Kōreisha Account
JPN Brand AdvocatesInspection Service
Why is inspection so important?
When bidding on cars that are between 5 and 50 years old there may be hidden problems that were not picked up by the house when they graded the car.
Although the body/exterior of the car is inspected and the underside checked we are still limited to the 3-10 photos or in some cases 16 photos released by the seller and auction house.
Now imagine having the car checked over for 20-30 minutes with 80 photos and a few videos of the car. This would give you a much better overall feel of the condition of the car. Going off the grading alone on older cars isn't recommended.
We've seen Grade 4 B cars with severe rust on the underside and Grade R cars that are near perfect but had a new bumper due to underside damage caused by high curbs in service stations car parks.
Inspection really is the only way to guarantee better buying practices and to mitigate as much risk as possible; thus protecting your financial interests.
What levels of inspection are there?
Many companies may offer an inspection service which is a written report. These are not carried out by these companies but by the auction house themselves for a fee of ¥1800-2200.
By providing a list of questions to the house they'll send an inspector to the vehicle and check those specific areas. But without photographs it's still open to debate on what exactly "some rust underneath" or "many minor damage on body" means.
The main reason we opted to offer inspection services was to maintain our high standards. Many of the JDM classics we inspect we reject on the basis of condition and/or rust, many of which we may have bid on going soley from the grading and inspector comments.
The service we offer is far more indepth and covers the entire car from exterior, interior, underside, under bonnet, engine, transmission and running gear. View the galleries below for example photographs from 3 inspections.
Where can JPN inspect?
We have inspectors at over 40 auction houses and key prefectures (Chūbu, Kantō , Kansai) so even dealer cars can now be inspected.
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