Data methodology — Milo the Motor Mole Report

How Milo gathers data

Milo does the digging so you don't have to. He builds every report from public records, live market data, and real owner experience — then uses AI to turn it into a straight, plain-English read on the car. Here's exactly where it comes from.

NHTSA — federal safety data

Open recalls, owner-filed complaints, defect investigations, Technical Service Bulletins (TSBs), and NCAP crash-test star ratings — pulled straight from the U.S. government's vehicle databases.

EPA — FuelEconomy.gov

Official EPA fuel-economy figures and estimated running costs for the exact year and trim.

Live used-market listings

Real asking prices and how long cars are sitting on the lot, drawn from active dealer and marketplace inventory, to compute a fair market value you can negotiate against.

eBay parts marketplace

Typical real-world prices and photos for the parts most likely to fail, so repair-cost estimates reflect what components actually cost.

Wikipedia & Wikimedia Commons

Correct-generation vehicle photography, matched to the exact model year.

YouTube

Repair walkthroughs, diagnosis videos, and the sentiment in owner comments about what breaks and how the car drives.

Reddit & owner forums

What real owners say about living with the car — the common failures, quirks, and “is this normal?” intel a listing will never mention.

Today's fuel & charging prices

Current gas, diesel, and electricity prices, so your running-cost estimate reflects what you'd actually pay now — at the pump or the plug — instead of a number from years ago.

Theft & insurance-cost risk

How often this model tends to get stolen and roughly how pricey it is to insure — so there are no surprises when you call for a quote or park it on the street.

Full vehicle history (add a VIN)

Enter a specific car's VIN and Milo checks its title records, salvage, flood, and total-loss flags, and reported odometer readings — the hidden past a clean-looking listing won't show you.

Milo's AI analysis (Anthropic Claude)

Every source above is synthesized into the plain-English verdict, the mileage-by-mileage failure timeline, real repair-cost ranges, and your negotiation number.

Milo reports at the model level — the documented patterns for that year, make, and model — which makes it a complement to a VIN-specific history like Carfax, not a replacement. Everything here is decision-support and educated forecasting, not a guarantee about any one car. Sources are queried live and cached briefly, so coverage can vary by vehicle.