rebodied with out salvage a title

[elcamino]

A good friends nephew was a auto body man. For years when he worked at a Chevy body shop he would buy wrecked cars and fix them in his own shop, moonlighting. Often the owner of the wrecked car wanted to buy a new vehicle and he would get the wreck for a good price if the dealer took it in trade or sometimes he made a deal with the owner.

When it came time to sell he would tell them they were wrecked but often did not tell them of the extent. Well after doing this for many years and making a lot of money. He sold a Blazer that was in a bad run off the road accident. He fixed using all GM parts but he never disclosed the extent of the accident to the buyer. It did not have a salvage title. Well, although he was a good body man and used all GM parts to repair it, the new owner, a young girl was fatally injured in the Blazer. This happened about 6 months after he sold it to her parents. They suspected something wrong with the vehicle, so they hired a very good lawyer who found out the extent of the damage and how much he made on the transaction. An investigation determined that he was negligent in his repair, some parts were not replaced and later failed. They said he failed to disclose the extent of his repairs, he insisted he did but nothing was in writing. He was lucky to stay out of jail. He was sued, the parents blame him for the accident even though it was shown the driver was speeding. He cannot find a job in any body shop to this day and works construction. He was not really a crook, although he was a good body man, he was not state licensed and insured to do this work outside of the GM dealership.

So I guess the moral is, be very careful restoring vehicles of any omissions on a vehicle repair. If the buyer can prove a defect exists or you altered the vehicle with the intent to defraud and you failed to disclose, you are in breach of contract and can be sued for any and all damages to include punitive damages.

There is a fine line between restoring a car and making a car from junk. I don't think I would want to be the person who just bought a restored 1969 Z28 for $50g only to find out it was a total piece of junk before the restoration and was made up of many other cars unless the shop doing the work was Body Codington etc.