Carvana has quickly become a major force in the used car industry. However, has the volume of car sales become too much for the used car dealer to handle, or maybe something more nefarious? A Colorado woman recently bought a 2019 Honda Pilot, but instead of enjoying her purchase, the car forced her to ask a disturbing question; Why did her Honda have 40,000 more miles on the title than the odometer? 

Is Carvana making mistakes or defrauding customers? 

The Honda Pilot’s owner, Sydney Allen, turned to Contact Denver7 to figure out why her Pilot had a 40,000-mile discrepancy. 

“I bought a car from Carvana back in September,” said Allen, an Aurora resident. “This could potentially be serious odometer fraud or intent to defraud, and I never received a callback, never was able to reach anybody.” 

This is not the first accusation toward Carvana alleging unseemly practices. Last week, Colorado man, Dennis Atencio, accused Carvana of selling him a stolen and wrecked car. 

“At first, I thought it was the most enjoyable car buying experience that I’ve had,” said Atencio. But seven months after he bought it, a repo truck hauled it out of his driveway. “It’s very embarrassing. Just the humiliation has been extremely painful.”

The police reports show that only months before it was sold to Carvana, his car was stolen from a Hertz rental lot. 

The claims against Carvana are mounting

Allen and Atencio are only two of many dissatisfied customers making claims against Carvana. According to The Denver Channel, before she even discovered her car’s hidden secret, Allen, as have many other Carvana customers, had trouble getting her car’s title at all. When the title finally showed up after four months, it read that the Honda Pilot had 84,545 miles. This mileage was roughly 40,000 more than the actual car’s odometer read.

“Which means that I essentially could never resell this car because nobody knows what the correct mileage is or if somebody has rolled the odometer back,” said Allen. 

What is going on with Carvana? 

Contact Denver7 has uncovered that Carvana has been fined multiple times and even had its licenses revoked in multiple states for various registration violations and inaccurate reporting on inventory history. 

According to Mike Rowe, owner of Resale Recovery, “The mistake is that people believe Carfax,” said Rowe. “Carfax is doing the best job they can with the information they have, but they have very, very limited information.”

“Insurance companies need to share this information that they have internally,” said Rowe. “Unfortunately, it’s true of most dealers that, even though they may see [the damage] if it’s not on Carfax, they know they can sneak it by an unsuspecting consumer. And they do,” said Rowe.

It is also worth noting that Carvana never responded to Allen about her questions and concerns with her car until she teamed up with Contact Denver7. In a statement from Allen to Contact Denver7, she said that after Denver7 reached out on her behalf, Carvana then offered her a full refund plus $1,000 for her trouble. 

Whether fraud or a series of honest mistakes, Carvana is catching plenty of heat. Only time will tell what’s going on with the online car retailer.