Selling a dead or junk car in Grove City

What the city counts as a junk car

Section 521.18 of the city code makes it a nuisance to keep an inoperative car, a car without current registration, or loose auto parts on any lot in Grove City. Only a licensed, properly zoned junkyard is exempt. The code treats a car as inoperative if it has any one of these:

• a missing wheel, or a missing or flat tire
• a missing or broken window or windshield
• extensive damage, or defective or missing parts
• no current, valid registration

There is no waiting period before a car qualifies. When the city finds one, the code has it serve written notice on the owner or occupant, in person, at the home or by certified mail. From then on you have five days to end the violation. Each day after that counts as a separate offense.

City code compliance staff inspect homes and businesses by sight. Their number is (614) 277-3075.

Three more clocks to know

• 72 hours, uncovered. A car at least three years old that looks undrivable, has extensive damage and is worth no more than $1,500 can draw a certified letter under Section 303.10 once it has sat outdoors, uncovered, on private land for over 72 hours. From the day the letter arrives, you have 10 days to put the car in a garage or other structure, or remove it. Each 30 days after that is a new offense.
• 24 hours on the street. Police point to Ordinance 351.03: no vehicle may stay parked on a public street for more than 24 hours, even where no shorter limit is posted.
• Two inches of snow. Once that much falls, the code puts Grove City in a snow emergency on its own, and drivers are expected to know it. No vehicle may be parked or left on a posted snow emergency route until the mayor or a designee lifts the emergency, and Chapter 352 names inoperable cars outright. Police can remove them.

If police already towed it, call (614) 277-1710. To get a car back, Section 303.08 has you show ID and proof of ownership at the police department, which is in the Safety Complex at 3360 Park St. Then you pay any fines or bond, plus the towing and storage charges at the lot.

Grove City or Jackson Township?

A 43123 ZIP code does not put you in the city, and the city's own FAQ says so: not everyone with that ZIP lives in Grove City. It sends people to the Franklin County Auditor's site, where parcel numbers that start with 040 are Grove City and 160 is unincorporated Jackson Township. The city rules above apply inside city limits.

Title and plates from Grove City

Ohio titles run through the county Clerk of Courts, not the BMV. Two Franklin County title offices are each about 5 miles from City Hall on Broadway, measured as the crow flies: Title South, 45 Great Southern Blvd., due east, and Title West, 4153 W. Broad St., to the north. Both keep the same weekday hours, 8 a.m. until 5 p.m., except that on Wednesdays the doors open at 8:15.

When you sell, the clerk's FAQ has you write in the price, the buyer's full name and address, the date and the mileage, then sign in front of a notary. A lost title needs a duplicate first; see junk car with no title.

Under Ohio law the registration ends when the car changes hands, and you must take the plates off right away. You can move them to a car you buy later in the same registration period. Leaving them on is a fourth-degree misdemeanor. After you sell covers the rest.

Getting an offer

Online or at (877) 421-6008, give us the car's year, make and model, the miles on it, whether it starts, and where the title stands. The truck can meet the car where it sits: a driveway near Town Center, your workplace, or the shop where it broke down. Grove City sits just southwest of Columbus; for statewide rules, see Ohio.