Anyone ever do the "WE BUY JUNK CARS! #xxx! Free Towing! IRS Deductiable" Ads?

[DPancoast]

Alright so as most of you guys know, my car is down for the count. It wouldn't matter so much, as I was driving around my piece of junk Rodeo as a DD. However, at 185k on the clock, it's seen it's last days this past week.

The truck has a leaking/going trans, needs a radiator, suspension, and most importantly, it has blown out brakes (diagnosed to be a brake booster/master cylinder... also needs rotors/pads/probably calipers). It's a 93, a/t, 2wd, v6, clunker that only gets like 9mpg, and the heat barely works.

With that said. I am borrowing a friends 96 Jeep Grand Cherokee, V8, leather, premium sound, 4wd..blah blah blah, until I can get my car back on the road. BUT with my Rodeo taking a dump, I wanna buy the Jeep Im borrowing because the owner only wants $1500 for it.

So long with all that in consideration, I saw some of the ads that I mentioned in the title in the newspaper today and was wondering if you guys on TST have ever done them. Most offer from $200-500, free pick up (some "within an hour"), and some if not all offer cash when they pick it up. I'll basically take anything for the truck because trying to fix it is not worth it and the money will be used to pay off/buy the Jeep I currently and borrowing.

Some people say it's legit... some people say it's not worth it. But since the truck is not inspected, not insured, and the brakes don't work, I don't want to risk driving it to a yard that probably won't take it.

Anyone have any thoughts?

[Got Insulin?]

When I toasted the engine in my Integra (296K miles), I called one of those ads, and they came to me. Only got like $120 for it, but it was an 88, so whatever was better than nothing.

[jpalamar]

If they give you $200, that is $200 you don't have and you won't have to risk driving it.

Plus even though they give you cash for it, I think you write the fair market value(minus what they gave you) off on taxes.

[ThePrimerSuspect]

when scrap was higher, you could easily have gotten $600. but now its more like 200

[FocusDude]

We had a old car that was flooded on the inside, it stank and was funky. Nothing desirable, really- body was kinda beat, though not smashed & it did run but they did not ask or check. Wifey called and they picked it up the next day, handed us 100 I think and that was that. She couldn't find the title and they could care less as it's now parts. We've since found it, think they want it ?

[turboman808]

My brother had a real nice GTI with some nice suspension mods and a tune and exhaust.

They made the most money by selling it to my mom who donated it or something and got a tax write off worth more then what they would have sold the car for.

I wasn't there so I can only tell the story as I understand it. Its a shame the car was really fast and had nice interior.

[DPancoast]

yeah, I have nothing to lose really, since I will most likely work out a good deal with the owner to pay as I go type thing.

we shall see.

anyone else?

[tcturbo91]

i'm looking into this as well when i strip my totaled integra of everything except the bare shell. i'm hoping these guys will take it since its still worth something in scrap metal

[loudrims_inc]

I donated my 1998 Dodge Intrepid with the garbage crappy weak 2.7L engine about 5 yrs ago, and u guessed it...the engine seized on me so thats why i donated it. I contacted the "Children Born with eye defect" foundation(dont exacly remember the name) and i got a $500 tax credit. It depends on the organization...just make sure to ask a million questions!

[RSX Type-Slow]

One thing to remember with "tax credit" donations is you have to itemize your tax deductables. If you keep all your reciepts for tax write off's, and it's more than $5,700 (gov't standard tax deduction) then you'll be fine and make some money on the donation.

lets say you write off all clothes and tools you use for work (a tax write off) and it totals $5,700, then you will qualify for more than the gov't standard tax deduction.


but if you have WAYYYY less than that, AND you donate your car and they give you $1000, it's better off for you to just take the gov't standard.



So basically if you cannot find more than $5,700 worth of stuff you paid for that are tax deductable then you donate your car, you're giving your car away for free.


It happened to me when I donated my old ford explorer. The company gave me a reciept for a $500 tax deduction but I wasn't able to accumlate more than $5,700 worth of tax deductions ($5,700 is the given amount for a single, non house owning person) so I basically gave them the junk truck for free. Granted it still went to a good cause, but I'd love to have the extra cash.


Dan I hope this helped and not made you more confused. I can't really explain how it works but do some research on the interwebs and it should help you out.

[DPancoast]

yeah that made sense. I know a little about taxes so it helped more than it hurt lol.

I called a couple places but so far they seem shady... I'll have to look more into it tomorrow. Today was a weird day.