Selling a junk car in Menifee

Why Menifee calls it a nuisance

The chapter rests on Vehicle Code 22660, which hands cities the power to abate these cars. Menifee's council found that stored wrecks tend "to reduce the value of private property," "to invite plundering" and "to create fire hazards." Section 11.20.010 also lists "abandoned or inoperable vehicles" among the attractive nuisances that can draw in children. Any car like that in the city counts as a public nuisance, unless the chapter allows it.

When the letter comes

Menifee's notice of intention tells the land owner to remove the car "within 10 days from the date of mailing of this notice." Inside that ten-day window, the landowner or the car's owner can also request a public hearing from the Vehicle Abatement Officer. It is heard by a city official the City Manager picks from outside the enforcement department. Own the land but not the car? Swear in writing that you are not responsible, before the 10 days end, and Menifee treats that as your hearing request; attendance is optional. Hearing notices go out by registered mail no later than ten days before the date.

Miss the deadline and the city can take the car without any hearing. It can then go to a scrapyard or dismantler "Five days after adoption of the order declaring the vehicle or parts thereof to be a public nuisance or five days from the date of mailing of notice of the decision," whichever is later. From then on it stays a wreck, unless it could carry horseless carriage or historical vehicle plates.

Parked on a Menifee street

Section 12.20.030 sets a separate 72-hour limit for any vehicle or trailer left standing in one place on a city highway, running or not. Shuffling it along the curb won't help: after a tag, the code bars parking it again "within a radius of 500 feet from the original location."

Signing it over

California has no county title office; the DMV does it, at field offices the state runs. Sign the Certificate of Title on the seller's line, get the lender to sign as well if one is listed, and hand it over; the buyer submits it. Those DMV seller instructions skip any notary. Then, inside five days, report the sale on REG 138 through dmv.ca.gov/nrl or the mail. Menifee sellers should not skip it: when a buyer later dumps a car, that report of sale is what clears the last registered owner of the abandonment infraction and any balance owed after a lien sale.

Regular plates normally go with the car. A Junk application is different: at that point the plates are turned in to the DMV. After you sell lists the last steps.

Getting an offer

Reach us at (877) 421-6008 or online to get a car in Menifee picked up. The truck can meet it at your house, your job, or the spot where it gave out. Perris is 7.2 miles away as the crow flies; Wildomar, Murrieta and Hemet are close too, and California covers statewide law.