This past week while I was in FL, I sold our 2000 Passat to CarMax. The guy there remarked at a 15 year old car that only had 1 owner...very rare in the used car industry as even the older man next to me was trading in a leased 2014 Stingray with 2,000 miles on it. But I digress...
On Labor Day weekend in 2000, with only a couple thousand miles on the odometer, we were driving in Cleveland when a drunk lady plowed into the back of us on the highway. The Passat was amazingly solid, buckling the trunk almost up into the rear windscreen but I was still able to pull over and stop safely. It took Doersham's over 6 months and $9k (in 2000) to rebuild it and they did a great job. The Passat was traded in with 180k miles on the odometer and served us well.
When the CarMax rep pulled the Experian history report, NO ACCIDENT RECORD came up. I thought this was odd, but since Caveat Emptor and I wanted as much out of CarMax as I could, I said nothing. Now, as I look at Audi V10 R8's on eBay, I'm now treating every "1 OWNER!!1!!!1" used car like a tainted chick: who's lying about never being hit? How much has our society come to rely on an electronic third party doing a flawed background search to determine a cars' "true" worth?
Just sad how many stories we hear these days as car guys of people/shops scamming their way out of a bad CarFax check. Whatevs...