2003 Camry - Carfax vehicle history - suspicious?

Is the car at Lattof or Hoskins Chev?

My explanations are after the entries below.

Pretty self-explanatory.

Sounds like the pre-delivery service.

These 3 entries indicate that the car was sold to a retail or fleet customer, registered, and a loan was issued.

The car made the round of several auctions before it was sold. My guess is that it was a fleet or rental car company vehicle that a dealer in Lincolnwood eventually retailed as a used vehicle.

Whoever bought the car in Lincolnwood traded it in on something else.

the long gaps in between mean are the periods when someone owned the vehicle.

Thanks for the detailed reply Ray. It's Grossinger Chev actually.

The "long gaps in between" that I'm referring to is when the car apparently sat on one (Lincolnwood) dealer's lot for 8 months (5/31/2005 - 2/24/2006) without being sold, and then another (Palatine) dealer's lot for 2 months (2/24/2006 - Present) until I walked up and test drove it yesterday.

I would imagine the Camry, as a pretty popular car, would be fairly easy to sell. Is this normal for a car to sit on a dealer's lot for that long?

Grossinger has dealerships in Lincolnwood as well as the one you went to, so I bet the vehicle's movement was from one Grossinger dealership to another.

I have no idea why the vehicle sat for such a long time without selling without looking at it. Cars sit in used car lots for extended periods when they are overpriced; damaged and not repaired; not detailed properly; or someone at the dealership was using it for their own use.

These first four, the vehicle came into the country and was sold to an individual who had to take out a loan to buy the car.

Sounds like the guy moved to Iowa...but what's up with the "Kentucky Motor Vehicle Dept"?

The guy traded the car in the spring of 2005. It was such a high-mileage vehicle (49,000+ miles in 18 months) that no one wanted to look at the rig, so it got passed around a lot.

The mileage is pretty high for the age, but it's gotta be pretty much all highway miles. If you plan on hanging onto it for a while, I'd say you've got the best of both worlds -- you can use the high mileage to dicker down the price, but the mileage doesn't really count from a wear-and-tear perspective -- highway miles are much better than in-town miles.

Since Toyota makes Camrys in Kentucky, the likelihood is greater that the car was made in Kentucky than in Japan.

The report was submitted to Carfax by the Kentucky Motor Vehicle Dept.

t auction in Southeast Region. Listed as a fleet

Late model, relatively high miles, sold at auction indicates that it was probably a company car for someone.

Yeah. Brain fart on my part. The VIN would tell for sure -- a "U" in the 7th place from the right would be the Kentucky plant.

Then why was it registered as a "personal" vehicle? Aren't most company-owned vehicles registered as "fleet", etc. so they can write off the depreciation?

Lease vehicles may be registered to the driver with title held by the leasing company.

It is possible that the car was a company car for someone who worked at TMM Georgetown, TMMNA, TMIS, or TMCC, which would account for the high miles and 2 years of service.

In fact in the VIN there is a "U" in the 7th place from the right. Looks like it was made in the Kentucky plant.

So after analyzing the Carfax report, is it safe to say that there are no obvious red flags?

I'm go> > "Ray O" wrote:

I'm not that familiar with Carfax and don't trust Carfax that much because there is no guarantee that all problems have been reported. For example, if the car got flooded, what is there to prevent FlyByNight Auto Repair from using a hair dryer to dry out the carpets and then sending the car down the road with no report? In other words, the absence of a report of a repair or wreck does not necessarily mean that the car has never been wrecked.

A friend has had good experiences with Arlington Toyota on Dundee Rd., I've had good experience with Bredemann in Park Ridge and Schaumburg Toyota if you want to take the car there for inspection. I like Schaumburg Toyota because the service department is open until Midnight, they are a multiple time recipient of Toyota's President's Award, and Bill and Ricky in their service department always give me a discount because I send all my friends there.

I've bought a couple lease vehicles in my life and managed to dicker down the price due to the high mileage. Had good luck with both, had to have a rebuilt trans in one but I knew that from the start, I dickered the price accordingly. Like someone else said, most of the mileage has to be highway mileage to stack up that fast but, proper maintenance is still important. Can/will they provide service records? Talk to your bank or look at the KBB for the proper deduction for high mileage. I think the price you want would be the average retail or resale for your area, not the trade-in which would probably be lower. Follow your instinct and have the car checked by a mechanic other than where you're purchasing. If all checks out you should feel comfortable paying a little over actual value since it's a Toyota. My 2 cents, Dave

I don't see any obvious red flags. Lots of TSBs against that year & model, 'tho -- I'd recommend checking over the list to see if anything gives you heartburn, and maybe zero in on some of the items during the inspection.

Price-wise, $12,300 is pretty good from a dealer -- it's roughly what I'd be willing to pay a private seller around here for that particular car. If it's fully detailed inside and out, with new tires (basically, hard to tell from "new"), I'd consider it a steal.

The car is definitely fully detailed inside and out - it looks mint. The tires look okay, I'll get a closer look at them when I have the mechanic check it out.

And "TSB" stands for what exactly?

I have had a couple people give me some warnings after reading over the Carfax report:

"Between 2/25/2005 and 4/28/2005 approximately 8000 miles were put on the car. That's 4000 miles a month. I was in the auto business many years ago. Favorite of a used car dealer was to re-register cars in different states to cover up a 'clocked' (speedo turned back) car. My opinion is to be leery with this car."

"I don't like that it's been across several states. that's what is done when there's a title problem. if it was listed as totaled or severely damaged in one state, it may not be reflected in another, depending upon what is required. Ditto for water damaged cars."

Are these valid c> snipped-for-privacy@msn.com wrote:

TSB = Technical Service Bulletin - manufacturers publish TSB's to advise dealers of specifications, how to correct problems, production changes, etc.

OK, a bit of relevation for me. The car probably did not go to Cedar Rapids Iowa. Cedar Rapids is the home of Toyota Motor Credit Corp - the car was probably leased through them and was probably a TMCC employee's car. I used to drive about 1,000 miles a week when I called on dealerships, so the 4,000 miles a month is about right for someone calling on dealerships, i.e., a Toyota employee.

TMCC released the title when the lease was up.

An unscrupulous dealer would not clock a speedometer and still show 4,000 miles a month, and the new electronic odometers are not as easy to "clock" as the old mechanical ones.

This is a valid concern, but it did not go from Kentucky to Iowa to Illinois. I think it went from Kentucky to an auction and an Illinois dealer bought it.

that said, a competent technician shoujld be able to detect physical problems with the car.

Speaking as an electrical engineer, I can tell you that it's easier to fudge an electronic odometer than an old-fashioned rolling-digits one. Especially if the person doing the fudging works for a dealer and has access to factory equipment designed for that very purpose.

I appreciate the explanations Ray. I feel better about buying this car now - pending the results of the mechanic's inspection.

To you and every> > The car is definitely fully detailed inside and out - it looks mint.

I would not purchase a lease/rental car. depends on how long u wanna keep the car. if it is short term, it;s ok.

cos usually, they wack the hack out of rental cars

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I don't trust CarFax because dealers are so eager to provide the reports.

Correct me if I'm wrong but, the computer will still show the actual miles even if the odometer was changed. Dave

I must disagree....if you check out the car well, an ex-rental can be a splendid deal. I've bought two Toyotas from Hertz as ex-rentals, a '97 Camry (Japan made) and an '03 Avalon (from Georgetown). The Camry, which we've had going on nine years, has been the most trouble-free car we've ever owned, and we've put over 110 K miles on it. We've had the Avalon almost two years and 15 K miles later all we've done is put gas in it, changed oil and filter, and flushed the transmission. If I were to replace the Camry....simply because the odometer has lots of numbers on it now, Hertz would be the first place I'd shop for a "new" one.