Sell your dead or junk car in Miami

When the car dies in a city garage

The MPA's booting rule covers cars inside garages and lots it owns or runs, such as the Courthouse Center Garage at 40 NW 3rd Street. For a car parked over 72 hours and judged abandoned or inoperable, the code says the MPA "may attempt to notify the owner" and ask for it to be moved before the boot goes on. It does not have to.

The notice on the window says four things: the car is booted, trying to move the boot will damage the car, the number to call MPA staff, and the fee to take the boot off. With a car that cannot be driven out anyway, the useful call is to the buyer who will haul it.

If the police towed it

Miami's code gives owners clear rights after a police tow. Under Section 42-112 the towing company must contact the registered owner who was not there when the car was taken:

• by phone within two business days, if a number is readily available
• otherwise by mail, with a good-faith effort within three business days to send the lien notice required by F.S. 713.78, and "in no case" later than seven working days after the tow

You will be told where the car is, how to get it back, and that you can ask for a hearing within seven working days of getting the notice. At that hearing the city must show probable cause for the tow and the charges. If the hearing officer finds the tow company's notice was not adequate, "the storage charges of the tow company cannot be collected" or are refunded.

You do not have to wait for the hearing. Posting a cash or security bond equal to the towing and storage fees with the police department gets the car released right away. A separate section, 42-121, covers cars seized over drugs, prostitution or illegal dumping; getting one of those back takes a $500 bond or a $500 administrative penalty, plus towing and storage. Our towed or impounded guide covers selling once it is out.

A dead car at home

The city code sections we reviewed for this page do not set a time limit for a non-running car in a private driveway. That does not mean there is none. The city may have its own rules in parts of the code not covered here, so check with the city before you count on keeping it.

Some limits are clear from the zoning code. Section 2502 bars an automotive care service center from "storage of automobiles not in operating condition," and a towing establishment's definition leaves out "accessory storage of inoperable vehicles." So a shop that is holding your dead car may want it gone.

State law fills in two gaps. When an ownerless wreck is found on public property in Miami, Chapter 705 has a notice posted giving five days to haul it off. And when a tow company pulls a car off private land without the owner agreeing to it, Florida law limits how far it can go: in a county of at least 500,000 people, the storage lot has to sit within 10 miles of the spot the car was removed from; smaller counties allow 15.

The Miami-Dade title office

Miami-Dade's FLHSMV location at 200 NW 2nd Ave, (305) 375-5448, is a short hop: as the crow flies, it lies less than a mile east of central Miami. You may not need it. A paper title gets signed over at home. Fill in the seller's block on its front: buyer name, street address, odometer number, agreed amount, sale day. Florida asks for no notary.

An electronic title is the exception. There is no paper to sign, so the buyer and the seller both appear in person at a service center with photo ID, and the reassignment and odometer disclosure happen there. Any lender's lien must be settled, with the lender reporting it, before ownership can change.

Water damage and total losses

Under Florida law, a car becomes a total loss when the repair bill at the time of the damage would take 80 percent or more of the money needed to replace it with a similar car. If an insurer totals it because of water, it becomes a flood vehicle, and the state must stamp the title before it can be sold. FLHSMV calls that stamp a brand, and insurers report flooded cars. See flood damage for more on flooded cars.

No title at all? When the car has ten or more model years behind it and is valued under $1,000, Florida offers the derelict certificate, HSMV 82137, so it can be sold for scrap; the buyer must hold a salvage dealer license or be a registered secondary metals recycler. The form even has room to name the driver and transport company doing the hauling. That car is scrapped and never titled again.

After the sale

Keep the plate; in Florida it leaves with the seller. The Notice of Sale is due within 30 days, filed on HSMV 82050, and the statute asks it to name the VIN along with the buyer's full name and home address. That removes the car from your record. Dropping the insurance on that plate, or moving out of state, means the plate goes back to a service center. After you sell has the full list.

Getting an offer in Miami

Call (877) 421-6008 or begin online. Give us the year and model, an idea of the mileage, whether it still runs, and what the title situation is. A driver comes to wherever it stopped: a home driveway, a repair shop, a parking garage, or an apartment lot. Nearby city pages include Hialeah, Miami Beach and Coral Gables, and the Florida page covers the whole state.