Evading the Trap of Car Clocking

Buying a used car has become a rising trend with an increasing number of buyers browsing the car lots of used car dealers to purchase a ‘new’ used car. With the increased durability of automobile components, today’s cars are built to last longer. The fact that you can browse through a vehicle’s history, provenance and service records by availing the Vehicle History Document makes purchasing a used car a trustworthy venture as well. But buyers should steer clear of malpractices perpetrated in the used car selling industry. Clocking refers to one of such deceitful tactics wherein the odometer of a car is rolled back to display a lower mileage.

The lower the odometer reading, the higher the price a used car seller can demand. Buying a clocked car can not only be an expensive affair but it can also be dangerous. An inaccurate estimate of the car’s age can cause you to delay essential repairs. There are certain measures you can take to avoid becoming a victim of car clocking.

How to avoid buying a clocked car

• ·        Look for signs of tampering

Get a certified mechanic on-board to help you inspect the odometer for signs of tampering. One of the possible signs of odometer clocking is misaligned digits on the odometer.

• ·        Peruse the vehicle history documents

You can obtain the vehicle history documents of a used car from the car dealer or online from web services such as Carfax and AutoCheck. You can compare the displayed mileage of the car to what is mentioned in the documents.

• ·        Assess the condition of the car

Inspect the car for chips on the bonnet and bumper that could indicate long journeys. Worn out carpets and mats, seats and pedal rubbers can also point towards a car that has been driven for more miles than what the odometer reading reflects.

Reputable classifieds websites can make your car buying experience a much more reliable process. SoloAutos is one such website that provides listings of used cars in San Antonio and other Texas cities. The information provided is comprehensive and credible, making for a hassle-free buying experience for those who’d like to purchase used cars in San Antonio.

How to avoid being a victim of VIN cloning

The quest for a used car can lead to getting a well-maintained model for a price considerably lower than the original. Lower insurance costs and reduced registration fees are other factors that make the purchase of a used car so much more tantalizing. But buying a used car is also fraught with the risk of becoming a hapless victim of common car scams, one of which is ‘VIN cloning’.

What is VIN cloning?

VIN cloning refers to an intricate scam that involves stealing a car, taking a VIN or Vehicle Identification Number from a car of a similar make and model and using it to make fake VIN plates for the stolen car.

If you are sold a stolen car, you are paying money for something that is not, technically, yours. If your vehicle is discovered to be stolen, it will be confiscated and you’ll be left with nothing but resentment and a faint chance of recovering the money lost if the laws in your state require a faulty car dealer to pay up for selling a stolen vehicle.

How can you safeguard yourself from VIN cloning?

When buying used cars, you can take certain steps to ascertain that you aren’t buying a stolen vehicle.

• ·        Ask for a vehicle history report

Once you have access to a vehicle history report, tally the current odometer display with the reported mileage. Multiple registrations in different locations over a short period of time should raise a red flag.

• ·        Check the VIN in multiple locations in the car

Check that the VIN plate on the dashboard, driver’s door sticker and car frame match with each other and do not display any signs of tampering. Also, see if the VIN on the car matches with the vehicle history report and service history documents.

• ·        Be wary of unbelievably low prices

If the price seems too good to be true, it probably is. Beware of prices lower than what other car dealers are asking for the same make and model. Ask a qualified mechanic to check the car for signs of VIN cloning if you are doubtful.

Buying a used car, whether in Houston, Texas, or other US cities, requires you to be vigilant and skeptical. No one wants to be a victim of a scam and there’s no reason that you should be one. Using a reputable website for buying used cars can also serve to scaffold you from a sour experience. SoloAutos is a website that helps residents of Houston and other Texas cities find used cars available with authorized car dealerships and credible car owners. The site only lists used cars in Houston that have passed a benchmark test for legitimate ownership, maintenance and performance.

Being Vigilant When Buying Used Cars Online

The advent of the Internet has helped make it much easier for buyers and sellers of various kinds of products, to connect to each other. Not only do we buy new clothes or furniture online, but we have also moved online for purchasing new and used cars. The convenience of the online buying of used cars needs to be coupled with a sense of responsibility on the buyer’s end to ensure that they settle for a fair deal. Buying from an authorized car dealer is the first step one can take in securing their experience of buying a used car. There are several other things that should be kept in mind to steer clear of a sour experience.

Tips for buying a used car online

• Buy from authorized car dealers

Only purchase a used car from an authorized car dealer who is licensed to sell them. This would help you avoid being a victim of the illegal act of curbstoning wherein damaged or stolen cars may be sold by people who are not licensed to sell cars. As these people aren’t the original owners or authorized car dealers, they do not usually hold the vehicle title which provides essential information about the car’s origin and history.

• Take a test drive

Try to buy from a car dealer in your state or city. That can help you arrange a meeting with the car dealer to physically inspect the car and take it for a test drive. This is an important step to ensure that you encounter no hiccups when the car actually gets on the road.

Take a mechanic along to perform a thorough check of the nitty-gritty of the car’s performance and to gauge how well it’s been maintained.

• Beware of wire transfer transactions

Car dealers who ask for hard cash or insist that you make a wire transfer before you have the car in hand should raise red flags. This is a move usually common to car scams such as selling a vehicle with a salvage title.

A reputable website that connects car dealers and buyers is the first step to achieving your dream of owning a well-maintained used car. SoloAutos is a website that provides detailed and updated listings of the used car inventories of San Antonio car dealers and car dealers in other cities of Texas. If you’d like to connect to a San Antonio car dealer, this is a platform that can help you do that.

Buying A Used Car That Will Serve You Well

Buying a used car is no longer a compromise that you make when you are on a tight budget for car shopping. Rather, it is the sensible (and oft-travelled) road to take if you’d like to buy your desired vehicle at a fraction of its original cost. Today’s automobiles are made with high-quality components and can be driven for hundreds of thousands of miles before they show any signs of breaking down. Also, with the availability of reliable services that supply vehicle history reports giving comprehensive information on a car’s history, you can buy a used car with complete peace of mind.

There are several aspects that you should consider when looking for a used car such as its history, its safety and the warranties available on the vehicle.

History of the vehicle

A car dealership would always profess that the vehicle they are selling is absolutely safe and not prone to any breakdowns. Taking the words of the car dealer on face value can set you up for a fall, or rather, a crash.

Look for authorized car dealerships that buy vehicle history reports and make the information available to used car buyers. A vehicle history report lets you know the car’s history of ownership and the number of accidents it has been in, among other things. You can also obtain the vehicle history report of a car yourself from reputed web services such as Carfax and Autocheck.

Safety

Make sure that the used car you plan to buy has essential safety features such as air bag deployment, electronic stability control and anti-lock brakes. Also make sure that you get the car inspected by a certified mechanic for hidden problems that may not be apparent at first glance.

Warranty

A certified pre-owned car dealership can provide you with a warranty lasting from anywhere between a year to six years on certified pre-owned vehicles. Vehicles less than five years old and with a mileage lesser than 60,000 miles are eligible for such warranties.

You can also buy an extended warranty on a vehicle if it is not provided. This is especially useful if you are buying a model that would be expensive to repair such as European models like BMW or Mercedes whose parts need to be imported.

Browsing through the used car inventories of car dealerships that are reputable can secure you from car scams and frauds. SoloAutos is a classifieds website known for listing Austin car dealerships and car dealerships across other states of Texas. SoloAutos can serve as a one-stop destination for those looking for credible and updated information on used cars for sale at Austin car dealerships.

Negotiating For A Fair Price To Pay For A Used Car

When buying a used car, inspecting it thoroughly for possible flaws is as essential as negotiating for a fair price that you are willing to pay for the car. Shelling out money to match the sticker price of a used car is far from advisable because sellers and dealers are most likely to pitch used cars for sale at higher prices than warranted.

You can and should haggle on the price of a used car till your throat runs dry. A car depreciates in value as soon as it is driven off the lot. Add to that the fact that a used car has borne the brunt of long motorway journeys and changing seasons, and the value of the car declines even further.

Used cars for sale may be offered at high prices but you can negotiate for a fair deal with the private seller or car dealership. Usually, negotiating a used car’s price with a car dealership is a tougher task. With the following tips in mind, you can make sure that you come away buying a car that would give owners of new cars a run for their money!

Tips to negotiate a used car’s price

·        A used car is only worth what buyers are willing to pay for it

Before you head to the car dealership ready to haggle, make sure that you have done your research. Check out what other buyers would be willing to pay for a similar car.

You can use the help of Kelley Blue Book; a California-based vehicle valuation and automotive research company. The company reports the market prices of new and used automobiles.

·        Decide your floor and ceiling offers

Determine the lowest/floor offer and the highest/ceiling offer that you are willing to make.

When you arrive at the dealership, put forth the floor offer. This offer should be a few hundred dollars lower than the average market price of the used car.

·        Negotiate a fair deal

Start out with your floor offer for the used car. Most likely, the salesperson would reject this offer and try to pitch to you a price higher than the average market price. In such a case, gradually increase the price that you state as being willing to pay for the car.

During the negotiation, two scenarios may result. The salesperson may keep decreasing the demanded price as you slightly increase the price you are willing to pay till you both meet midway. In the other scenario, you may reach your ceiling offer or the highest amount of money you are willing to pay for the car (which shouldn’t be more than the market price). If the salesperson refuses to concede to your ceiling offer, you are advised to abort the mission. Give the salesperson your number in case they decide to change their mind though. You may get a call from the car dealership in a couple of days.

Even if the negotiation fails to match your expectations, don’t lose heart. If you stick to your guns, you are sure to get a used car for a fair price.

Car listings on reputable websites provide you access to authorized car dealerships that are less likely to try to rip you off. Soloautos is one such website that lists the used cars for sale in Houston and other cities of Texas. The cars for sale in Houston are listed along with the details of the sellers or dealers of the cars.

How To Get A Great Used Car Loan

Buying a used car can be a great bargain if you choose a well-maintained, high-performance car. You must make sure that you inspect the car thoroughly during the test drive. Car scams such as clocking or cloning that involve rolling the odometer back or stealing a car’s VIN to put it onto another, respectively, must be carefully avoided.

Another aspect to consider when buying a used car is getting a loan at a low interest rate. Despite the relatively low prices of a used car, as compared to a new one, you may have to take a loan to pay for the purchase. Getting a loan is rather like the process of shopping for the used car itself; you’ll need to fish through the various options available to choose what’s most suitable for you.

Things to keep in mind when looking for a used car loan

·         Evaluate the prevailing economic conditions

Interest rates on car loans are dependent on the prevailing economic conditions. Get to know if the interest rate on a desired car loan is going to be high, low or steady in the near future. Unless you are in a great hurry to buy a used car from one of the authorized car dealers in your state, wait for the interest rates on used car loans to fall.

·         Check your credit score

In the United States, a ‘credit score’ is a number that represents the likelihood of a person paying a loan back.

Banks and credit card companies evaluate potential borrowers on the basis of their credit score to foresee the risk associated with giving the individual a loan.

Your credit score depends upon how much debt you carry against your income as well as the regularity with which you have been meeting your financial obligations in the past.

·         The higher the down payment, the lower the interest rate

The more money you deposit as down payment for buying a used car, the lower will be the interest rate charged on the car loan. In other words, the more money you invest in the beginning, the more secure the bank feels lending you money. 

When buying a used car online, choosing a reputable site can quell most of your worries. Soloautos is one such online platform for helping San Antonio car dealers and car dealers across other states of Texas connect with used car buyers. The car listings of San Antonio car dealers, provided on this website, is comprehensive and credible.To know more about san antonio car dealers visit: http://www.soloautos.com/used-cars-san-antonio

Steer Clear Of Clone Cars

Buying a used car is not limited to choosing a car model you like and bargaining for the price you’d like to pay for it. You also need to look out for car scams perpetrated by dealers looking to dupe prospective buyers of used cars. One of such scams is car identity theft.

What is car identity theft?

Car identity theft, also known as car cloning or VIN fraud, is the act of stealing the Vehicle Identification Number or VIN of a legally registered car and using it to disguise the identity of a stolen car.

Using car cloning, stolen cars can be sold to unwary customers to earn substantial amounts of money. Even if the buyer pays several thousand dollars for the car, it would be confiscated by the police as soon as it is discovered that the car was stolen. Nobody is liable to reimburse the money spent by you to buy the used car and you may also have to become part of the associated criminal investigation.

How to avoid buying a used stolen car

·        Examine the vehicle history report of the used car for sale.

·        Check the VIN plate on the dashboard for any signs of tampering such as inexplicable scratches.

·        See that the VINs on the dashboard, driver’s door sticker, car frame, vehicle title and the service history documents match.

·        Beware of prices that seem too good to be true. If the car is being sold for a considerably less price than comparable makes and models, it may be a sign to watch out for.

·        When buying a used car for sale, review the vehicle title carefully for incorrect spellings or other signs that may indicate a forged document.

·        Get the car examined by a qualified mechanic to tell for signs of car identity theft that you may be unable to identify.

Buying a car that has been cloned could turn out to be your worst nightmare. After all, nobody wants to spend their hard-earned money on a stolen car, do they?

When you are looking for a used car for sale, make sure that you buy only from an authorized car dealership and that you review the car’s documents and the car itself with careful scrutiny.