Horrible News from Toyota Owners site

[TRDFerguson]

believe me, both sites gave me several records.

this is the "AutoCheck" record.
Welcome to AutoCheck

it had more miles in 2004 than the odometer reads now!

 

[DC runner]

Why does that list a dealer? Did you buy from them? who lied? At this point take photos of mileage and get all evidence you can. Contact the seller and inform them of your intent to sue and notify police.

 

[KHoffRunner]

My parents had a '95 4runner and around 80k a drink was spilt in the dash so they had to replace several gages including the OD and when they sold the vehicle two years ago they gave the guy the pulled OD. Then about two weeks later our vehicle was listed on craigslist with only 70,000 miles, which was the number on the replaced OD.

 

[jnat306bg]

I bought a 2005 Honda Civic last September. The owner and I went to a notary to have the sale info filled out on the back of the title, I then took it to the county clerks office to have it put in my name and when I got the title it showed 181000 miles. The car had 18100 miles on it. The notary added a 0 to the mileage. I need to go have the clerks office inspect it and get it corrected to the current mileage but it will always so a ? on a car fax.

 

[nghiS4]

i thought it was a possibility that he bought it after the "work" was done to the odometer, but the "Free VIN Checks" thread that just popped up:

http://www.toyota-4runner.org/3rd-gen-t4rs/117089-free-vin-checks.html

showed me that he smogged it on 11/28/11 at 201,785 miles. I bought it 12/4/11 with 102,089 miles!!!! So he obviously he committed the fraud just days before selling it to me. And, its easy to imagine that all they had to do was turn the 2 back to a 1. Not to mention the ad said it had 98k on it, and when i arrived it had 102k on the odometer. Fishy.... dont know how i went through with buying this thing.

I think the small claims court is definitely my best bet, the cost of legal council would eat a huge chunk out of any money i could get back.

I'm curious if you ever got some resolution from this matter?

 

[Monsterbait]

sorry to bring back this old thread but what ever happened? The same thing just happened to me and would like some advice from someone who this has happened to before

 

[Nunyabiz]

Sounds to me like you got enough to peg him on fraud in small claims.
You have the evidence that he ran the Odometer back and I don't see how he can really refute it to a judge in small claims.

Also do NOT depend on Carfax, I would run one just to see but odds are at least 50/50 that the Carfax wont show a dang thing.
if it does then great, use it to your advantage but carfax is not a reliable way to judge what a car has really gone through.

It goes both ways on Carfax, it can show something that never happened or never show something that did.

edit: hell I didn't even notice this was from over a year ago, doh.

 

[criera]

Some follow up would still be mice. I see the op is still active and still owns the rig. Cmon trd, dont be a turd and tell us what came of this.

 

[Brentif]

I can pull the carfax for you if you like, just give me the VIN and an email address to send it to. Happy to help our community!

 

[TheUltimateBohab]

I usually try to avoid calling calling to everyones attention that I'm a COMPLETE IDIOT, but this is an attempt to keep this from happening.

DO YOUR RESEARCH BEFORE BUYING!

I put my myself in a little bit of a pinch after selling my tacoma, and I (much too quickly) bought a 1998 4runner sr5 that was in good shape with 102k miles. 5 weeks later i was replacing the passenger side cylinder head ($1600) due to a failed time-cert in the #3 cylinder.

Now i put the truck's VIN into the Toyota Owner's site and what do i find?

My 4runner really has over 200k miles and has had repeated CEL/Spark plug issues since 2007, with 4 visits to the dealer in 4 years to replace "cylinder 3 spark plug" and " oil soaked coil pack" etc.

I know i made a huge mistake not doing my research and in a way i deserve it, but is there anything i can try to get the seller for? odometer fraud at least?

Thanks for any input.

i had a mileage issue with my 97 as well the ODO says 177,000 but i really have like 350,000 its super easy to just swap out the gauge cluster in those years. never the cylinder issues tho or really any for that matter... engine or trans anyway

 

[TRDFerguson]

I looked into the odometer fraud thing with the DMV, and found their policy to be that once a car is over 10 years old, they will not investigate into any kind of odometer fraud. I also realized that I was never gonna find the guy who I bought it from... the phone number I had for him is disconnected.

Basically I decided that this was a seriously harsh way to learn a lesson, and I am just going to keep my 4runner forever. I mean the $1900 I put into the engine was not wasted, the engine is 2/3 rebuilt. The rest of the truck is in very good shape and I feel confident that it will serve me well as long as I want it to.

Its a hard pill to swallow and I feel stupid every time I think about how I spent damn near $10k for my 15 year old, 220k mile truck. But all i know is that if it werent a 5vz toyota 4wd... I would feel way worse.