A Virginia woman says she found herself in a financial mess after discovering that the used car she bought from a private seller wasn’t what she’d been told.

Barbara Aboagye, from Woodbridge, Virginia, thought that she’d hit the jackpot, and found “a dream come true,” she told News4.

“I saw this car, a 2015 Porsche Macan,” she said. “And I love it.”

There it was, Aboagye’s dream car, listed on Facebook Marketplace by a private seller from Pennsylvania, for $25,000.

The two arranged to meet, and according to Aboagye, the seller handed her a clean title. That means there were no liens on the car, and he owned it outright.

She then secured a loan with her bank. The seller got his check, and she got her car.

For 19 months, Barbara said she’s been paying down her loan and hasn’t missed a single payment. She even paid double some months.

But the joyride came to a screeching halt when, in early spring, she looked out the window and noticed her beloved Porsche was gone.

“I was like, oh my God, what is going on? Is this stolen?” Aboagye said.

She was even more confused when she called police and they told her it wasn’t stolen — it had been repossessed.

“I said, what is going on? How come?” she said.

Aboagye’s bank told her they didn’t repossess the car, and confirmed she was current on her payments.

So if her bank didn’t order the repo, who did?

After weeks of getting no straight answers, Aboagye contacted NBC4 Responds. We went to her house to see if we could get to the bottom of the mystery, and she gathered all of her paperwork for us.

After several hours and several phone calls to all the parties involved, we found the answer: The car was still under the seller’s name when it was repossessed.

That’s the same name that was on the supposedly clean title she was given.

The seller purchased the Porsche from Carvana in 2020, and financed it through Bridgecrest — Carvana’s finance company. According to Bridgecrest, the seller was delinquent on paying the loan, only making three payments in 2022.

The company said it repossessed the vehicle not knowing about the fraudulent sale.

When Aboagye called the man she bought the car from, he told her the car was paid for.

Bridgecrest is “working with law enforcement to understand what occurred and the unlawful actions the seller took to fraudulently sell the vehicle for which he never paid,” the company told News4.

Since Aboagye was able to purchase and register the car unknowingly using a fraudulent title, the vehicle identification number was linked to her home address, which is where the tow truck was sent to repo the car.

“I’m shocked,” Aboagye said. “I’m speechless. I hear stories and stuff like that but I never knew I would be a victim one day.”

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According to Ira Rheingold, the director of the National Association of Consumer Advocates, title washing is the most common scam for vehicle titles.

“The person who sold the consumer the car clearly was the person who committed the fraud,” Rheingold said.

Title washing is when unscrupulous sellers “wash” a title to remove information, like liens or salvage.

“Fraudsters are out there. They’re always looking to take advantage of folks,” Rheingold said.

Luckily for Aboagye, her journey had a happy ending. While her repossessed dream car had been sent to an auction house, and was about to go on the auction block, both Carvana and Bridgecrest agreed to release the car so she could take it home.

“I feel so relieved,” Aboagye said as she got back behind the wheel. “Super happy. I can’t thank you guys enough. I am so grateful.”

News4 contacted the seller numerous times, but he never responded.

As for Bridgecrest, they told News4 they contacted several law enforcement agencies but haven’t heard back from any of them. They have not pursued any civil action against the seller.

How can I protect myself from title fraud?

When buying a car from a private seller, experts have a few tips:

• Ask for a photo ID and compare the names to those on the title to be sure they match.
• If the title is a duplicate, be wary and ask more questions. Ask where the original is and if you can see it.
• Get a CARFAX report. If it shows the car was salvaged, the title should reflect that. If it doesn’t, walk away from the sale.

Neighbors in this Alexandria, Virginia, community are hoping there’s power in numbers as they band together to take on their power company in their fight for accountability.

“The night that it happened, the power went out, but then it came back on and then went off, and came back on again, and it was popping all over the house,” said resident Dana Goward.

Dominion Energy said equipment failure caused two power surges, right before Christmas.

Losing their power was temporary, but it was the surges that followed when the lights came back on that caused appliances to go haywire.

“Our air conditioning unit, the compressor blew,” said resident Tina Takish. “The air conditioner is toast.”

Takish said it will cost $7,000 to replace the air conditioning unit.

Resident Lisa Harter said the transformer of her HVAC system was damaged, and she had to pay $620 to have a thermostat replaced.”

Goward also had some damage: “Our electric charger to our electric vehicle, and that was more than $500,” she said.

Connie Delorme said an outlet that was attached to a surge protector was destroyed.

Mary Rowland lost couple of surge protectors and has black smoke marks on her power box and on her cable box.

Marcia Gordon said, “I heard a bang. It cost me over $4,000 to get a new breaker box.”

These stories are just the tip of the iceberg. The neighbors sent NBC4 Responds a spreadsheet of 46 homeowners who have damages totaling more than $57,000.

Dominion Energy says it investigated the outage and subsequent surge and found an “unanticipated equipment failure” on their end. The homeowners filed claims with the power company, trying to get paid for the damages, but the company denied them.

When News4 asked Dominion Energy why, the company responded: “Unanticipated equipment failures … much like lightning strikes, are beyond the reasonable control of the company and fall to the property owner or their insurance company to fix.”

You can guess this explanation didn’t go over well with the residents.

“I mean, there needs to be some accountability,” Takish said.

Another homeowner, Jeanine Lauth, said, “It seems to me, if it was their faulty equipment, they should be responsible for damage.”

However, when people sign up for utility service, they sign a contract that’s loaded with all types of terms and conditions, and those contracts often can be hundreds of pages long. If you were to read through Dominion Energy’s terms and conditions, settle in for a bit: It totals 366 pages.

“Not all of it is super legible to the average person,” said Kajsa Foskey of the Virginia Poverty Law Center, which advocates on behalf of utility customers.

“So you might be signing something that says, if this particular thing happens, the utility is not liable for the outcomes. They’re not responsible for damages or paying for it,” Foskey said. “And sometimes, folks don’t understand that that’s what they’re signing up for.”

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And if you don’t agree with the terms of the utility company, unfortunately, the way the system is set up, she says, you’re stuck with them.

“If you live in a particular service area, your provider is going to be whoever has the contract with that particular area to provide the service,” Foskey said. “I mean, realistically your options are: Move.”

The homeowners also filed complaints with the State Corporation Commission, which regulates utility companies in Virginia. But Lisa Hartley and Marcia Gordon said that was a dead end, too.

The homeowners shared emails from the commission that said it “does not adjudicate damage claims. Damage claims need to be filed directly with the utility company” or their insurance company, or “filed through your local civil court.”

When News4 asked the commission what complaints would fall under their jurisdiction, they told us issues including billing, metering and bad customer service.

“I don’t know how anyone could listen to all of us and everything that we’ve just thrown out there and just not assume liability?” resident Lisa Harter said. “That’s not, that doesn’t make sense to me.”

Customers do have a right to request the commission to initiate a formal investigation, which is a public process in which the utility company will need to issue a response. The homeowners said they’re going to try this next and will let us know the outcome.