Viewed a cat d car, lots of damage covered up/hidden
Discussion
Hello,
Firstly, sorry for the long post!
I went to view a car last night. I travelled for 100 miles each way, through London in rush hour and had the cash for the deposit – so clearly I’m not a time waster, I was genuinely interested.
The car was a cat D write off. It was advertised as having light rear damage and needing a replacement rear wing and bumper. The bumper was included in the sale. This really was the extent of the advert in terms of damage, but the rest of the car looked good, dealer service history, low miles, late year, good options etc. I emailed the seller asking if the wheel and/or suspension had suffered any damage and his reply was no, just the wing and bumper need replacing.
Based on this, I travelled up to view the car last night. When I got there I instantly noticed that the FRONT NEARSIDE wheel had suffered impact damage. The damaged that was photographed and described in the advert was to the rear offside This started alarm bells ringing, suggesting the car had had a spin and hit kerbs. The car was backed right up against a house and in between a couple of other cars, so access was difficult. Anyway, I got round to the rear offside and saw the wheel had a huge chunk missing from it and it didn’t look like it was straight. It was clearly toeing in by a noticeable amount. The seller said that he had another wheel he would include. Not quite what I had in mind when I asked him if there was any damage to the wheel and he had replied “no”. The reason I had asked was to clarify if the suspension and differential had suffered impact. It was difficult to get under the car due to its position, but I managed to get my camera under and take some photos. Looking through the photos I saw each suspension component had been replaced with salvaged parts, wishbones, driveshaft, anti roll bar mount, even the differential mount! They all had writing on them from a salvage yard! Clearly the wheel had taken a lot of impact and potentially causing damage to the differential. (this is not the first time we’ve come across this, we’ve previously bought an accident damaged car which was advertised as having light rear damage and subsequently needed differential bearings, again they’d covered up the damage with a new driveshaft).
Upon further inspection the rear light cluster had also been replaced. It seems all this had been done to cover up the real extent of the damage. With straight wheels and a fitted light cluster he thinks he can get away with saying light damage to the bumper and wing. The chassis rail in the boot was creased, the chassis frame underneath the wing (near the wing mounting bolts) was all rippled and creased, the metal cage which the light cluster fits into was badly crumpled and split with the metal folded in places. This would need to be cut out and a new one welded into place. There was also the remains of red and black plastic from the old light cluster in the boot. Hidden away in the boot was a broken parking distance control module and a broken alarm siren. Both had broken connectors, so the wiring loom required repair as well.
So I left the car, disappointed. After it being described as having light rear damage to the wing and bumper, it was clear it really needed: 2x replacement wheels, replacement wing, replacement bumper, replacement light cluster cage (to be welded into place), repair to the chassis rail, repair to the chassis frame and wing mounting areas, replacement alarm siren, replacement parking distance control module, replacement wiring harness connectors, investigate possible damage to front nearside suspension, investigate damage to rear offside chassis, suspension mounting points and differential. Therefore a lot more work than the indicated “just needs wing and bumper”.
Then shortly after we’d left, he sent me a text message, clearly meant for somebody else. It read: “car is still for sale, really bad timewasters”. How are we the time wasters? We travelled for 5 hours in total to view the car with cash for the deposit. I asked the important questions before I left and he obviously covered up multiple factors with the car. I left feeling like he was the time waster, not me! After all, I took up less than an hour of his time, viewing a car that was clearly not as described.
So, am I being unreasonable, given the car was advertised at cat D, light damage to rear bumper and wing? Is it common for salvage cars to change hands several times, each time having a bit of work done to cover up the severity of the original damage? Not really sure what to think, it’s a shame as the car was otherwise immaculate, and was clearly a very nice example prior to the accident!
Cheers,
Dan
Firstly, sorry for the long post!
I went to view a car last night. I travelled for 100 miles each way, through London in rush hour and had the cash for the deposit – so clearly I’m not a time waster, I was genuinely interested.
The car was a cat D write off. It was advertised as having light rear damage and needing a replacement rear wing and bumper. The bumper was included in the sale. This really was the extent of the advert in terms of damage, but the rest of the car looked good, dealer service history, low miles, late year, good options etc. I emailed the seller asking if the wheel and/or suspension had suffered any damage and his reply was no, just the wing and bumper need replacing.
Based on this, I travelled up to view the car last night. When I got there I instantly noticed that the FRONT NEARSIDE wheel had suffered impact damage. The damaged that was photographed and described in the advert was to the rear offside This started alarm bells ringing, suggesting the car had had a spin and hit kerbs. The car was backed right up against a house and in between a couple of other cars, so access was difficult. Anyway, I got round to the rear offside and saw the wheel had a huge chunk missing from it and it didn’t look like it was straight. It was clearly toeing in by a noticeable amount. The seller said that he had another wheel he would include. Not quite what I had in mind when I asked him if there was any damage to the wheel and he had replied “no”. The reason I had asked was to clarify if the suspension and differential had suffered impact. It was difficult to get under the car due to its position, but I managed to get my camera under and take some photos. Looking through the photos I saw each suspension component had been replaced with salvaged parts, wishbones, driveshaft, anti roll bar mount, even the differential mount! They all had writing on them from a salvage yard! Clearly the wheel had taken a lot of impact and potentially causing damage to the differential. (this is not the first time we’ve come across this, we’ve previously bought an accident damaged car which was advertised as having light rear damage and subsequently needed differential bearings, again they’d covered up the damage with a new driveshaft).
Upon further inspection the rear light cluster had also been replaced. It seems all this had been done to cover up the real extent of the damage. With straight wheels and a fitted light cluster he thinks he can get away with saying light damage to the bumper and wing. The chassis rail in the boot was creased, the chassis frame underneath the wing (near the wing mounting bolts) was all rippled and creased, the metal cage which the light cluster fits into was badly crumpled and split with the metal folded in places. This would need to be cut out and a new one welded into place. There was also the remains of red and black plastic from the old light cluster in the boot. Hidden away in the boot was a broken parking distance control module and a broken alarm siren. Both had broken connectors, so the wiring loom required repair as well.
So I left the car, disappointed. After it being described as having light rear damage to the wing and bumper, it was clear it really needed: 2x replacement wheels, replacement wing, replacement bumper, replacement light cluster cage (to be welded into place), repair to the chassis rail, repair to the chassis frame and wing mounting areas, replacement alarm siren, replacement parking distance control module, replacement wiring harness connectors, investigate possible damage to front nearside suspension, investigate damage to rear offside chassis, suspension mounting points and differential. Therefore a lot more work than the indicated “just needs wing and bumper”.
Then shortly after we’d left, he sent me a text message, clearly meant for somebody else. It read: “car is still for sale, really bad timewasters”. How are we the time wasters? We travelled for 5 hours in total to view the car with cash for the deposit. I asked the important questions before I left and he obviously covered up multiple factors with the car. I left feeling like he was the time waster, not me! After all, I took up less than an hour of his time, viewing a car that was clearly not as described.
So, am I being unreasonable, given the car was advertised at cat D, light damage to rear bumper and wing? Is it common for salvage cars to change hands several times, each time having a bit of work done to cover up the severity of the original damage? Not really sure what to think, it’s a shame as the car was otherwise immaculate, and was clearly a very nice example prior to the accident!
Cheers,
Dan
danyeates said:
described as having light rear damage to the wing and bumper, it was clear it really needed: 2x replacement wheels, replacement wing, replacement bumper, replacement light cluster cage (to be welded into place), repair to the chassis rail, repair to the chassis frame and wing mounting areas, replacement alarm siren, replacement parking distance control module, replacement wiring harness connectors, investigate possible damage to front nearside suspension, investigate damage to rear offside chassis, suspension mounting points and differential. Therefore a lot more work than the indicated “just needs wing and bumper”.
You should've text back with exactly this 
he may have got the point.StottyZr said:
danyeates said:
described as having light rear damage to the wing and bumper, it was clear it really needed: 2x replacement wheels, replacement wing, replacement bumper, replacement light cluster cage (to be welded into place), repair to the chassis rail, repair to the chassis frame and wing mounting areas, replacement alarm siren, replacement parking distance control module, replacement wiring harness connectors, investigate possible damage to front nearside suspension, investigate damage to rear offside chassis, suspension mounting points and differential. Therefore a lot more work than the indicated “just needs wing and bumper”.
You should've text back with exactly this he may have got the point.Panthro said:
Unfortunately thats the risk you take with buying crash damaged cars. No amount of blurb is going to reflect the actual damage until a visual inspection has taken place. In this instance however the seller has been extremely misleading. What car was it?
Z4 3.0Yes, I've rebuilt several VX220s in the past, but they're different in that they have bolt on crumple zones, so are actually quite easy to rebuild to factory spec without any sign of damage whatsoever. Traditionally built cars are a bit different I suppose.
danyeates said:
Hello,
(this is not the first time we’ve come across this, we’ve previously bought an accident damaged car which was advertised as having light rear damage and subsequently needed differential bearings, again they’d covered up the damage with a new driveshaft)
I can understand how this is frustrating, as I travelled from Essex to Nottingham to look at a car which had been described as completely clean, only to find out it was a Cat C, and this was buying from trade. But if you have already been caught out before, sure that would make you think twice about buying Cat D cars again in the future?(this is not the first time we’ve come across this, we’ve previously bought an accident damaged car which was advertised as having light rear damage and subsequently needed differential bearings, again they’d covered up the damage with a new driveshaft)
bigricho said:
danyeates said:
Hello,
(this is not the first time we’ve come across this, we’ve previously bought an accident damaged car which was advertised as having light rear damage and subsequently needed differential bearings, again they’d covered up the damage with a new driveshaft)
I can understand how this is frustrating, as I travelled from Essex to Nottingham to look at a car which had been described as completely clean, only to find out it was a Cat C, and this was buying from trade. But if you have already been caught out before, sure that would make you think twice about buying Cat D cars again in the future?(this is not the first time we’ve come across this, we’ve previously bought an accident damaged car which was advertised as having light rear damage and subsequently needed differential bearings, again they’d covered up the damage with a new driveshaft)
Luckily being caught out before has meant we're more careful when viewing cars now!
It's a minefield really, but as long as you go in with your eyes wide open you should be ok.
I say this as someone who inadvertently ended up driving an actual cut-and-shut Astra GTE for 3+ years while I was at University, and only became aware of it when I had a lairy bodykit fitted (yes, I know) and the bodyshop pointed out the welds (to be fair he said they were the best he'd ever seen). It never let me down once even if the dash was out of a 16v and it had a 8v engine, and I was too dumb to notice.
Whilst there is some truth in insurance companies writing cars off for a variety of reasons if you take the majority of Cat-D sellers at face value it's like the insurance company just couldn't be bothered to fix it and paid out full market value instead, because somehow that saves them money? Some of the yarns that get spun about parts being delayed, stolen-recovered cars turning up out of the blue completely unmolested after a payout, etc will make your eyes roll out of your skull.
Whilst hire car costs can increase costs the reality is that any nearly-new car that is written off will most likely have had damage that would have a proportionate repair cost to its market value. Otherwise, why wouldn't they just repair it and save themselves some money?
Unless the seller has photos of the damage and/or the car costs peanuts anyway I'd always assume the worst - that the seller is sugarcoating the actual damage. If they acquired it after the damage was done & repaired even more so.
It's also a bit of a false economy too - whatever saving you make on a write-off car you'll have to pass on when you come to sell it, so outside of getting into a car you'd otherwise not be able to afford I'm not so sure it's a great plan.
I say this as someone who inadvertently ended up driving an actual cut-and-shut Astra GTE for 3+ years while I was at University, and only became aware of it when I had a lairy bodykit fitted (yes, I know) and the bodyshop pointed out the welds (to be fair he said they were the best he'd ever seen). It never let me down once even if the dash was out of a 16v and it had a 8v engine, and I was too dumb to notice.
Whilst there is some truth in insurance companies writing cars off for a variety of reasons if you take the majority of Cat-D sellers at face value it's like the insurance company just couldn't be bothered to fix it and paid out full market value instead, because somehow that saves them money? Some of the yarns that get spun about parts being delayed, stolen-recovered cars turning up out of the blue completely unmolested after a payout, etc will make your eyes roll out of your skull.
Whilst hire car costs can increase costs the reality is that any nearly-new car that is written off will most likely have had damage that would have a proportionate repair cost to its market value. Otherwise, why wouldn't they just repair it and save themselves some money?
Unless the seller has photos of the damage and/or the car costs peanuts anyway I'd always assume the worst - that the seller is sugarcoating the actual damage. If they acquired it after the damage was done & repaired even more so.
It's also a bit of a false economy too - whatever saving you make on a write-off car you'll have to pass on when you come to sell it, so outside of getting into a car you'd otherwise not be able to afford I'm not so sure it's a great plan.
Edited by Durzel on Thursday 23 August 10:53
danyeates said:
StottyZr said:
danyeates said:
described as having light rear damage to the wing and bumper, it was clear it really needed: 2x replacement wheels, replacement wing, replacement bumper, replacement light cluster cage (to be welded into place), repair to the chassis rail, repair to the chassis frame and wing mounting areas, replacement alarm siren, replacement parking distance control module, replacement wiring harness connectors, investigate possible damage to front nearside suspension, investigate damage to rear offside chassis, suspension mounting points and differential. Therefore a lot more work than the indicated “just needs wing and bumper”.
You should've text back with exactly this he may have got the point.StottyZr said:
danyeates said:
StottyZr said:
danyeates said:
described as having light rear damage to the wing and bumper, it was clear it really needed: 2x replacement wheels, replacement wing, replacement bumper, replacement light cluster cage (to be welded into place), repair to the chassis rail, repair to the chassis frame and wing mounting areas, replacement alarm siren, replacement parking distance control module, replacement wiring harness connectors, investigate possible damage to front nearside suspension, investigate damage to rear offside chassis, suspension mounting points and differential. Therefore a lot more work than the indicated “just needs wing and bumper”.
You should've text back with exactly this he may have got the point.Gassing Station | General Gassing | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff