Use Official Government Sources for VIN Checks
If you’re going to do an on VIN check or vehicle history check for a title, make sure you’re only doing it through an official government source. Things like Carfax or VIN or these online sources many times can have very serious omissions and errors, so you won’t even get the information you need. Here’s an example of a government source: this is the Illinois Secretary of State. Make sure that the website you’re doing a VIN check on is a .gov website, not a .com or any kind of commercial website. You want it to be an official government source.

Avoid Inaccuracies by Using Government Records
But if you use a third party, you’re not going to get the official registration and title status. It’s not going to be 100%. Only the government records are 100% accurate, and many of these online VIN checks don’t have access to the official government records because you have to have a legitimate reason to do it. Just handing it out to the public isn’t good enough. So if you’re accessing a government source, you’re going to get the true information about your title.

Consultation and Expert Advice Available
Not some you will be back in your reading in just a few seconds. In the meantime, remember that actualhuman.com offers you live one-on-one private consultation with an expert in this exact subject. We want to listen to your story, we want to hear your questions, we want to give you expert advisement of your options and tell you what we know about your particular situation. Now back to your reading. A third party may provide partial information. Now, some states like Illinois, you can actually go online and do it.

State Requirements for Accessing Vehicle Records
Most states, you have to go in person. The reason why is because they want to know who they’re giving this information out to. They’re not just going to give it out to random people on the internet because some of this information is considered private and confidential about vehicle ownership and liens. So you have to go in, you have to show your ID, sign a form to get it. If you’re in a state, or you’re looking up in a state like Illinois, or I know that New York does it, a few other states, you can get online records. You might have to put your name and phone number to get a text to prove who you are, but at least you’re getting it from a government source.

Risks of Using Non-Governmental Sources
Online lookups are notoriously inaccurate when they come from a non-governmental source. It’s considered a non-primary record source, and when you get records from that, you run the risk of missing liens. Maybe it’s stolen and doesn’t show up. Maybe it’s a salvage and it hasn’t been reported. So you want to get it right from the horse’s mouth so you’re not buying a vehicle that has something wrong with it that would prevent you from getting a title in the future.