Trailer VIN Check: registration history, damage and other problem records.

Trailer VIN check for major history and problem records has been added to all major vehicle history providers in recent years. Although travel trailers of pull-behind type are not motorized vehilcles they are also registered with the DMV by their VIN, have liens in their history, can be damaged, totaled and sold at salvage auctions.

Veryfy that the trailer VIN is correct before starting the search!

When you check a trailer history by VIN you should always verify that the VIN is correct. With trailers it may be even more important than with cars for the following reason. For a long time vehicle history sites have been focused of motor vehicles, mostly cars leaving out trailers. Whenever you enter a car VIN in a search box you may be sure that if the VIN is correct it will be recognized, decoded and found it the database, and if the VIN is wrong the system will respond immediately that your VIN is invalid so you can correct it and check again.

The latter type of response actually means that the VIN is deemed invalid because in the process of lookup the VIN first passes validation and verification stages where its factory specifications are decoded. If a manufacturer is not added to the database of the VIN decoding / check site a negative response is returned on this stage. As online car VIN check is a long established procedure most car manufacturers (except for maybe very exotic ones) have been added to online databases and decoding systems, which, unfortunately, is not the case with trailers. As a result, trailer VIN decoding fails more often, especially when a home made, a custom trailer or the one with a lost VIN plate has been assigned a new VIN according to the state's rules. Such VINs are present with the DMV registration records but decoding and so history search fails on many websites.

However, for the same VIN the response may be both 'invalid VIN' or 'no records found' on different sites, which may be misleading. When you know the VIN is correct you may be sure that there are no records, even if the response is 'invalid VIN'. And on the contrary, if your VIN is wrong, 'no records found' does not mean that the VIN is correct and no problem or any other essential records have been reported.

What if The VIN label / plate / tag does not have a 17-character VIN

All travel trailers manufactured after 1981 should have a 17-character VIN. But sometimes the VIN is split into different sections when etched or printed. As a result, the VIN plate may even look like a table with the property name and the VIN part that corresponds to it. You have to put all these parts together in one sequence without any separators like dashes or other signs to get a full 17-character VIN. Otherwise, some decoders will not recognize it. If you are not sure about the sequence of VIN sections check this page explaining the meaning of different VIN sections and their sequence.

In most cases, these are 2 parts where the first 11-12 characters econdingthe manufacturer's specs labeled as the VIN, although it is not complete, and the last 5-6 digts (only digits!) identifying a spesific vehicles with the given specs, are labeled as 'serial number'. The 9-th character is calcutaled based on all the other characters in the VIN and is used to verify that the VIN is correct. Please note that the serial number is just a part of the VIN, not the VIN itself.

Read about trailer VIN locations title washing if you don't know how to find the VIN or want to inspect one in person.

Which trailer types can be checked by VIN?

Today, finding a VIN history for major camper / RV type trailer manufacturers like Forest River, Coachmen, Keystone , Winnebago, Hurricane, Jayco, Fleetwood, American Coach, Coachman and other is not a problem.

Large cargo trailers, like Great Dane, Fruehauf, Heil Trailer International, Premier Trailer, Reitnouer Trailers, Stoughton which include different construction types, like Lowboy, Step Deck, Stretch Double Drop, Gooseneck and other, both powered and unpowered, as well as boat trailers, are also found being quite an expensive vehicle type.

Smaller boat trailers, car trailers or tractor cargo trailers tend to have less records or have just the basic title records but even so the situaion is better than years ago.