One side effect of Hurricane Katrina has been the resale of flood-damaged cars billed as problem-free. Cars that have been in a flood, even if they look good, are by and large lemons in the truest sense of the word. Now, Congress is looking at a bill that would make it harder for unsuspecting shoppers to end up with a Katrina vehicle.
Called the Passenger Vehicle Loss Disclosure Act, the bill would red-flag any vehicle that was totaled or flood-damaged. The red flag would spell out clearly to buyers what they were about to purchase by tagging the car’s VIN instead of its state-by-state title ID.
One interesting quote in the story below comes from Senator Trent Lott, whose car was totaled by Katrina. “But it looked fantastic. Just to look at it, you wouldn’t think there was a thing in the world wrong with it.”