Dealership lied about odometer readings, refuses to fix it - rendering vehicle unsellable.
Posting on behalf of my in-laws, from Alberta, Canada. They purchased a brand new Kia Seltos in 2021 with 63km on it. They’ve decided it’s time to sell it and purchase a truck (there is still amount owing on the Kia), and had it listed on marketplace for about $22,000 - hoping to at least get $19,000 as it is in immaculate condition and only has 83,000km on it. They received much interest from dealers asking for the VIN, and finally one dealer reached out after saying “yes we will buy the car for $19k” and said “hey your car is unsellable, I’m not sure if you know this but your car fax has odometer discrepancies.”
They checked the carfax (and they only got it serviced at the dealer they bought it from for the last 5 years), and sure enough there were issues. It said 63km on it on the date of purchase, they brought it in for service 2 months later and the carfax says 38,000km. 1 month later 39,000km. 4 months later it says 8,000km. They only drive in town so there’s no way they put almost 40k on it in 3 months. The Kia dealership has basically told them it’s not anything they will fix, they’ll give them $14,000 for the vehicle and that’s all they will do. My in-laws called a lawyer and the lawyer said the dealership needs to contact Carfax to change this but the dealership said “their hands are tied”. The main manager never shows up to the scheduled meetings either. One of the managers told them that “he’s never seen anything like this and doesn’t even know how digital odometers can change.”
What can they even do at this point? They can’t take less than $19k for it, it’s definitely worth that or more. This dealership is stepping all over them, and I honestly wonder if the odometer was actually tampered with or if it was just the carfax? Regardless they can’t sell it without the carfax being fixed, and the dealership is treating them like absolute garbage. My mother in law just called me in tears telling me they won’t do anything to help. Any advice is appreciated.