Bought a car. Found out it's been in an accident.

I'll make this as brief as poss:



Now I need to get it re-wired and I'm taking back to the garage for a check to see what other damage was caused it in the accident to see if it's worth keeping.
BUT where do i stand with this - I've been sold something under false pretenses. I would never have bought a car if I knew it had been in an accident and if I knew I'd be paying £200+ to fix it up. It seems like stuff keeps going wrong with it ever since I got it but I thought ''oh it's a cheap 2nd hand car, this must be normal'' - but no it's not.

Will it affect my insurance?
How did it pass it's MOT?! (he had it's MOT done a month before I bought it)
I have not had the log book or anything confirming that I own the car and it's been 3 weeks - should I phone the DVLA now?
I don't trust a word the seller said to me now so how do I find if he sold me a stolen car?

I know it's mess. You live and learn. But I just need to figure out where I stand and what to do now. Fix the wires and continue driving it or get in touch with the guy and ask for my money back (but I've spent over £200 fixing it so why would I give it back to him and make a loss? And my insurance cancellation date has passed so I don't know how that works).

Anyone who can answer any of this, I'd be grateful.

What FXX said. If its a private sale then you havent got a leg to stand on.

Unless the advert stated that the car had never been in an accident. In which case, if you can get hold of the advert again, I would be threatening the guy with small claims court.

I'll make this as brief as poss:



Now I need to get it re-wired and I'm taking back to the garage for a check to see what other damage was caused it in the accident to see if it's worth keeping.
BUT where do i stand with this - I've been sold something under false pretenses. I would never have bought a car if I knew it had been in an accident and if I knew I'd be paying £200+ to fix it up. It seems like stuff keeps going wrong with it ever since I got it but I thought ''oh it's a cheap 2nd hand car, this must be normal'' - but no it's not.

Will it affect my insurance?
How did it pass it's MOT?! (he had it's MOT done a month before I bought it)
I have not had the log book or anything confirming that I own the car and it's been 3 weeks - should I phone the DVLA now?
I don't trust a word the seller said to me now so how do I find if he sold me a stolen car?

I know it's mess. You live and learn. But I just need to figure out where I stand and what to do now. Fix the wires and continue driving it or get in touch with the guy and ask for my money back (but I've spent over £200 fixing it so why would I give it back to him and make a loss? And my insurance cancellation date has passed so I don't know how that works).

Anyone who can answer any of this, I'd be grateful.

I'd write them a letter stating when you bought the car, and the advert stated that there were no problems and the car had new tyres.

Go on to say that the description they gave was false, and you deem the car not to have been roadworthy due to the worn tyres and accident damage causing dangerous engine problems, and you want either a full refund including repairs, or just payment for repairs, or you will be looking to take the matter further.

Then see how they respond. It's an offence for anyone to sell a car that isn't roadworthy, not just dealers. Yes you do have less rights that when you buy from a dealer but people can't just sell wrecks.

If I were you, I'd run a few checks on it - you might be driving in a dangerous car and/or breaking the law.

First of all, run a vehicle data check (aka HPI) on it. These can cost as little as £3, and will tell you if the car has been written off, stolen or has a debt on it, etc.

The MOT test simply checks that the car is reasonably safe at the time the test was conducted. The fact that it's passed its MOT could be due to the MOT not being carried out correctly, the accident occurring after the MOT test, or it could just mean that the car is actually in a roadworthy condition despite the damage. However, an MOT certificate is NOT proof of the vehicle's MOT status - it is very easy to forge an MOT certificate as they are just printed on normal blank A4 paper nowadays. You can check the vehicle's actual MOT status here: https://www.gov.uk/check-mot-status. I believe that it is possible to get an MOT test done even if it's not due, just for piece of mind, and if not, a garage can perform tests on your car to make sure it is safe and roadworthy.

The 14 year old tyre is a bit odd, but it could just be that the previous owner put the original spare tyre on recently.

It won't affect your insurance at all, as long as it's not recorded as a write-off (aka total loss). If it is, you should contact your insurer and tell them, as some insurers can be a bit funny about insuring cars that are total losses, some insurers will refuse to provide cover for them (e.g. Swiftcover) and others may only allow third party cover on them. If the car has been written off, it should have had a VIC test performed on it, your HPI check should tell you whether or not this has been done. If it hasn't, the DVLA won't provide you with the V5C and you will need to get this done in order to return the vehicle to the road.

Thanks for this response - very helpful. I ran a check on it (one of those 3 quid checks) - thankfully it's not stolen which I was beginning to worry about. It was written off in 2010 as a category 'C' accident. But it passed a VIC a year later. Since it's passed the VIC, do I need to inform my insurer? I'm currently waiting for the V5C to come in the post - it's been 3 weeks and the DVLA website says wait 4 weeks and then contact them, so I'll hang on for a bit longer. I checked it's MOT status - it's been done but I think he must have had a mate at his local garage do it for him because any mechanic with half a brain would not have given it a pass on it's MOT. I'm getting it re-wired today and then I'm taking it to a garage for them to have a good look at and tell me if it's safe to drive.

In hindsight I should have done a history check on the car before I bought it and I'd strongly recommend other people to do it when buying a used car - but I wasn't aware that you could do it - or do it so easily. My parent doesn't drive and none of my mates have cars so I had no one who knew much about cars to help me - so I just winged it. On the plus side I've learnt a lot of stuff about cars now and how to tell if they're not worth buying, so next time I'll know what to look for and what to avoid. Bit of an expensive lesson though!

Yes it would be better to let your insurers know. As I said before, the majority of insurers will be fine with it, it's just that a few of them don't insure previous write-offs. Some of them will but with certain conditions, such as having the car inspected or only offering third party cover. Most insurers will be completely fine with it however.

There is nothing wrong with a category C car, as long as it's been repaired safely. Category C basically means that it's uneconomical to repair, if the car wasn't worth much at the time of the accident, it wouldn't take a major collision to write it off. The only problems with them is the insurance issue and the value will be about 25% lower than an equivalent non written-off car. Other than that, it's just the same as any other car.

Any updates on this op?