Buying a car that has been stolen in the past

[Landy9010]

I m looking at a 2010 Land Rover defender 110. It looks good, clean and reasonably rust free. However, after doing a vcheck I can see that it was stolen, recovered and then sold at auction to its current owner back in 2023. I know that this has an effect on the value of the car and will make it harder to sell in future but I would like to know how bad it would be overall. It has 100,000 miles on it and is on the market for £20,000. Is this too much? Should I just avoid it?

Edited by Landy9010 on Thursday 2nd October 16:46

[aceofspades1]

Wouldn't say there's a specific issue with buying a stolen recovered vehicle, but I'd be skeptical.

When it comes to sell despite it being cheaper you'll instantly put off many buyers. Especially considering the value of the vehicle, once you start to reach the £20-25k mark in private sales buyers will become much more weary. I wouldn't be surprised if the trade in value is rock bottom too.


Just had a look online - my knowledge of the Land Rover market is limited so I'll happily stand corrected but I'd expect a private sale 2010 Defender 110 with that mileage to be around the £18-21k mark. With the stolen marker, I'd subtract accordingly from there...

Edited by aceofspades1 on Friday 3rd October 08:30

[Mr Tidy]

The problem is likely to be when you come to sell as people are quite wary of them. In fact I would be too unless I knew a bit of background. Some are recovered intact, some with no interior, some crashed, etc.

Years ago I bought a couple that were straight cars from my employer when I worked for an insurance company. No problem selling those back in the 80s when most people didn't have access to HPI - made a few quid on both as well!