Rise in odometer rollbacks found in CARFAX study

Odometer rollbacks are on the rise throughout the nation.

With approximately 2.1 million vehicles on the road today with rolled-back odometers, a CARFAX study shows a 14 percent rise since 2021. That’s an additional 300,000 with misrepresented mileage, costing consumers an average of $4,000 in value.

“Odometer fraud didn’t go away with the introduction of digital odometers,” said Patrick Olsen, Editor-in-Chief for CARFAX. “We’re still seeing the number of vehicles on the road with a rolled-back odometer rise year-over-year. It takes con artists only a matter of minutes to wipe thousands and thousands of miles off a vehicle’s odometer.”

California led the nation with a reported 469,000 vehicles with rolled-back odometers this year, up 7.2 percent. Texas followed at 277,000, an increase of 12.8 percent.

The top 10 states were:

1. California: 469,000, up 7.2%
2. Texas: 277,000, up 12.8%
3. New York: 100,000, up 9.0%
4. Florida: 85,400, up 1.4%
5. Illinois: 79,000, up 7.6%
6. Pennsylvania: 69,600, up 2.1%
7. Georgia: 67,600, up 4.0%
8. Arizona: 57,000, up 4.8%
9. Virginia: 56,000, unchanged
10. North Carolina: 49,000, up 8.2%
    
    Olsen pointed out that a slight adjustment of a few thousand miles will affect values.
    
    “However, most odometer tampering incidents involve tens of thousands of miles. That means the 7-year-old sedan showing 40,000 miles on the odometer might have 90,000 miles or more,” he wrote.