Someone scratched my rear bumper at 90degrees and ran off. I reported to the Police & got a police report.
It will come in my CarFax - what should I do when I sell it?
I never repaired it - so it still has the original bumper w/ VIN sticker on the rear bumper.
I am concerned someone might make my Car less marketable if I release the VIN in case of an ad - down the line, I want to upgrade my car.
Thanks
In my view you don’t have to do anything. First, I am not sure Carfax picks up something as minor as a scratch. Second, the scratch is there and the buyer can evaluate if it is an issue with him, or not. If asked, I would tell the truth about origin of scratch and lack of repair.
I have bought cars with scratches. Everyone has done so. Your car is no less marketable than it was before. It is always up to the prospective buyer to judge for himself the importance, or triviality, of a scratched bumper. And it is up to the seller to decide whether to accept a ridiculously low offer, made for whatever pretext, or to send the would-be buyer quickly on his way.
My advice? Do nothing. And quit festering over this. My guess is that it will amount to much ado about nothing.
The only thing that will show up on CarFax as a result of this is an odometer reading if you got it fixed at a shop that reports to them. If you had intended to roll back the odometer, this will make it difficult for you, but otherwise will have no effect. Any time you take your car to a shop that reports to CarFax, even if it’s only for an oil change, they record and submit your mileage. When someone looks at the report on your car, they should see a good trajectory of dates and mileages-- if the mileage suddenly goes down at a later date, they’ll know the odometer has been rolled back.
A CarFax is not like a credit score or a driving record-- the only thing it’s good for is finding things like odometer rollbacks and fraudulently “cleaned” salvage titles from cars that have been rebuilt from serious wrecks, fires or floods. If there has been something like this, it will be explicitly clear on the report. Some misinformed people think that the number of “reports” on a car’s CarFax record is in some way an indicaion of it’s general roadworthyness, but this is absolutely false.
“Some misinformed people think that the number of “reports” on a car’s CarFax record is in some way an indicaion of it’s general roadworthyness, but this is absolutely false”
That was exactly my worry! Convincing the mis-informed people.
It only has 60k miles.
I’d just hang on to the police report and show it to the prospective buyer if they express a concern. If you list the car online with the VIN number, you’d probably mention that the bumper is scratched anyway and can put a mention in about the minor hit and run leading to the scratch.
If you’re really worried, wait a couple of months and get a CarFax report on your car. I’d very surprised if this mishap shows up at all.
Are you going to sell the car while it’s still less then 3 years old??? If not DON’T worry about it. Keep it until the car is 5-10 years old and the scratch won’t make one bit of difference. What I find is more important is how well the vehicle is maintained. Keep records on oil changes and all other maintenance. Keep the car cleaned. I’ll buy a car with a BIG scratch that’s been maintained well over a car with no scratches and hasn’t been well maintained.