How to get a used car inspected before you buy

• Buyer’s guide
• 5-minute read
• Updated October 2026

A pre-purchase inspection is the one thing almost every expert recommends and most buyers skip. Here is what it is, what it costs, how to arrange one when the dealer makes it hard, and what it cannot tell you.

What an inspection is

A pre-purchase inspection, often called a PPI, is an hour or so with an independent mechanic who has no stake in the sale. They put the car on a lift, look underneath, scan the computer for stored fault codes, check the fluids, brakes, tires and suspension, and look for signs of body repair or flood damage. Many shops will also take it on a short test drive. Most independent shops charge somewhere between $100 and $200.

It is cheap insurance. In a 2026 survey, 67% of car owners had at least one unexpected car expense in the previous year, and 44% named surprise repairs as the biggest one (Caribou, August 2026). The best time to find the next surprise is before the car is yours.

How to arrange one

• Pick the shop yourself. A dealer’s “we already inspected it” or “use our guy down the street” is not an independent inspection. Look for a well-reviewed independent shop near the dealership, ideally one that works on that make.
• Call ahead. Tell them the year, make and model and that it is a pre-purchase inspection. Ask what they check and what they charge. Book a time.
• Tell the dealer. Most will let you take the car for an inspection, sometimes with a salesperson along. Put a 48-hour hold on the car while you arrange it.
• If the car cannot leave the lot, ask for a mobile inspection instead. Several companies and many independent mechanics will come to the dealership with a scanner and a creeper. A dealer who refuses both is a dealer to walk away from.

What to ask the mechanic to look for

• Signs of body repair: paint texture that changes from one panel to the next, overspray on trim, bolts under the hood with the paint broken on them, panel gaps that are wider on one side.
• Signs of flood damage: silt or rust under the carpet and seat rails, a musty smell, fogging inside the lights, corrosion on exposed connectors under the dash.
• The known weak spots for that model year. Give them your list from your research.
• Stored fault codes, even if the check-engine light is off. A recently cleared code is a question in itself.
• Tire age and wear pattern, brake life, and anything leaking.

What it cannot tell you

A mechanic sees the car on one day. They can tell you a panel was repainted but not why, or that the transmission fluid is fresh but not whether it was changed because of a problem. They cannot tell you why the car was traded in, how it was driven, or what the dealer paid for it. Those answers belong to the previous owner, and that is what a Truth Trade report adds to the inspection: the story behind what the mechanic found.

Related: How to research a used car · Flood cars, washed titles and rolled odometers