Salvage vehicles on Ebay-"like new"perfect"condition

[PHOEBISIS]

I know a lot of you guys must haunt-hunt Ebay for cars and such-just for the heck of it-even when you aren't in full buy mode.
Has anyone else noticed all the Salvage vehicles with low miles and recent production-2002 and better-that are described as like new,perfect condition??The usual tale is that"the car was in a small wreck that just dinged fender,bumper,light etc,but didn't "injure" the frame,drivetrain,or suspension?
Now in the pictures the cars look just fine,but any decent body shop can make a car look good in a low resolution picture,or even in person if you aren't some sort of expert.
What is the real story?I know darned well that insurance companies don't total out$20,000+ vehicles with just $1500$5000 worth of damage!I doubt they would total out a $20,000 vehicle,if it had just $14000 worth of repairs.(actual price you could sell it for before wreck).Are they just outright lying about the extent of original damage?Or,lying about the original damage-maybe flood instead of wreck?
At what point do insurance companies total a vehicle-what percent of pre wreck value?Thanks.Charlie

[baseballfanz]

Bottom line it's "salvage".

[tnbowhunter]

If your going to buy one of these cars you will have a hard time unloading it come trade in time. Most dealers will not take one in on trade. Plus it will have a big S or a reconstruct on the title. Undoubtably some of these cars-trucks are fixed right but unless your planning on keeping it for a long, long time or just going to use it for a beater they aren't worth it in my opinion.

[dragkaw]

A friend of mine's father was in florida and drove by a Crysler dealer and saw a Prowler just the color he had always wanted and stopped in to look at it got offered an unbelivable deal and had like 50 miles on it. When they sat down to do the paperwork the title had some kind of different name and ....... TITLE so he called his son and asked him if he had ever heard about any kind of titl like that. He called a Car dealer locally and they said you would have a hard time finding insurance as something had happened to it. Called him back before signing any papers told him not to buy it but find out why it had that kind of title. Turns out by law they have to tell you and after some pressure the salesperson said it fell off a car hauler on the interstate and was draged for about 1/2 a mile upside down. They had it fixed but the insurance industry does not like to re-insure a totalled vehicle. So they told me. So be careful what you do when buying stuff that has been salvaged get the vin call iti n to your insurance agent and check it out. Happy Salvaging!