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Beware the flood of flood cars

Last updated: December 2012

As the recovery from the East Coast’s superstorm continues, a flood of water-damaged vehicles is spreading across the U.S. Hundreds of thousands of cars were damaged during Superstorm Sandy. Most of them will be scrapped, but many others will find their way to market.

Water damage can be insidious. Cars can run adequately for months or even a few years after being flooded, but they’re inherently unsafe and unreliable. They will slowly rot and corrode. Electrical systems can become erratic, resulting in intermittent glitches, and air bags might malfunction. The engine, transmission, brakes, cooling system, or other mechanicals might fail. And mold and other contaminants can cause health problems for drivers and their passengers.

In a typical post-flood scenario, an auto insurer will declare a water-damaged car a total loss and pay off the owner. The car might then be sold for salvage. Some buyers might be looking for usable parts, but others will try to fix up the car for resale. Some cars with titles branded (or amended) with some variation of “flood damaged” or “salvage” might be resold to unwitting buyers. Unscrupulous sellers might produce counterfeit titles without the brand or use inconsistent title branding between states to try to launder away the evidence.

“California, the largest car market in the United States, doesn’t even have a flood brand,” says Rosemary Shahan, president of Consumers for Auto Reliability and Safety, a nonprofit organization. “And these cars can end up everywhere. States that are big car markets and have lax consumer protection laws are big dumping grounds.”

But not everyone who sells a flooded car is a scam artist. Some owners might fix up their cars and sell them later without even being aware that they’re passing along a ticking time bomb.

 

How to spot a flood-damaged car

Water damage can be hard to detect, but there are some telltale signs you should be aware of:

  • Inspect the carpets to see if they are wet, damp, or muddy.
  • Check the seat-mounting screws to see if there is any evidence that they have been removed. To dry the carpets, the seats must be removed, not generally a part of normal maintenance.
  • Inspect the lights. Headlights and taillights are expensive to replace, and a visible water line may still show on the lens or the reflector.
  • Inspect the difficult-to-clean places, such as gaps between panels in the trunk and under the hood. Waterborne mud and debris may still appear in these places.
  • Look for mud or debris on the bottom edges of brackets or panels, where it wouldn’t settle naturally.
  • Look at the heads of any un-painted, exposed screws under the dashboard. Unpainted metal in flood cars will show signs of rust.
  • Check if the rubber drain plugs under the car and on the bottom of doors look as if they have been removed recently. It may have been done to drain floodwater.
  • Check the history. The National Motor Vehicle Title Information System, at vehiclehistory.gov, provides reports on cars with branded titles from approved commercial data companies. The cost for a history report varies, but most of them are $2 to $13. Insurers, salvage pools, and junkyards are required by law to report to this database regularly.
  • Have the car inspected. Before buying any car, have it thoroughly checked out by a qualified mechanic. If you buy one online from someone in another area, services such as Inspect My Ride and Carchex can arrange to have it looked over and will e-mail you an inspection report, often with photographs.

If you are from an area impacted by a flood and have a car that was not damaged, be aware that buyers may still suspect that it was. Consider having a mechanic inspect the car before you sell it so that you can present potential buyers with your car’s clean bill of health.

   

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