I bought a 1996 Ford Ranger xlt on the 12th of this month. Paid cash. Drove it off the dealership lot with 133511 mile showing. On way home noticed odometer and trip meter not working. Also found key would not unlock or lock driver door. No rubber on windshield wipers. Owner said he had done all the required maintenance checks in their shop. No mention of mileage problems. Took it back for odometer and trip meter repair and door lock fix. Spent all day waiting at the dealership. Mechanic said everything was working fine and I left. Odometer and trip meter still not working and speedometer said doing 60 when doing 25 and everything in between. Since them I have found that carfax has reports of odometer fraud against this vehicle. No mention of this by dealership. Yesterday radiator started leaking coolant. Truck now at mechanic with rusted out and plugged radiator. Cost to fix: $550.00. Spent $90 for a used gauge cluster that works.

Gathering information to file complaints against dealership to Federal Trade Commission, Consumer Reports, BBB and anyone else I can think of.

YES, I know the adage: Buyer beware, but I think this dealer did none of the pre-sale maintenance requirements and I bet he knew of the odometer fraud. The carfax report also shows two different odometer readings while this dealer had this truck.
Any inputs welcome.

 

Does the sales agreement say AS IS anywhere on it?

Odometer fraud is another thing altogether, but you have tampered with it, swapping cluster is "tampering", so not sure how that would work, but you would need to put old cluster back in and DO NOT MENTION anything about swapping it out, EVER, to anyone including a Lawyer, as they would have to disclose that

 

You didn't notice any of those problems on the test drive ?

The mechanic you paid to do a pre-purchase inspection didn't notice any of these things ?

You didn't run a CarFax report on this car before purchasing it ?

 

RonD------Yes, I got a 4 month, 1000 mile warranty. As I said, I took it in because the odometer and trip meter were not working at all. Don't know why the dealer couldn't figure out that I would notice that! He sold the truck as having 133511 miles on it. By the odometer not working we know it has more miles than that, in fact the last time the odometer was verified was 2012 (I found out later) with that mileage. I took it in and they said they would fix the odometer and trip meter but they didn't fix them at all and they messed up the speedometer so it did not read even close to the actual speed. I used a gps to check and when doing 25 the speedometer swung from 25 to 60 and points in between. So, since they messed it all up and I couldn't drive it with the speedometer bouncing all over the place, I did what I did so I could drive it SAFELY. If I took it back to them who knows what else they would F up?
I am now waiting on the results of a safety check. If there is a problem with the brakes that will be another item to report in my complaint.

 

NO, NO and NO. The dealer said he had done a through check in his shop. MY BAD. BUT--------with the odometer fraud, door locks not working, odometer and tripmenter not working, no rubber on wipers, they didn't fix the problems with the meters, in fact made things worse, there is not way this is a honest dealer. Maybe I can't get anything done for my case, but he surely is doing this to others and I want to put a stop to it.

 

What about the Bill of sale?
As is or no as is?

If the inspection is not good then it may be best to try and get full refund and give them back the vehicle, like you say "who knows what else may be wrong"

 

Look up some atty's and go chat. it wont cost you anything, and will give you a better idea as to where you stand.

but DO NOT tell the dealer your seeking
legal advice.

 

It doesn't matter, speedo and odometer tampering is Federal crime. If all that your telling us is true you have them. It doesn't matter if you looked around to see if there was a fixable problem. Who is going to tell them, are you? I sure hope not. You will get all you moneys back plus all incurred expenses. From running around trying to figure out there mess for them. Also I wouldn't be silent about it, tell everyone you know.
I worked at the dealership level for 28 years. I have seen quite a few case of this stuff. It never ends well for the selling party.

Ken