Why You Need Do a VIN Check on a Car
Buying a used car can be a difficult experience, especially when you don’t know all the right steps to making a smart purchase. A VIN decode and check are two things that are absolutely necessary for you to do before you give anyone a penny for a car. the following are five reasons that you need to go through these processes:
1. You’ll Know if Your Car’s Been Manhandled
When you check VIN number using services like CarProof, you receive results quickly, sometimes within only a few minutes. The history check provides details to you on a number of matters, including the number of times that the vehicle’s owner has changed. With that information, you will be able to see if the car has had one or two owners over the years, or if it has passed through more hands than a football does during a season full of games. You may want to think twice about buying a car that many people have owned as it may indicate a complex issue with the vehicle.
2. It Will Tell You About Recalls
The recall list is another piece of information that you will need to have to ensure that you don’t buy a dangerous vehicle. Recalls are requests for people or dealerships to bring the car to a specialist and have someone repair something that the manufacturer botched and didn’t fix before the car’s release date. You’ll need to make sure that the prospective vehicle didn’t have a recall, and if it did, that someone got the issue fixed.
3. You’ll Get the Info on Crashes
Crashes are another aspect of car ownership that you will need to know before you put your money toward a purchase. The history check will tell you how many accidents that the prospective car has seen since it has been in existence. If it has been in more than one accident, you may want to hold off on buying it. Some people say that cars are not the same once they have been in an accident. You don’t want to have to find out the hard way that the notion is correct.
4. You’ll Know It Is What It Is
By checking the VIN on the car, you can have peace of mind knowing that the car you are buying is indeed the car that you intend to have. A lot of shady stuff goes on in the world, and you want to make sure that you haven’t been duped by people who manipulated the VIN or something. That wouldn’t be cool at all.
5. It Can Help You to Negotiate
Perhaps the biggest reason that you need to check the VIN on the prospective vehicle is so that you can have an edge for your negotiations. For example, a dealer can’t get away with charging you $20,000 for a car that has been in three accidents over the past five years and still has a recall issue. That’s just one example of the usefulness of getting the history of your vehicle. You will be doing yourself a disservice if you do not grab that information as quickly as possible.
You should now know the importance of doing an old-fashioned car history search with your vehicle identification number. Don’t forget to ask the dealer or the seller to provide you with the information so that you know what you’re dealing with right away. Some dealers provide it as a free service, but most likely, you will have to pay a small fee for the report. The fee will not be painful, though. It may just be the smartest decision you could ever make.
