The Expert Podcast

Is there such a thing as a fake car title? Well, the short answer is yes. A vehicle title is a legal government document issued only by a government agency. It's a certificate printed by, in most states, the agency called the Department of Motor Vehicles. Some states call it something else, and that's an official document. It's like money or any other certificate. You can't buy one from a company, you can't download one from the internet, and a copy is no good. It's kind of like a copy of a $100 bill—it isn't worth anything. A copy of a title is also not worth anything. You need the original certificate.

There's a lot of fakes going around. Here's an article from Oregon where the DMV is warning that there's a lot of fraudulent titles out there. What people are doing is they're using laser printers and all kinds of sophisticated printing technology to make a title certificate or a certificate of origin. Now, a certificate of origin is the original document; it's like the birth certificate for a vehicle. It's before any title is issued. It's the ownership document that comes from the manufacturer, from the factory. So, when you buy a new Ford Mustang, Ford will make a certificate of origin for that Mustang at the factory where it's built. They'll ship it to the car dealer. The car dealer gets it, and when they sell it to a person, they use that to get a title for the first owner.

Some scammers are making fake certificate of origin documents because it's a little bit easier to scam. A buyer can't do a title search on a VIN number unless it's already been titled. A certificate of origin never has been titled, so it's not going to have anything in the title search. This is more and more common, and they're seeing it in Oregon and other states.

So how do you verify that the title you're getting is legitimate? Well, the first thing you want to do is take that VIN number and go in person to the Department of Motor Vehicles. Don't do it by phone. Don't do it by email. Certainly, don't do any of these online VIN checkers like Carfax or VINCheck or any of these. They're very low-level consumer-based online database searches. They're not entirely accurate. They don't show anything about liens, and sometimes even the information on stolen cars isn't there. The only 100% accurate vehicle records information comes from the government. Now, it's inconvenient, right? You have to go wait in line at the DMV, but that's the only way you're going to get a 100% answer. If you do an online VIN check and you read the fine print, it says right there, this may not be an accurate report. It may not be all the information. They only get information from places that are reporting to it, which isn't all of them.

The other thing you want to do is take that VIN number in person to your local law enforcement agency—police department, sheriff, or anybody with a badge and a gun—and have them look it up in their system to see if it's stolen. The DMV may not have all the stolen car information, and the sheriff isn't going to have information about liens, back taxes, or anything else, or salvage. So you want to protect yourself from fake titles.

Even if the seller is handing you a title, make sure it's properly signed. Make sure that the name you see on the front of that title matches their ID. Don't take a title from somebody whose name is different from the one printed on the front of the title. Also, don't take a title that's signed over on the back to somebody else and then re-signed to you. That doesn't work; that's going to be a void title.

If you buy a car from a dealership, before you give them the money, have them show you the title. Now, they may not be able to give it to you because they probably have to file it to get a new title in your name. But at least have them show it to you to make sure they actually have it in their possession. Many times, dealerships have their own financing on cars, and they don't have the titles. If they take your money, you're just hoping, crossing your fingers, that they're going to pay off their loan to get the title back. So make sure you're verifying that as well.

Private sellers can actually be a little more secure as long as you verify that title and make sure the person you're buying it from shows their ID and that it matches the title.

If you have questions about how titles work or verifying titles, you can click the link below. Also, we have live consultation available with a certified title agent. You could do a video call, live, one-on-one with a title agent to get answers to your questions and even some background on vehicles. If you found this video helpful, be sure to click on other videos on our channel to see if there's further information that could give you more insight into resolving your particular situation.