Vehicle (new) moving between dealers?

[Hall]

My son is looking at cars to purchase and one we found has these entries in it's CarFax listing

How / why would it move back and forth like it did from 1/23 to 1/30 ? These dealers are in the same metro area so my first thought was the buyer was at "Voss" and the sales group transferred it from "Germain". These dealers aren't connected either, as in owned by the same corporation higher up. It also shows it was sold on the 24th and the 30th, at two different dealers, but CarFax says it's a 2-owner vehicle. It was originally leased for ~2 years, then a 2nd (or 3rd ??) person bought it in 2021.

 

[Tdbo]

My guesses:

1. Series of dealer trades in which one or both of the sales went south.
2. Example of Carfax reflecting "GIGO" put into their system
3. Players in the drama either did not or could not go back and correct the record

 

[svtrit]

I just bought a car with a similar issue. Imported from Canada to a dealer in Kansas. I bought it from a dealer in Iowa. I figured it didn’t sell in KS after sitting 4 months and my dealer somehow got it.

 

[eljefino]

Ohio is weird with titling in that dealers have to title cars to themselves before transferring to customers. Most other states let dealers reassign titles amongst themselves without involving the state.

Seems like they just traded it amongst themselves because reasons.

Also seems like the more dealers it visits, the more pinstripes and geegaws it's going to accumulate!

 

[92saturnsl2]

In my case when I bought my '15 Sedona, Carfax reported several dealer transfers (a couple in Ohio which as eljefino mentioned results in additional titling records).. The previous dealers which sold it onto other dealers were smart enough to get rid of it, because it had a bad transmission (that wasn't obvious when driving it, just leaked). The dealer that sold it to me was the unlucky one, as they ended up footing the bill for transmission replacement
So I would take multiple dealer transfers as a red flag, but it could be something as innocuous as they couldn't sell it as quick as they wanted (no demand).

 

[Hall]

So I would take multiple dealer transfers as a red flag

On a used car, I agree. This was a brand new car between Honda dealers before it's for actual sale to a customer (it's reflected right below what I show in my screenshot). On 1/30/2019, there's a record of it being titled/registered at the BMV in Ohio (temporary tags) and then less than 2 months later, another "registration" (which means they got their hard plates).

 

[mrsilv04]

Reverse entries #2 and #3 and it makes sense. Too much happened in a short amount of time, and a difference in reporting something on the next business day made it look odd. Germain was a day late in reporting a 'sale' (most likely a dealer trade).

 

[Hall]

Good catch. Yeah, if Germain input the wrong date and it should have been the 22nd or 23rd, they "sold" it (or dealer transfer) to Voss and it went right on their lot for sale to the public.

 

[92saturnsl2]

On a used car, I agree. This was a brand new car between Honda dealers before it's for actual sale to a customer (it's reflected right below what I show in my screenshot). On 1/30/2019, there's a record of it being titled/registered at the BMV in Ohio (temporary tags) and then less than 2 months later, another "registration" (which means they got their hard plates).

My bad-- chances are the other dealer had something they wanted, so they swapped cars, or vice versa.