Carfax or Autocheck?
 

Anyone have an opinion on which service is better? I understand that these services are only as good as what is reported to them. But its better than nothing.

Can you swing both?

Sixto
87 300D

Nothing beats paying a mechanic a hours labor to check the car over. Other than some information that the car had X miles at X date , there is little information that is really helpful. I tend not to like CF as some of the information can allow a clueless person to give a seller grief over nothing.

After I purchased my SL, I found the online ad where the previous owner of my SL tried to sell the car and offered free car fax. It listed 2 leases, that here were 7 owners* and miles at lic plate renewals. It also listed " Minor to Moderate rear impact", this is quite a range spanning the distance from a door ding to broken tail lights / trunk lid / bumper cover.

I had looked the car over pretty hard prior to purchase and saw no signs of any real body damage. A second look netted that the rear bumper cover probably was painted / might have been changed. There was a ever so slight tear in the plastic bumper backer that was only visible from under the car. None of the sheetmetal was bent at all. This damage would be consistent with backing into the garage a bit too far.

So, the car now carries a car fax brand of having moderate damage. While I don't plan on selling the car any time soon, a non car person armed with consumer reports / car fax and " The blue book says the car is worth XX " is going to make a big fuss that the car was totaled.

* I had looked at another super clean SL that had a maintenance book full of dealer stamps. CF listed 2 owners but the seller said they were the original owner. LIAR !! FRAUD !!! KBB says to deduct 23.65227% for each owner over original and a additional 54.432143% for mental anguish. As it turned out the car was bought on lease with Mercedes as the "owner" , then the original leasee bought the car at end of term.

I have seen multiple ownerhip on carfax too. You just have to look closely though at the history shown in CF. Many times the 2nd or 3rd owner of a used car is actually the dealership which CF classifies as an owner. Its not that difficult to point out to a potential buyer. If they want to make a fuzz about it thats their problem. If they ignore the obvious they must not want the car.:)

I also don't disagree about bringing it to a mechanic. I think this applies to older vehicles more than newer ones. I have gotten good at spotting paint jobs over time after looking at many used cars.

I almost bought an old W202 that the seller had a clean Autocheck for. I got a Carfax for it which showed it had been to a body shop, among other things. I took it to an MB dealer for a PPI who checked his records which indicated that they had reset the SRS after an airbag deployment in a different accident than the one Carfax showed.

The most valuable datapoint for me was the PPI, which opened my eyes as to how much I'd have to sink in to the car. I couldn't offer the seller anywhere near what he wanted, and he sold it to somebody on eBay (who probably got nothing but the Autocheck from the seller) for what I considered to be too much money.

Carfax,Autocheck,Etc.,Etc.,etc.
 

5 minutes after they offered their services; the Used car market found a way
to circumvent the System.

Nothing,Nothing,Nothing...Did I say nothing? Beats a PPI by a Skilled Mercedes
Expert!

Anything Else is just mental masturbation.