It's amazing to me how little it takes to "total" a car these days. The cost of body work has gone through the roof. The insurance companies will often give their customer a check for the current market value of a vehicle and then sell the "residual value" at auction.

Many of the cars are truly totaled and only bought for parts. Sometimes, though, they aren't that bad. They do usually come with a salvage title.

I keep an eye on what's for sale at Copart. They are nationwide and the largest auto auction place. I like to buy vehicles from southern places that don't use a lot of salt on the roads.

I recently bought a 2008 Toyota 4Runner. The interior is in good condition. No airbags were blown. This one came out of Arkansas. It has 133,xxx miles. My successful bid was $4000. After auction fees and expenses of going and getting it, I brought it home for about $4800.

Here's what it looked like in October.





With a new rear door ($200), a fender flare ($100), a front door handle ($12), a mirror ($40), a tail light ($60) and some paint .... this is what it looks like now. I paid $1400 for the body work.

I used to be in the salvage business. Most are pretty well wrecked or stripped. But a few do sneak through that surprise you. My guess is between the mileage and what it needed, the insurance company just paid out on it. Looks like you got a good deal.

quote:

Sometimes, though, they aren't that bad. They do usually come with a salvage title.

Looks great!

Question: does the 'salvage title' give any information, such as those that had been underwater, stolen, or other?

quote:

Question: does the 'salvage title' give any information, such as those that had been underwater, stolen, or other?

No... its just marked SALVAGE in big letters.

You can't get plates with a salvage title.
In Missouri, you have to have a salvage inspection in addition to the usual safety and emissions inspections. The salvage inspections are done by the Missouri Highway Patrol. The salvage inspection checks all of the various parts to make sure they match the original VIN or that they are declared and that tax has been paid on major parts. They are also looking for stolen parts.

Once you have your salvage inspection done you can apply for a new title. The new Missouri title will be marketable, but it will always be marked "Prior Salvage".

Any affect on insurance driving with a salvage title?

quote:

Originally posted by Aeteocles:
Any affect on insurance driving with a salvage title?

You can't get plates or legally drive a car with a salvage title.
Once you go through the above process to get a new "Prior Salvage" title it has no effect on insurance. I carry "full coverage", not just liability, on a "Prior Salvage" titled vehicle.

Nice grab. You got lucky. I'd do that deal in a heartbeat.

I won't buy salvage w/out knowing the history. In your case, knowing the history, I'd be open to buying if the price was reasonable.

Sweet!

My best friend effectively does this for a living (he's a mechanic with a small shop). You really have to know what you are doing to come out ahead. He's a pro and has been doing it for years and net net I think its 70/30 on money invested (versus ultimate market value). The winners outrun the losers for him so he makes money but sometimes what you can't see or know puts the deal underwater. Doing a single vehicle you are in a crap shoot.

Had one, never again.

Flood cars can be a real nightmare because of electrical and other problems. They generally take a price hit when it comes time to sell.

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. Doing a single vehicle you are in a crap shoot.

Yeah. That's true. This is my 4th. The first one didn't go well. But I've learned a lot ...

If Florida has two "salvage" titles.
One is "rebuilble salvage" and the other is a "certificate of destruction".

The former is for a vehicle that is considered too costly to repair (by insurance) and "totaled", and may be rebuild-able, (like the OP's). Once inspected and a "drivable" title issued, it will carry "Prior Salvage" title.

Those that are too far gone to be repaired correctly, fire, flood and such, or unsafe no matter what repairs will get the "COD" and can never be put back on the road, ever.

And a lot of auto-body repair places have different scales for insurance work, much like health-care and the delta is narrower, partly because of the cost to repair vs replace and have the issue done and gone, vs repair and save a few dollars, and have a constant flow of un-happy insured drivers with repaired vehicle callin them, and it would be harder to get auto-body shops to repair the "fender benders" if the unhappy customers were sent back to them by the insurance companies.

Sometimes it is more cost effective to send someone away happy, then to walk the thin green line.


And we all are paying for it anyway with this tax called compulsory auto insurance.

Nice job, Matt.

Between the wife and I and the kids we have probably bought a dozen salvaged vehicles. Two of my good friends who happen to be brothers owned a body shop and did the cars for us. I would watch Copart for vehicles I wanted and then would give him the lot numbers to bid on. My last purchase was a 2016 for Expedition Limited El 4WD. Black with black leather 4 captains chairs and a 3rd row bench. Automatic running boards and bells and whistles galore. Came from Texas and was hit in the rear pretty hard but no air bags deployed.

Had just under 5000 miles on it. It still had that new car smell when it arrived here. After repairs I had $38,000 in it. Window sticker was in the glove box and showed just under $65,000

Twin Turbo Eco Boost has plenty power. I Absolutely love this truck.

^^ Sounds like a good one!

You have to know what your are doing. Insurance companies total loss vehicle like this because they are required to write to repair the vehicle to pre-loss condition. In this case, you are able to cut a ton of corners and still have it look half decent. There's a lot of stuff you can do fixing it yourself that a insurance company would get sued into the ground for trying.

I've always fantasized about buying an old CRV that was but in the rear. The floor would always collapse and replacing it meant total loss. Such a great deal, just beat the floor out and keep rolling.

Interesting timing on this post.

I'm considering listing for sale a 2008 Audi A4 S-line, manual transmission, that I've had for a number of years.

In the first year I replaced a couple modules that had received more water than promised. Since then it's been a lot of fun to drive, but not getting much use in the 6 months.

quote:

Originally posted by sigmonkey:
If Florida has two "salvage" titles.
One is "rebuilble salvage" and the other is a "certificate of destruction".

The former is for a vehicle that is considered too costly to repair (by insurance) and "totaled", and may be rebuild-able, (like the OP's). Once inspected and a "drivable" title issued, it will carry "Prior Salvage" title.

Those that are too far gone to be repaired correctly, fire, flood and such, or unsafe no matter what repairs will get the "COD" and can never be put back on the road, ever.

And a lot of auto-body repair places have different scales for insurance work, much like health-care and the delta is narrower, partly because of the cost to repair vs replace and have the issue done and gone, vs repair and save a few dollars, and have a constant flow of un-happy insured drivers with repaired vehicle callin them, and it would be harder to get auto-body shops to repair the "fender benders" if the unhappy customers were sent back to them by the insurance companies.

Sometimes it is more cost effective to send someone away happy, then to walk the thin green line.


And we all are paying for it anyway with this tax called compulsory auto insurance.

Nice job, Matt.

Actually there are 2 other salvage Florida titles, at least when I was doing a bunch of them late 90's early 2000's (1-2 a month for a several years)...…
Salvage rebuildable- after the state inspection the title would permanently be branded Salvage title rebuilt

Salvage rebuildable theft (after inspection you got a normal clean title with this one)

Salvage unrebuidable

Certificate of destruction.

Each state has different laws regarding salvage vehicles...Many insurers won't insure them or charge about 20% more to insure them......back in the day when I did them, you could buy a Florida unrebuildable vehicle and take it to Kentucky and title it and it would be a clean title. However, if it ever came back to florida it would revert to an unrebuildable and unregistered title.....

Not salvage, but I used to buy my cars from this place called Henry's Towing in Manassas. Haven't done it in years, but I purchased three first gen CRX and one third gen Civic Si from them. $80, $120, $450, and $150. All we're driven home from the lot. All required repairs. Two could get plates and inspection prior to repairs. Most expensive of you four needed a weekend of work and $500 parts.

This was in the early 2000's. I didn't own a car made outside of the 80's until 2012. At the time you could still easily buy 80's parts and the internet still had crazy good deals on what you couldn't get local. All in four cars $2,000. Ex-wife took one just to spite me, one of my favorites 1987 CRX, that one was a non-Si one, but it was awesome, prefectly clean body and 100% perfect interior. 80,000 mi. All it needed was a ring job which I did, and repaint, no body work. Even after giving her that prestine beauty I made a profit off them including one of the four being a donor car and getting sold only for scrap.

I could never do that today, don't have the time or knowledge of newer cars to even attempt it. Back then one could pretty much completely disassemble a Civic with a $40 tool kit from Sears.

Liability insurance only and my cars cost one moth of a normal car payment each. If I had money at the time I would have been saving so much.

Over the past 20 years I have owned 8. Two still are our daily drivers. A 2010 Honda Accord that I purchased with 4,200 miles on it in 2010 and it now has 108,000 miles and it has been a perfect car...The second one is a 2012 Toyota Tacoma Crew Cab pickup. 48,000 miles on it now. Bought it two years ago. Not a single issue with it either...

In fact we have purchased all eight from the same dealer in Cottondale, AL. We have purchased/owned Honda’s, Toyota’s, Lexus, and Infinti vehicles....We have not experiended a single issue with any of them other than the normal wear and tear issues (battery, tires, brakes, and oil changes)......

Truthfully I think alot has to do with the dealer....Our dealer provides full disclosure of each vehicle we consider and also provide a full bumper to bumper warranty for 12 months from date of purchase....we trust this dealer and I think that is a HUGE plus when dealing with salvage/rebuilt title vehicles....Mark