This article on car finance check is purely for reference purposes only and does not attempt to provide legal advice.
A finance agreement is where the financial institution purchases the car you want and hires the car to you over an agreed period of time. When the final payment is paid, the ownership of the car transfers to you.
Until the final payment is made the car is owned by the financial institution but you will have full use of the car for the term of the finance agreement.
Before you can sell the vehicle you must repay the full amount of finance outstanding.
You can easily discover if there is finance outstanding on a vehicle with most of our Vehicle History Reports. Have a look at our Vehicle Check Pricing for more information on the different reports available, and which ones cover car finance checks.
Once we have the vehicle registration, we provide car finance checks by:
Due to Data Protection, the only information we can provide is whether the vehicle is clear of outstanding finance or not. No additional information can be given for car finance in Ireland.
The owner has the responsibility to ensure no outstanding finance is found. It will be your responsibility to settle the finance if you purchase a vehicle with outstanding finance or it could be repossessed by the financial institution.
Contact the seller as they are responsible for clearing the finance before selling the car.
Some people may try to sell the car in order to pay the outstanding car finance but it is important to highlight that ownership of the car does not transfer in this situation as it is still owned by the financial institution.
Unless you know and trust the seller it is a highly risky process to agree to buy the car in this case as you are relying on the seller to follow through and clear the finance.
The financial institution will only deal with the person who took out the car finance, so you will not be able to contact them yourself. This will also make it difficult to find out how much is owed as well as who took out the finance.
However if you took out the finance you can arrange to pay the balance with the relevant financial institution.
You are only covered by the Consumer Protection Act 2007 if the car was bought from a Commercial Dealer. For more information contact the National Consumer Agency.
Consumer to Consumer transactions are not covered by the Consumer Protection Act 2007 or the Sale of Goods Act. We recommend you seek legal advice in this case.
You can find more information on car finance check in Ireland concerning advice on buying a used car and on consumer protection commission. For more details on car finance in Ireland consult MyWheels Vehicle history help centre.