Got a dead car in Burlington? Here are your options

What Chapter 20 covers

The chapter is split into parts, and the headings alone tell you where a dead car can get you in trouble:

• Section 20-8, "Covering of vehicles."
• Section 20-59, "Parking nonmotorized vehicles for periods longer than twenty-four hours prohibited."
• "20-79 Towing and storage of vehicles for nonpayment," under the part on removing unlawfully parked vehicles.
• A part headed "Abandoned Vehicles and Vehicles Unlawfully Parked on Lawns and Yards."
• "20-157 Leaving dismantled, nonoperating or unregistered vehicles on streets prohibited."

We list the headings here, not the full wording. Read the sections at the city's code page before you rely on a deadline. The lawn-and-yard heading is the one to watch if you were thinking of rolling a dead car onto the grass to free up the driveway.

The state's 90-day test

Vermont law has its own definition, and it reaches further than most people expect. A "junk motor vehicle" includes a "discarded, dismantled, wrecked, scrapped or ruined motor vehicle or parts," and also one "allowed to remain unregistered or uninspected for 90 days from discovery." A healthy engine does not save it: three months parked with a lapsed sticker can be enough.

Inspection is the part people forget. Safety inspections have been the law in Vermont since 1935, and federal law adds an emissions check read through the car's OBD II system. Missing or dead OBD connector? That alone is a fail. Vermont lets you renew a lapsed registration as long as no more than three years have gone by since it ran out.

If the car sits on someone else's property

Vermont defines an "abandoned motor vehicle" as one left on public or private property, or along a highway, for more than 48 hours without consent. If it has no valid plate or its VIN is gone, any length of time counts. The landowner then has 90 days from finding it to apply to the DMV. Within three business days of a Burlington tow, a certified DMV letter goes out to any lienholder and to the last registered owner. One protection runs the owner's way: no storage fees can be charged for any time before that certification form goes to the DMV. Car abandoned on your property covers the landowner's half of this.

The DMV office on Market Street

Vermont titles come from the state Department of Motor Vehicles, at dmv.vermont.gov. The office we checked is at 4 Market Street in South Burlington, phone (802) 828-2000. Downtown Burlington is about 4 miles northwest of it, measured point to point. Chittenden County may have others. For a replacement title the DMV recommends an appointment, or you can mail the form to Montpelier or apply online.

Paperwork for a Burlington sale

What you hand over depends on the car's age:

• 2009 model year and earlier, on a Vermont registration in your name: the title is not required. The registration certificate counts as proof you own it. Burlington sellers hand it over to the buyer along with a signed bill of sale.
• Newer cars: every owner on the title assigns it, with all liens released.
• Model year 2011 or newer: add an Odometer Disclosure Statement.

Vermont wants the bill of sale to identify the car by make, year and VIN, and to show the price, the miles, the day it changed hands and your signature as seller. Our bill of sale guide walks through it. A lost title is replaced with form VT-004 for $42.00. Kept a car your insurance company wrote off? Vermont sends it through the rebuilt vehicle process; a scrapped or dismantled car needs a salvage title within 15 days unless it is exempt or more than 15 years old.

Plates and the registration certificate

Pull the plates the moment the car is sold. The Burlington plates stay with you and can go onto another unregistered vehicle you own. Without a plate-transfer application, you return them to the Commissioner five days after the sale. Mail the registration certificate back right away, endorsed with the transfer date and the new owner's name and residence. Returning it, or the plates, is also how you ask to be considered for a registration refund. After you sell has the rest.

Getting an offer

Call (877) 421-6008 or use the form. There are four questions: which car it is, its mileage, if the engine cranks, and what ownership paper you hold. Anywhere in Burlington, our truck takes the car from where it sits: driveway, parking lot or garage bay. Burlington sits 4.8 miles from South Burlington; for rules across the state, see Vermont.