It is quite annoying because the defects you can have in the HU inspections in Germany are well-defined and sorted into multiple tiers: * No defects (Ohne Mäng

It is quite annoying because the defects you can have in the HU inspections in Germany are well-defined and sorted into multiple tiers: * No defects (Ohne Mängel) → pass * Negligible defects (Geringe Mängel) → pass, but owner is expected to fix the defects asap. * Significant defects (Erhebliche Mängel) → no pass, with possiblity to re-check those specific defects for a smaller fee. * Dangerous defects (Gefährliche Mängel) → no pass, car may only drive to a place where the defects are fixed. * Not roadworthy (Verkehrsunsicher) → no pass, car may not even leave the inspection yard, license plates get invalidated, authorities are notified. The article talks about some cars having "notable defects" and some cars having "any defects", and there is no indication whether they actually lump some of those defect tiers together there. It is actually quite common to have some negligible defects during any inspection, which includes stuff like broken license plate lights. Also defects on wear parts like spent brake plates obviously impact road-worthiness, so if you do not maintain your new car well and drive lice a racer, you can still get one of the higher tier defects in the first inspection. If you take your car to a shop to do the inspection, pretty much every mechanic will at least look around for the most common stuff. Even the untrustworthy shops will usually do that as they can then try to upsell you additional repairs. Also it would be good to know if they actually found structural defects like suspension or chassis issues. Those should not happen in the first inspection at all. In fact, for cheap cars defects like these are usually the death sentence. Older beater cars usually pretty much double their sell price by just having passed the HU for another 2 years.