Selling a dead or junk Kia

From a Seoul bicycle-era company to West Point, Georgia

Kia was founded in May 1944 and is based in Seoul, South Korea. It opened its first integrated car assembly plant, the Sohari Plant, in 1973. Its first cars were the Brisa range of small cars in 1974, built on Mazda designs, followed by the Brisa II family car in 1975.

Today Hyundai Motor Company is Kia's largest shareholder. As of 2025 it held 35.17% of the company, or 36.99% counting related parties.

For the US market, Kia builds cars at Kia Motors Manufacturing Georgia in West Point, a plant Kia opened as a $1 billion facility. It also built a $1 billion plant in Nuevo León, Mexico, which makes 300,000 cars a year. In Europe, its plant near Žilina, Slovakia, began mass production of the EV4 hatchback on August 20, 2025, Kia's first fully electric car built in Europe.

The EPA's fuel economy list starts Kia in the 1993 model year, with the Sephia. The Sportage followed for 1995 and is still sold.

Which Kias draw the most NHTSA complaints

We counted the NHTSA complaints from Kia owners across every model year of each model on October 10, 2026. Each complaint is what an owner reported, not a proven defect. A model sold for twenty years has been out there much longer to pile them up than one that came out in 2024.

Those seven hold 35,818 of the 43,879 complaints. A few things stand out:

• The Sorento leads by a wide margin, with almost a quarter of every Kia complaint. It has also been on sale since 2003, longer than any Kia except the Sportage.
• The Optima's count is high for a car that ended in 2020. Its successor, the K5, has 499 complaints from 2021 on.
• The Telluride already has 2,043 after six model years, more than the Sedona minivan collected in twenty.
• The newest Kias have had little time. The EV3, listed only for 2027, has none yet; the K4 has 58 and the EV9 has 255.

Each model page breaks its count down by year and by the component owners named.

The theft problem, and what it means for a dead Kia

One thing reaches across many Kias at once: theft. Wikipedia records that in May 2023, after a class action, Kia and Hyundai agreed to pay a $200 million settlement to consumers who suffered losses because of the security flaws. On August 16, 2023, a federal judge rejected that proposed settlement. States, Washington among them, also settled with the two makers over the missing anti-theft technology.

A Kia that was stolen often comes back with a smashed steering column, a cracked ignition, broken glass or parts gone. Sometimes the insurer pays out and leaves you with the car. Our Kia and Hyundai theft damage guide covers that case, and selling a car with no keys helps if the keys went missing as well.

Selling a Kia that will not run

You don't strip anything before the sale. Sell the whole car as it sits: the battery, the catalytic converter and everything else stay on it, and it leaves on our truck.

1. Have the year, model and mileage ready. The VIN helps if you can read it through the windshield.
2. Let us know if it starts, if the wheels roll and the steering works, and which parts are broken or gone.
3. Say whether you hold the title. Lost it? Start with selling a junk car with no title.
4. Tell us where it is parked: a driveway, a lot, a street, or the shop where it gave out.

The truck comes to the car, and pickup is free anywhere in the US. Once it is gone, deal with the plates and the paperwork.

Rather talk it through? Call (877) 421-6008.

Every Kia model on this site

All 24 Kia nameplates in the EPA list, with the model years the list shows. Data for the latest years is not complete yet. A model listed as ending in 2025 or 2026 could still be sold new. Complaint counts are as of October 10, 2026.