Selling a junk or dead car in Miami Lakes

Four kinds of problem car

Section 17-3 sorts them by type:

• Junk: "incapable of being propelled or driven by its own engine"
• Wrecked: damage whose repair "exceeds the sum of $500.00" (a legal test, not a price)
• Stripped: parts have been removed
• Dilapidated: "fallen into partial ruin especially through neglect or misuse"

A car cover does not make a car invisible to the code. Only "a maximum of two vehicles" may sit under covers on any private property, and they must rest on an approved parking surface.

The garage rule and the midnight swale ban

The zoning code, Section 13-1508, leaves little room: "Unlicensed vehicles and inoperable vehicles may only be placed and kept on a lot in a closed garage." A driveway does not qualify, and neither does the side of the house.

Swales close overnight. Between midnight and 6 a.m. a swale must stay empty, though a vehicle may use the driveway approach if it leaves the sidewalk clear. The town can grant an emergency exception for a single vehicle per residence for no more than 48 hours, and a longer hardship waiver only when the garage and driveway approach are already full.

Five days after the notice

When an abandoned vehicle turns up on public property, the officer places a notice on it and follows Florida's abandoned property statutes. The notice warns the car "must be removed within five days from date of this notice; otherwise it shall be presumed to be abandoned and will be removed and destroyed by order of the Town of Miami Lakes." If it is still there five days after posting and mailing, and no reasonable cause has been shown, the officer may have it taken away.

Title and tag, Miami-Dade style

For Miami Lakes the closest listed office is a downtown Miami one: (305) 375-5448, at 200 NW 2nd Ave. In a straight line it is about 12 miles to the southeast.

The seller signs a Florida title with no notary present. The plate belongs to you: take it off, then move it to another car or turn it in if you cancel its coverage. The state also wants the notice of sale, HSMV 82050, inside 30 days; it ends your liability for the car.

Lapsed registration is common on a car that sat. Miss a renewal and Florida adds a flat delinquent fee, $5 at the low end and $250 at the top, scaled to the license tax. Time in dead storage is different: no license tax is owed for it once an affidavit, notarized or certified, proves the car was off the road. Sitting for years goes further.

Your offer

Call (877) 421-6008, or use the online offer. Share the model year, make, model, mileage and title status. Closed garage or driveway, either is fine for the truck. Nearby: Hialeah Gardens, Hialeah, Miramar. Won't start? Read car doesn't run, or the Florida page.