The Expert Podcast

So if you're a follower of our car titles YouTube channel, did you see us on the People's Court recently? There was a case on the People's Court where one of the plaintiffs had purchased a vehicle, and the seller did not give them a title. They gave them just a receipt or bill of sale. What happened was they went to try to get a title and they hired us to do the paperwork for them. They had a bill of sale, filled out the form, submitted it, and the client called us back later and said, "I'm having some difficulty getting a title. Can you look into it?"

So our company did some research for the client, who did some background checking on the vehicle. Come to find out, the seller of the car that sold them this car had sold them a vehicle with a fake VIN number and a lien on it. The VIN number that was on the paperwork was not correct; it didn't match the vehicle. The vehicle's VIN number had been altered allegedly, and the actual vehicle had a lien from a bank.

They took this case to People's Court, and the plaintiff used our paperwork. They showed our forms, they showed that they had applied to the DMV, and the DMV had discovered that there was a lien on it. The judge — and here's a little clip of the judge talking to both parties — it's a very entertaining show. But it turns out that the defendant was found to be liable to the plaintiff for the purchase of the vehicle. The judge wasn't very happy about this either, somebody trying to sell a car that had a lien on it.

This is another reason it's very, very important to get good documentation when you purchase a vehicle — that you get a copy of the ID of the seller. This buyer was able to avail themselves of the legal system because they had the identity of the seller, they knew who they were, they had a copy of their license, and were able in this case to use the private sector court — not the public sector official government court — but it's a good example of where there are some vehicles that are ineligible for a title. If it's got a lien, if it's stolen, if it's got a parts-only stamp on the title record, there's a lot of scenarios that you can never get a title. So make sure you perform your due diligence.

If you want title consulting, we have that on our website. But this was an interesting case, and we could see this People's Court episode appeared in four different time zones across the country, four different day parts on different TV networks. We could tell when it was showing somewhere in the country because our website stats would spike — we started getting tens of thousands of visitors every minute because somebody was watching the episode.

And they would say, "Yeah, I use Car Titles, they did the paperwork, they helped me out." And then the DMV — and as soon as they said Car Titles — we would watch our stats and it would spike up. This happened five or six times throughout the day because in different parts of the country it's on at different times on different networks or on different cable affiliates or network affiliates. So it was an interesting case.

The judge looked like, we believe, did the right thing. They told the defendant, "You defrauded this person, you did not sell a legal vehicle." And it was something where it's a good lesson to buy a car and get a title. Look, even though we're a title company, we have people calling us all the time that ask us, "Hey, I'm looking to buy a car without a title." We always tell people, we do not recommend buying a car without a title — no matter what.

We can help you if you already bought one and try to get a title, but there are some vehicles that just flat out are not eligible for a title. And that's always a risk if you buy a car without a title. There may be a revelation that comes that you could never get one. Maybe the car's not eligible for a title. And this case was a really good example of doing that.

We communicated with the producers afterward and let them know if they needed more information. We provided some documents and they have cases that happen all the time that have to do with vehicle records, vehicle titling, and we may work with them in the future.

Lesson learned from this: If you're buying a vehicle without a title, be aware that until you successfully get a title, all your money's at risk. And if you can avoid it, don't take that risk. It's never enough of a discount. If you're buying a ten-thousand-dollar car without a title and it's only costing you three thousand, you might think, "I'm saving seven thousand," you're really not. You're really putting three thousand at risk until you get a title because you may never get a title. And if that's the case, you didn't save seven thousand — you just wasted three.