How does VINwiki work?
VINwiki creates vehicle timelines that include posts by our users. Those posts include photos, text, dates, mileage, and location. Over time, this paints a more vivid picture of a car’s life than we have ever been able to find before. When future buyers search for information on a car, our content is prolific and available. This allows owners and enthusiasts to add value to a car by staying organized and telling the car’s story here.
How else can I use VINwiki?
When you land on VINwiki’s web site or app, you will see a very cool social feed. These are the posts being made by the people you follow and on the cars that you follow. You can see what your friends are doing to their cars and you can keep track of cars you owned in the past or want to own one day in the future. You can also browse around and see what kinds of maintenance issues people who own cars like yours are seeing a few miles down the road so that you can make more informed decisions and see what is coming.
Do I need a VIN to post?
Yes, you do. That is what allows us to uniquely identify each car as a subject. Your posts are valuable to the history of that car so we want to make sure they get to the right place.
Where can I find my VIN?
Your VIN will be located several places on your car. It will be at the base of the windshield, with a barcode on the doorjamb (which our scanner can read), on the frame and several other places. It will also be on your insurance card, state registration, title, and any loan documents that you have. You can also call your insurance agent and they can provide you with a list of the VINs for all of the cars you have insured with them in the past. This is a great way to quickly find the VINs to the cars that you have owned in the past so you can plug them into VINwiki and see where they are now.
What types of posts are useful on VINwiki?
This is a great question. The real answer is anything! We act under the theory that any information about the history of a car is compelling to a future buyer. Even if it is just a great photo of your car, stopping at your favorite restaurant, road trip updates, or a remark about your favorite feature; it all helps tell the story of your car. Of course the things everyone looks for also make great post – tire replacement, fuel mileage tracking, servicing, repairs, and transactional records.
Can VINwiki help me clean out my glovebox?
It certainly can. The best thing you can do with those receipts and records is make them available to future buyers. Just snap a photo of the receipt and post it to VINwiki then you never have to think about it again. Trying to remember when your last service was? Scroll through your vehicle’s timeline and you will see when it was.
What if my car is in an accident?
Accident information is a crucial aspect of vehicle history reporting. It is one of those questions that everyone knows to ask when buying a used car. This is where VINwiki really keeps you in control. While other history reporting sources use police data and insurance data to make assumptions about how severe an accident was, you get the explain what happened. Take photos of the extent of the damage, document the repair process, and show the finished result. Put the concerns of future buyers to rest with comprehensive, transparent, disclosure and they will thank you for it by paying you more and asking fewer questions.
Is there any security risk to posting to VINwiki?
Not at all. In fact, VIN number are required to be publicly visible on your car. Registration info is part of the public record. VINwiki is taking those two realities and letting you use them to your own benefit.
How does VINwiki add value to my car?
This is a great question. Our goal here is two fold. We want people to document their lives with their car and we want the output of those posts to mean more money when you are ready to sell. We have all seen vehicle listings with very little information, unclear history, and strange descriptions. VINwiki offers the buyer a look beyond the ad. When people look at a car without any knowledge of its history, they have to factor in all of the unknown history in as issues that they may have to repair. When you show what service items have already been dealt with and how reliable the car has been based on the preventative maintenance you have performed, they can pay more based on the peace of mind. You care about your car and VINwiki is the place to show that.
What if the information is inaccurate?
We use the name VINwiki because a wiki style site is community managed. All post that seem suspicious or inaccurate can be flagged for removal. Obviously we cannot guarantee the accuracy of all of the content on VINwiki but our community does a great job of managing it for us. We always recommend qualified inspections on cars during a purchase process but we hope that the content of VINwiki can be useful as you consider the purchase of a car.
What else do you guys have planned?
We have some big ideas for the directions that VINwiki can go in. We want to offer more data from your car’s manufacturer, we want to learn what service patterns and problems are common on each car, we want to use the masses of data coming in to let you make more informed decisions. Your car’s story is your story as well and we are here with the unending mission of making it easier, more efficient, and more enjoyable for you to tell it.
