A remarkably low odometer reading has a way of making every other detail fade into the background. The paint may be dull, the tires may look suspiciously old and the service book may contain a de
An engine can be low on oil and sound perfectly content. It may start normally, idle without complaint and carry the car through the morning commute. The driver sees no smoke, hears no knocking and re
Fresh motor oil is reassuring stuff. It pours from the bottle in a clear amber stream, looking clean enough to belong in a kitchen rather than an engine. A few hundred miles later, the dipstick can
There are dashboard lights that can wait until the weekend. A low washer-fluid warning, for instance, is hardly a reason to abandon a grocery run. The red oil-can symbol is not one of those lights.
A tire can look almost offensively healthy for its age. The tread grooves are deep. There are no nails in sight. The sidewalls still turn glossy after a wash, and the car has covered so few miles th
A lot of people shop for used cars like they are shopping for avocados. They want the freshest-looking one, the lowest number, the cleanest surface, and they assume that if they can just find t
Used cars are expensive enough now that people are starting to look in places they used to ignore completely. That is how government surplus auctions end up back in the conversation. On pap
A lot of used-car shoppers act like mileage is the whole story. They open a listing, see six digits on the odometer, and mentally move on before they even finish the first photo. Somewhere alon
Fourteen percent. That’s how far Ford’s May sales slid compared with last year. On paper it looks like a red warning light, 190,000 vehicles that never drove off the lot. Social feeds
When you buy a used car, you probably check the vehicle history report, poke around the exterior for dents, and maybe take it for a short test drive. That covers a lot of ground. But there is one scam