Used cars often sold with defects that have not been fixed, despite recalls

Associated Press

DETROIT

It’s a case of buyer beware, with potentially dangerous consequences.

More than 46 million cars and trucks on the road in the U.S. — about one-fifth the total — were recalled because of safety defects but never repaired, according to a study by Carfax, a company that sells vehicle-history reports. Some of those defects have the potential to cause a crash, injury and even death.

Last year, about 5 million of those cars were sold to new owners.

That’s because there is no legal requirement for dealers or individual sellers to get the repairs done before a used car is sold. They are not even obligated to tell buyers if a car is subject to a recall.

“It’s a very major public- safety problem,” says Chris Basso, a used-car specialist for Carfax, which analyzed state registration data to determine that one-fifth of the 238 million cars on the nation’s roads has an unrepaired problem that was the subject of a recall. “When those recalled cars go unfixed, they compound over the years, and it increases the chance of those parts failing.”

Federal regulators are pushing for legislation that requires dealers to fix recalled used cars. Independent dealers oppose such a measure but say they might go along with a requirement to disclose recalls to buyers because a new government database makes it easier to tell if a car on their lot has been recalled.

The number of unfixed cars is certain to rise because automakers recalled nearly 64 million vehicles nationwide last year, double the old record set in 2004. Government data show that 25 percent of car owners never get recall repairs done.

No one is sure how many crashes or injuries happen because of unheeded recalls. But buying an unrepaired car cost Carlos Solis his life. The 35-year-old father of two died Jan. 18 when shrapnel from the driver’s air bag in his 2002 Honda Accord tore into his neck after a minor accident near Houston.

Solis’ Accord had been recalled in 2011 to fix a faulty air-bag inflator made by Takata Corp. that can explode with too much force. But neither the two previous owners, nor the independent dealer in Houston who sold Solis the car last April, had the repair done.

Solis had no other injuries, says Rob Ammons, an attorney representing his family in a lawsuit against Takata, Honda and the dealer. “You fix the defective air bag, and he doesn’t die,” Ammons says.

Federal law requires car companies to notify owners of a recall within 60 days of finding a safety defect, which Honda did in 2011. But there’s no legal requirement that companies contact the new owner if a car changes hands.