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Phone:
805-892-4522 ext 111
Toll Free:
(866) 99- LEMON (892-4922)
Mail:
800 Garden Street Suite L,
Santa Barbara, CA 93101
Website:
www.sblemonlaw.com
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Automobile Fraud
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Automobile Fraud
Why
Automobile Fraud Is So Common?
An
astonishing percentage of car sales involve fraud.
Automobile fraud is so prevalent for a number of reasons.
The sheer volume of American car expenditures is
enormous--hundreds of billions of dollars a year. In
addition, both by necessity and by dealer ingenuity, car
purchases are complex. The sale involves compliance with
state titling and registration laws, often involves
trade-ins, financing, leasing, physical damage and liability
insurance, credit insurance, service contracts, options, and
other fees. This complexity provides ample opportunity for
confusion and deception. The most common and actionable
forms of automobile fraud are described below.
 Lease
Fraud
Leasing is an important profit center for dealers and a
frequent area of automobile fraud. Often this involves
abuses as to the terms of the lease, such as the amount
exchanged for trade-in, down payments, or rebates; higher
capitalized costs than represented; manipulation of residual
values; exorbitant early termination penalties; and even
deception about whether the transaction is or is not a
lease. If your lease terms are confusing to you, and you
think you have been deceived, you may wish to contact us.
Odometer Fraud
One
type of odometer fraud involves tampering with an odometer
so that its reading is less than the car's actual mileage.
Another type is the dealer's failure to disclose that an
odometer has exceeded its mechanical
 limits,
e.g., where the car has really traveled 150,000, not the
50,000 shown on the five-digit odometer. An auto dealer's
failure to make the federally mandated disclosures is a form
of fraud and something that we have experience litigating.
If you think that your vehicle was sold to you with an
inaccurate odometer reading, or if you were not adequately
placed on notice of the vehicle's mileage at the time of
sale, you may wish to contact us.
Spanish Language Sales
California law requires a seller or lessor of a vehicle, who
negotiates the deal in Spanish, to provide the buyer or
lessee with a Spanish version of the same document BEFORE
they are asked to sign the English one. Failure to do so
constitutes a statutory violation where the purchaser or
lessee then has the option to cancel the contract and get
their money back.
Wrecked & Salvaged Autos
 Sometimes
dealerships sell cars that were previously wrecked or
salvaged without disclosing this to the consumer. If you
purchased a used car or truck and you believe it may have
been in a serious accident before you bought it, we suggest
you take the following steps. First, take the car to a body
shop and ask for an inspection and report. Ask that the
frame be measured. If the frame is bent or the vehicle has
safety-related problems, you may contact us to discuss your
possible case against the dealer. Salvage vehicles have been
in such a severe accident that the insurance company or
leasing company "totaled" the vehicle (paying off the
consumer and taking title). These vehicles are supposed to
be repaired at licensed repairers and then checked for
safety. If they pass the safety inspection, they may be sold
with full disclosure of their salvage status. The insurance
company that totaled the vehicle must brand the title with
the word "salvage." If you were sold a salvage vehicle, and
did not know it to be salvage at the time of purchase, you
may wish to contact us.
Fraudulent Misrepresentation
Dealers are most famous for misrepresenting the cars the
sell (e.g., "one owner" or, even worse, "driven only on
Sundays to church by an elderly woman"). The real truth is
that they don't know—the dealers for whom they are selling
cars tell them nothing about the cars they are selling. And,
sadly, they learn that they have to say something or they
won't sell too many cars. There is a "line" as to what may
be permissible "puffery" by a retailer and fraud. Frequently
that line is crossed by aggressive salespeople who are
trying to make a fast buck at your expense. If you believe
that a dealer has seriously misrepresented something
regarding a vehicle's history and/or condition, you may wish
to contact us.
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