[Bursonaw]

Here’s an update on my title woes. I have spent several hours talking to the Virginia, Idaho, Washington State and Oregon DMV’s. I was able to get some history on my car and the car out of Oregon. My car was titled in Idaho in 1998 until I purchased the car in 2014 and prior to 1998 the car was purchased out of Washington State. The Oregon car is a 36 2dr Coupe and was titled in Oregon sometime in 2017 after it was purchased out of Washington state. When I contacted the Washington DMV, I found that they have no record of either car, as they do not keep records beyond six years if a vehicle has been inactive in their system. The vin number search ended for both cars there, But did find it interesting that the both cars history lead to Washington state sometime in the 60’s.
Prior to 2019 the NMVTIS (National Motor Vehicle Title Information System) was rolled out nationally, however some states are still not on the system. Oregon joined the NMVTIS system in 2020, but if a title is transferred within the same state they do not do a title search in the NMVTIS system. Some other states might do the same. This does not explain how more than one car could have the same vin number. So that’s why in the NMVTIS system it showed that both cars were merged in 2017 and neither myself or the Oregon car owner was ever notified of any issues. So after much discussion Oregon DMV, they reached out to their NMVTIS division and they told me that they have now separated the titles of both cars and verified that they are separate cars even though they have the same vin number. At this point I am waiting for the NMVTIS system to be updated and show that my Idaho title is now clear so it can be titled in Virginia. There is still no answer as to how the cars wound up with the same vin number but I do have some theory’s. In 1936 Ford put the vin number on the chassis and the transmission. If the cars were in the same shop they could have swapped transmissions or frames during restoration then sold them to someone in different states and it wasn’t discovered until the NMVTIS system was in place. Once this is all settled I plan to pay for a vehicle history report from NMVTIS just to have an official record of my title history. Hopefully by next week I will have a final answer from Virgina DMV. I will keep everyone posted, thank you everyone for your posts and support!