Selling a junk or project car in Garner

The rear-yard rule and its renewal

The one car allowed outside must be "entirely concealed from public view from a public street and from abutting premises by an acceptable covering." For each extra year, the town looks for "identifiable work" done in the past year and more planned for the next. Any second or third junked car belongs inside a fully closed garage or building.

A car near the end of a restoration gets one more option. If it has its wheels, tires, glass and roof, and the bodywork and paint are done but it is waiting on a part, it may sit under a cover in a carport instead of the rear yard.

Break those location or cover rules and you are in violation under Section 10-118. Separately, the authorizing official may order any junked car off the property once it is found, in writing, that "the aesthetic benefits of removing the vehicle outweigh the burdens imposed on the private property owner."

What Garner will not tow

Section 10-127 sets limits on the town. As a general policy it leaves private-property cases to state-law procedures whenever the landowner can use them. It will not tow from private land without a written request, except a nuisance or junked car it has ordered removed. And it will not use its state-law powers on a car "used on a regular basis for business or personal use." The code says simply keeping an inoperable car is not use.

Seven days' notice, by windshield and mail

Garner's Section 10-120 puts the notice on the windshield or somewhere easy to see, with a tow date "no sooner than seven (7) days after the notice is affixed or mailed." If the car is junked or a nuisance and the town can find the owner's address, a first-class letter goes out too. You may appeal instead of moving the car. Section 10-121 lets the town skip notice when a car blocks a driveway or business entrance, creates a traffic hazard, or damages property.

Once a car is impounded, Section 10-130 makes it unlawful to take it from the storage lot before the towing and impoundment fees, or a bond, are paid.

Title, plates and inspection

In Garner, title work runs through NCDMV rather than the county, either at a plate agency or through the mail. Its Raleigh office at 4121 New Bern Ave. is roughly 8 miles north of Garner in a straight line. Have the notary watch you sign the back of the title.

If the car will only ever be parts, its title can be junked: marked JUNKED, assigned with a notarized signature, and no new title issued. A car missing parts is often headed that way.

Your plate is yours to keep. A Garner plate that won't go on another car goes back by mail or to a plate agency while the insurance is still active. Part of the fee may come back to you. Garner is in Wake County, so emissions testing applies, though a car 20 or more years old skips that test.

Getting an offer

Call (877) 421-6008 or use the form. Give us the car, its mileage, if it can drive itself, and the owner listed on the title. Not sure whether to sell the project in pieces? See part it out or sell it whole. The truck meets the car in the rear yard, the carport or the curb. Raleigh and Clayton are each under 10 miles away; the North Carolina page has the state rules.