Almost half a million cars and trucks that were damaged in Hurricane Harvey and have since been sitting in impromptu holding lots are set to head back out onto the roads or into scrap yards with salvage titles. And thousands more that were uninsured are out in the wild and could be headed anywhere, with no information stating they’ve been in a flood.
The National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB) said more than 422,000 such insured vehicles have been parked at salvage locations. For comparison, there were about 300,000 vehicle claims from Hurricane Katrina and some 250,000 from Superstorm Sandy. Another 215,000 vehicle claims have been filed in the wake of Hurricane Irma in Florida. About a million vehicles total are expected to have been damaged by Hurricane Harvey alone. In Texas, makeshift holding areas have been filled with thousands of such vehicles as insurance companies decide what to do next. “Flooded vehicles have finally stopped arriving at the Royal Purple Raceway east of Houston,” the NICB said in a release, adding that there are about 23,000 cars and trucks at that site alone. The insured vehicles will be processed and rebranded with a salvage title and then either sold at auction for parts or crushed and sold for scrap, the NICB said. The cars and trucks will have their VINs entered into the NICB’s VINCheck database, where consumers can see if a vehicle has been damaged or branded as salvaged. The VINs are also put into the National Motor...