Selling a junk or dead car in Missouri

Who handles Missouri titles

The state does. The Missouri Department of Revenue's Motor Vehicle Bureau issues titles, and applications are taken by the bureau in Jefferson City or by any Missouri license office.

What goes on the title from you:

• In your own hand: the mileage from the odometer and the sale date.
• Your signature as seller. The Department of Revenue says no notary is needed for these signatures.
• Clean writing. Correction fluid and erasures are not allowed on the title.

A Missouri buyer also receives a safety inspection certificate from the past 60 days, an emissions inspection where required, and a notarized Lien Release (Form 4809) when a loan was ever recorded. Giving the car away? Write "GIFT" where the price goes. The General Affidavit (Form 768) for a gift does not need a notary.

Your plates come off first

The plates are yours to keep. Expired or current, they come off before the buyer gets the car.

Report the sale within 30 days

In Missouri, the seller tells the Department of Revenue about the sale. Within 30 days, a seller who is not a dealer files one of two forms: DOR-5049, the Notice of Sale, or DOR-1957, the Bill of Sale. On newer titles, DOR-5049A is printed as a tear-off strip you can use.

No title? Two routes

Get a duplicate. Apply at any license office or the Motor Vehicle Bureau. The cost is $8.50 for the duplicate plus a $9 processing fee, paid to the Department of Revenue.

Use the scrap route for an old, dead car. RSMo 301.227 allows a sale with no title to a scrap metal operator when the car is inoperable and ten or more model years old. Before buying, the operator checks for liens online, then sends the Department a bill of sale along with a copy of your state ID. Missouri skips the lien check for a car 20 model years old. The bill of sale certifies four things: its model year is ten or more years back, it is inoperable, it has no lien, and you have legal authority to sell it.

"Inoperable" has a strict meaning in that law: "rusted, wrecked, discarded, worn out, extensively damaged, dismantled and mechanically inoperative," with its highest and best use as scrap. A car that just needs a battery does not fit.

There is also a path for very old cars. Once a car reaches 26 model years, the Director can issue a junking certificate based on a bill of sale alone, after the highway patrol checks that it was not stolen. More in our guide to selling a junk car with no title.

Salvage brands on Missouri titles

RSMo 301.010 calls a car a "salvage vehicle" when, in its first six model years, it is damaged badly enough that fixing it would run past eighty percent of what it is fairly worth. An owner, a secured party or an insurer can also declare it salvage.

Missouri's Titling Manual names these brands: "Salvage", "Damaged", "Rebuilt", "Rebuilt Salvage", "Flood Damaged" and "Previously Damaged".

When a car is sold for salvage or dismantling, the buyer has ten days to get the title to the Director, with an $8.50 application, for a salvage certificate. A junking certificate is the paper that lets its holder possess, transport or assign the car as parts, scrap or junk. See our salvage title guide.

Missouri's junk-car rules

The state-level test for a junk car is the "inoperable" definition above, and the paperwork is the salvage or junking certificate. Rules about keeping a dead car in your yard come mostly from cities and counties. Under RSMo 304.157, a city or county may pass an ordinance for towing vehicles off real property. For local rules, open a town page. Most quote the city code directly, such as Kansas City and Springfield.

Towing and abandoned cars

• Private land: law enforcement may authorize a tow once abandoned property sits unattended past 48 hours, and earlier when it creates a safety hazard.
• Urban interstates and freeways: removal may come after ten hours.
• Notice: within five working days, the owner on record and any lienholder are sent written notice of the tow. The Director of Revenue searches records for them within five working days of the report.
• Hold period: a city or county holds the car 30 days after the notice. The wait is only 10 days when the car is over six years old, worth under $200 and more than 50% damaged. After that it goes to a licensed salvage or scrap business.

A dead car parked on the street is the kind that ends up on that short clock. See towed or impounded cars.

Inspections that come with the sale

Missouri puts the inspections on the seller:

• Safety: a certificate issued in the last 60 days. In Missouri, a car under 150,000 miles is exempt until ten years after its model year.
• Emissions: Missouri sellers living in St. Louis City, or in St. Louis, St. Charles or Jefferson County, hand over an emissions test done in the last 60 days.

A Missouri car that fails either one is tough to sell to a private buyer. We take it as it sits.

How a Missouri sale goes

1. Locate the title, or order a duplicate.
2. Describe the car to us: does it start, what is missing, and its location.
3. Fill in the odometer and date, then sign. No notary.
4. Remove the plates before the car leaves.
5. Send the sale report to the state inside 30 days.

Missouri's biggest cities

Figures are Census population estimates. Every one of these cities has free pickup.

Every Missouri town we cover

Each page has that town's local rules on junk and parked cars.

Kansas City · St. Louis · Springfield · Columbia · Independence · Lee's Summit · O'Fallon · St. Charles · St. Joseph · Blue Springs · St. Peters · Joplin · Florissant · Wentzville · Chesterfield · Jefferson City · Cape Girardeau · Wildwood · University City · Liberty · Ballwin · Kirkwood · Raytown · Maryland Heights · Gladstone · Grandview · Nixa · Belton · Ozark · Webster Groves · Sedalia · Arnold · Rolla · Warrensburg

Questions about a Missouri car? Call (877) 421-6008.

Cities and towns in Missouri

• Arnold
• Ballwin
• Belton
• Blue Springs
• Cape Girardeau
• Chesterfield
• Columbia
• Florissant
• Gladstone
• Grandview
• Independence
• Jefferson City
• Joplin
• Kansas City
• Kirkwood
• Lee's Summit
• Liberty
• Maryland Heights
• Nixa
• O'Fallon
• Ozark
• Raytown
• Rolla
• Sedalia
• Springfield
• St. Charles
• St. Joseph
• St. Louis
• St. Peters
• University City
• Warrensburg
• Webster Groves
• Wentzville
• Wildwood