Modern vehicles are loaded with electronics, and electrical systems are highly susceptible to flood damage. It is important that you protect yourself from buying a flood-damaged vehicle because faulty electronics could affect the operation of safety equipment like airbags and stability control systems.

Believe it or not, it’s relatively easy to protect yourself against title washing if you’re willing to spend a little time and money investigating the vehicle’s title history and having a thorough inspection performed – things that we recommend to any used car buyer. Here’s what you can do to protect yourself from buying a flood-damaged, rebuilt wreck, rebuilt stolen, or a salvage vehicle.

Get a Carfax Report
To guard against hidden problems in a vehicle’s past, a Virginia-based company called Carfax provides a unique service. Carfax compiles VIN data from insurance companies, Departments of Motor Vehicles, state and provincial agencies, and vehicle auctions in both the U.S. and Canada. Every time a vehicle’s VIN is keypunched into a computer, an electronic transaction is created that can be traced. Carfax compiles these VINs, tracks them, and puts them into a title history report that allows consumers to research the vehicle’s recorded past.

For example, say that a vehicle shows up in the Carfax record as “sold” at an insurance auction in New Orleans, with a flood-damaged title. A couple of months later the same vehicle shows up as registered in New York with a clean title and lower mileage. Congratulations! You, with Carfax’s help, have just identified vehicle fraud. With the record numbers of flood-damaged vehicles coming to market from the Gulf Coast, Carfax, as the primary source of vehicle title reports, has teamed up with FEMA and GE Fleet Services to better track cars and trucks wrecked by Katrina and Rita.

Even Carfax can’t track all vehicles, however. It is important to remember that a vehicle title will only reflect damage if an insurance company settles a claim on the car. If a car was not insured or the damage was not reported, it will have a clean title after the collision or flood damage is repaired. That’s why it’s important to have a used vehicle inspected before purchase.

Conduct a pre-purchase inspection
A trained eye can pick out such things as paint overspray, frame damage, water damage, and major repairs, and the few dollars it costs for the inspection could save you a ton of money down the road.

When a vehicle suffers flood damage, water lines or silt are usually evident in the engine compartment, trunk, doorjambs, ventilation system, and fuse box. Electrical connections might exhibit excessive corrosion, which usually takes the form of a green, crusty substance in the electrical plugs and junction blocks. If the bolts that mount the seat to the floorboards are rusty, or if rust is forming under the carpet inside the cabin or the trunk, it could be that the vehicle was underwater at one time. Check the carpet for proper fit – if it’s loose or wrinkled, it’s possible that the carpet was removed to repair water damage and then re-installed. A good tech will also reach up under the dash and the seats to check for mud, dirt, and silt. The only way filth of this nature can get into these areas is if the vehicle was submerged in dirty floodwater. Finally, cars that have been submerged often have a damp, musty odor inside or in the trunk.

A doctor can determine the state of our health by analyzing our body fluids. Likewise, a good technician can determine the health of a car’s systems by analyzing the fluids. Emulsified (milky in color) oil, power steering fluid, transmission fluid, and differential fluid is a sure sign of flood damage, because these conditions can be caused by water mixing with the fluids.