Greetings! Just bought a 95 Hatchback. My Introduction.

[surfingisfun001]

Hello! I owned a 1994 Honda Civic Coupe DX for over 6 years. I loved my car dearly. I bought it from the original owner after no longer being able to afford my gas guzzling Van. The car was in terrific shape. The original owner had maintained it well throughout it's course and kept it parked in a garage it's whole life. This car got great gas mileage. I'd say an average of 33 mpg. I took this car many places including cross country. It was a terrific car. I took great care of it. Unfortunately when on a road trip this past summer it was stolen in Seattle. It was recovered but completely stripped for parts.

I recently purchased a 1995 Honda Civic Hatchback VX. It appears to be in very good shape. The interior is in great condition. The engine looks clean. After I ran a carfax I found out it has twice the mileage so 355,000 instead of what the odometer reads "175,000". So there's that. I am trying to get some money back from the person I bought it from. It didn't pass smog and I had to repair a few things but I figured I would being it's an old car. Original owner had it for 2 years then 2nd owner owned it from 1997-2014. It looks like they took good care of it being it is in much better condition than most I have seen. All stock. I hope to have this car for a long time and have good times with it as I did my last one and am installing a few goodies that will make it much more difficult to steal.

Just wanted to say hello and that I look forward to being a part of the community!

 

[HeX]

Welcome aboard. Congrats on acquiring a rare VX. Post some pictures of it. Its unfortunate that the mileage is not what you were told. I'm curious to know what the previous owner said when you questioned him about the mileage. Does the CarFax show which owner had it during its largest acquisition of miles? I only ask because there is a slight chance that the mileage wasnt written clearly in the title registry and was entered incorrectly. If that happens to be the case then I believe it can be rectified.

 

[Bhikku]

Welcome! post up some pics of the civic

 

[lethal6]

Welcome!!

I agree with Hex. It sounds like a typo on the title/registration. A car that old doesn't need an odometer disclosure, so over the years it might have been omitted or misprinted.

On the other end of the spectrum, it is possible that someone switched the cluster though. I have seen/heard some shady s**t going down with swapped or high mileage cars to hide what they really have.

Also, Carfax can be a best guess for most cars. I have seen many of them wrong or omitted details through tons of cars at work. As a personal example, I had a Nissan pickup back in the day that had just over 400,000 miles on it when I sold it. I was the second owner next to my Dad who bought it brand new. During the time I had it, it was in 2 wrecks. One of them was $1500 of being totaled. Neither of them are/were on the carfax even though both claimed on insurance and fixed through licensed and reputable shops.

 

[surfingisfun001]

Thanks for the feedback. I am thinking that the cluster was replaced because on carfax in 2003 the mileage reads 176,xxx then in 2004 starts over and throughout the 29 reports it climbs all the way up to 169,xxx. So on the list of 29 reports it goes from 1995 - 2003 reading the mileage climbing from 0-176,xxx. Then in 2004-2012 starts over and goes from 0-169,000. When I purchased the car the odometer read 175,000. Less than what carfax shows in 2003. On the title, and I didn't see this at the time of the purchase, I should have looked closer, the mileage says 355,000 which is about the total of those two sums(plus two years since 2012). It looks like in Jan 2014 it was donated. 6 days later purchased from who I bought it from, a mechanic, technically a dealership. He put a good amount of work into it, had it for 10 months but never registered it. It could very well be that he thought the odometer was correct but the title and carfax show otherwise.

 

[HeX]

On the other end of the spectrum, it is possible that someone switched the cluster though. I have seen/heard some shady s**t going down with swapped or high mileage cars to hide what they really have.

Also, Carfax can be a best guess for most cars. I have seen many of them wrong or omitted details through tons of cars at work. As a personal example, I had a Nissan pickup back in the day that had just over 400,000 miles on it when I sold it. I was the second owner next to my Dad who bought it brand new. During the time I had it, it was in 2 wrecks. One of them was $1500 of being totaled. Neither of them are/were on the carfax even though both claimed on insurance and fixed through licensed and reputable shops.

CarFax is definitely not accurate. Only a helpful tool to know some background. to add toLetha6s points, some insurance agencies or shops never fully report some accidents or repair jobs for any number of reasons, some legit and some not.

Thanks for the feedback. I am thinking that the cluster was replaced because on carfax in 2003 the mileage reads 176,xxx then in 2004 starts over and throughout the 29 reports it climbs all the way up to 169,xxx. So on the list of 29 reports it goes from 1995 - 2003 reading the mileage climbing from 0-176,xxx. Then in 2004-2012 starts over and goes from 0-169,000. When I purchased the car the odometer read 175,000. Less than what carfax shows in 2003. On the title, and I didn't see this at the time of the purchase, I should have looked closer, the mileage says 355,000 which is about the total of those two sums(plus two years since 2012). It looks like in Jan 2014 it was donated. 6 days later purchased from who I bought it from, a mechanic, technically a dealership. He put a good amount of work into it, had it for 10 months but never registered it. It could very well be that he thought the odometer was correct but the title and carfax show otherwise.

It sounds like someone may have either rebuilt the engine or swapped in another with an odometer. Its still strange that the title or carfax doesnt explain why the odometer started over at zero. I believe such a thing must be noted at least in the title. You may want to verify all the VIN badges or observe if theyve look tampered. I've known of shops that instead of making massive repairs they swap VINs with a similar yet better running parts or complete identical cars. Does the engine even look or feel like it has 350k+ miles on it?

In the end, its purchased and you cant do much about that so if it runs well and has no obvious issues then you should be fine. I hope you purchased it for a good price.

 

[surfingisfun001]

I sent the second owner (from 1997 to 2014) a message on facebook after looking his name up from the title and he just got back to me. He said he needed to replace the speedometer at around 180,000 miles so the car does in fact have 350,000+ miles. A bummer and learning lesson though hopefully it will last a while still and I suppose if worse comes to worst I will need to do an engine swap.

 

[surfingisfun001]

I deep cleaned the sh!t out of my hatch yesterday. Spent literally all day detailing it. That thing was D.I.R.T.Y. ... Gotta figure it may have not been deep cleaned for 20 years. There was an entire layer of gravel not to mention a thick pile of dirt covering anything hidden so underneath carpet, in middle console, underneath trunk/fuel lever, in trunk, etc. Got it looking real nice and clean. Whats sweet is that everything is in good working condition in the interior and literally the only piece missing is the right tail light cover lid on the inside of the trunk which I found and bought on ebay to replace. So complete interior all stock, all stock under the hood... pretty excited to see where this thing takes me.

 

[Hecz]

350K miles and running? Yeah that's a Honda.

Has it always been a California car?

Welcome to Thee Club.

 

[surfingisfun001]

Thanks. Yeah, always been in CA.

 

[Vinnielj]

I have a 1999 Honda Civic LX that I bought brand new and it now has 307k miles


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[Vinnielj]

And it's still on the original power train.


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[nd4sped]

Thanks for the feedback. I am thinking that the cluster was replaced because on carfax in 2003 the mileage reads 176,xxx then in 2004 starts over and throughout the 29 reports it climbs all the way up to 169,xxx. So on the list of 29 reports it goes from 1995 - 2003 reading the mileage climbing from 0-176,xxx. Then in 2004-2012 starts over and goes from 0-169,000. When I purchased the car the odometer read 175,000. Less than what carfax shows in 2003. On the title, and I didn't see this at the time of the purchase, I should have looked closer, the mileage says 355,000 which is about the total of those two sums(plus two years since 2012). It looks like in Jan 2014 it was donated. 6 days later purchased from who I bought it from, a mechanic, technically a dealership. He put a good amount of work into it, had it for 10 months but never registered it. It could very well be that he thought the odometer was correct but the title and carfax show otherwise.

Bit note here as this person said. Carfax is ONLY what is reported! Dealerships are required to disclose their service orders at the end of the year. They usually do this a lot more often however and you will find that Carfax will show more updates.

Again Carfax only shows what has been reported.