A New Jersey Assembly committee has advanced legislation designed to protect consumers from unknowingly buying vehicles that were damaged by Hurricane Sandy.

Assemblyman Chris Brown is one of the sponsors of the bill that would require the seller of a vehicle to disclose whether it ever suffered weather-related damage requiring repairs from a named storm.

 “We really need to be on the lookout and do what we can to make sure that wide scale fraud does not occur and that people don’t take advantage of others knowing that their car really doesn’t work right but they want to unload it on some unsuspecting person and they portray it as though everything is fine.”

Insurance companies and banks now inform the state Motor Vehicle Commission so a title is changed to show that a car was water damaged.

 The legislation would make sellers responsible for designating that on the certificate of ownership or the bill of sale.