Does minor paint work show up on carfax / autocheck?

Typically, the only things that will show on Carfax are events that are detailed by a police report and/or insurance claim. If you bring a car to a bodyshop to have some touch-up done, it shouldn't make it to Carfax. That being said, I have seen plenty of deviation either way. I've seen cars that had the slightest bump or scrape, but because there was a police report, the Carfax gets branded with an accident report. Conversely, I've seen cars that have been hit hard, with obvious paint & bodywork, and yet have clean Carfax reports.

 

If you go through insurance, there is a good shot it will generate a "bad" Carfax report. If it was me, I would pay out of pocket.

 

This one should be on your brother-in-law. Unless it's a lot of damage, I'd do it without insurance, either way. Besides many insurance companies require a police report- are you sure that you'd want to do that?

Cheers,
Rich

 

Post pictures if you can, hard to tell what a chip or scratch is according to you.

We all have a different definition / standard ..... Sounds like the $3,800 is more important to you. Finally, really depends where these marks are located.

 

The ONLY thing Carfax knows with some reliability is what is reported to a state DMV and it may not know all of that. It only has access to auto insurance company data IF the specific insurance company sells it to them - many do not. For all practical purposes, the only thing you can count on as PROBABLY being on a car fax report is info generated by a police report.

IMO Carfax is one of the better scams around...but that's a different issue.

 

The price of the repair depends more on how many panels are affected. If you have 3 things on one panel and 2 on another it's only 2 panels to be painted. If you have 5 different panels to fix it makes a BIG difference. The little dents or scratches are not what is costly to repair it's the refinishing. Fixing one ding or 3 on the same panel would be almost the same price.

My friend just got his Diablo front bumper repainted 2 weeks ago. They removed it fixed all the little things, repaint and reinstall. It would have been $1800. But they gave him a rebate for only $1200 because he's a good customer. Job is very nice.

 

What year is the car in question? If it's pre 81' wont matter because no carfax's are available for pre 81 or is it 1980?

I've been trying to help a friend sell a car and somewhere in it's history it had some paintwork done after a run in with a shopping cart. The PO ran that through insurance and it's on the carfax as "minor damage" which has scared a lot of potential buyers so yes, going through insurance will most likely generate some sort of report on the cars history.

 

I believe previous owner.

 

Or Pissed Off. 😉