seriously lessen the car's life. Electrical and mechanical problems. Carfax would tell you if the car was ever registered in Louisiana, MS. And just because the title isn't a "salvage" or "rebuilt" title don't mean much. The car may have slipped through the cracks.

How to spot a flood-damaged car (consumer reports)

Here are some quick checks that you can perform yourself:

Look under the carpets to see if they are wet, damp, or muddy. Check the seat-mounting screws to see if there is any evidence that they have been removed. To dry the carpets, the seats must be removed?not generally a part of normal maintenance. Inspect the lights. Lights are expensive to replace, and a water line may still show on the lens or the reflector. Inspect the car in difficult-to-clean places, such as the gaps between panels in the trunk and under the hood. Water-borne mud and debris may still cling in these places. Look for mud or debris on the bottom edges of brackets or panels where it couldn't naturally settle from the air. Look at the heads of any unpainted, exposed screws under the dashboard. Any unpainted metal in cars flooded in New Orleans will probably already show signs of rust. Check the rubber drain plugs under the car and on the bottoms of doors. If they look as if they have been removed recently, it might have been done to drain floodwater. If you need to dig deeper, remove a door panel to see if there is a water mark on the inside of it.

I would also suspect looking for mud and silt in other, equally hard to clean places, like the engine side of bottom frame where the radiator sits. This seems to be a difficult to clean place and silt is normally not found there.

Other places might be underneath the battery tray, but this is a little easier to pressure wash and steam clean.