Selling a dead or junk car in Fernley

The two-car rule in Section 16.01.03

The code makes it unlawful "to keep, for any reason more than 2 junk, inoperable, or unregistered vehicles," unless one of the code's exemptions applies. Beyond the count, it sets two placement rules:

• the cars "must be placed outside of the front yard setback area"
• they must be hidden from view, or under a tarp or a fitted cover

A business that sells or repairs junk cars or their parts for profit out of a home also has to meet the Development Code's Home Occupations rules first.

The clock: once notified, you have 15 days to comply. The fine comes late in Fernley. A civil penalty, capped at $100 for each day, applies only "upon the third violation."

State law sets the same two-car ceiling across Nevada for unregistered cars no longer fit for the highway, with its own civil penalty capped at $100 a day, and it lets a city adopt its own ordinance on the same conduct. Fernley's adds the setback and the cover.

Posted streets and sheriff impounds

Where the city council has posted signs, Section 30.04.05 caps street parking at one hour. When a deputy sheriff spots an illegally parked car, a written notice goes on it. Under Section 30.10.06, if nobody answers that notice within ten days, the parking violation stands.

The same section calls an illegally parked vehicle "a nuisance" that "may be impounded by any deputy sheriff." Only the owner or an authorized agent can claim it, and only after the garage has been paid for the tow and the storage. See towed or impounded for the next steps.

When Nevada law calls a car junk

Under state law, a "junk vehicle" is discarded or abandoned, wrecked or inoperative, unregistered or unclaimed within 15 days of notice, and worth no more than $500 as scrap. An unregistered car with an unknown owner may get a posted warning that it is subject to being junked after 7 days, and the owner can ask a justice court for a hearing. If a tow operator holds a car appraised at $500 or less and the owner does not reclaim it within 15 days of a certified-mail notice, the owner's interest is waived. The $500 in both rules is a line the law draws, not what anyone pays for a car.

Title and plates for a Fernley car

Titles come from the Nevada DMV, not from Lyon County. The DMV's seller steps call for a correctly signed title, a photo ID whose name agrees with it, the mileage for model years 2011 on, and a Bill of Sale (VP-104) to file away. Your signature should copy the printed name letter for letter. With "AND" between owners both sign; with "OR" either can. The seller steps list no notary. Pay off any loan before the sale, and from model year 2011 on, the buyer must get the paper title itself. A lost Nevada title is replaced with form VP 012 for $20.00 to a Nevada address; see junk car with no title.

Keep the plates. Before ending the policy on the car, file the DMV's "Registration Cancellation and Vehicle Resale Notification" through MyDMV. Within 60 days, move the plates to another vehicle or turn them in. Yearly smog checks cover only urban Clark and Washoe counties, and Fernley is in Lyon County; on a private sale that check falls to whoever buys. After you sell covers the rest.

Getting an offer

Call (877) 421-6008 or use the form. Four details start it: make and model, a mileage guess, if the starter still spins the engine, and the owner or lienholder printed on the Nevada title. Our tow can load it at a tarp-covered spot in a side yard, a shop along Main Street, or the garage that towed it. Sparks lies 28.0 miles off and Reno 35.2, measured in a straight line. Statewide rules live on the Nevada page.