Has anyone here done this? Donate cars for charity, that is.
My old car, having taken me to and from work on a 1.5-2 hour commute each way (!) has finally died, and isn’t even worth trading in. Donating the car seems like a way to help a charity and get a tax write-off.
Is there a downside? My mother claims that someone donated a car and later found themselves liable in an accident involving the car. This sounds very UL. What’s the Straight Dope?
We’ve donated 2 cars.
Never a problem.
You sign over the vehicle to the charity - they are the official owners at that point and are free from obligation.
Do the following before handing over the vehicle.
Make arrangements with charity for pickup.
Make sure you’ve cancelled the insurance and de-registered the vehicle with your state DMV. (probably in the opposite order). Some states require you to surrender plates, I had too.
Removing the registration sticker from your window (if your state has them).
Do all of this yourself - don’t let the charity offer to assist in any of the “decommissioning”.
They only get the signed over title.
Of course they must supply you with a receipt, and your slip that’s needed for tax purposes is mailed to you.
Choose your charity carefully. I think the rules about what you can claim on your taxes changed recently, so you’ll have to do some homework.
Ooops. That first line should say “you” are free from further obligation!
Contact your local high school auto shop. They are always looking for things to rebuild. I’ve donated 2 cars to my high school, with no problems. Just sign over the pink, and take the deduction.
The lady across the street donated her old car. On the phone she said not to start it up (it was having problems) but the tow-truck driver decided to back it out to make things easier.
Apparently he got it to the street before the engine screeched, died, and burnt up 15’ in the air. Too bad I missed it.
This post brought to you by the MPSIMS/GQ crossover society.
If you donate it to a legitimate charity, and a proper title transfer happens, I can’t imagine how you’d be liable for anything that happens with it. You’d have the dated paperwork saying you donated it to the charity. Of course, if you “donate” it to the wino who hangs out in front of the corner store, who knows.
I donated to the American Cancer Society. It worked pretty much as BwanaBob described, except that the only “receipt” they gave me was a letter that said, basically, “Yes, you gave us a 1991 Nissan 240SX.” So for tax purposes I just claimed book value (about 2.5k) and that was the end of it.
(Later, I had a friend who signed up for unlimited CarFax reports, so out of curiosity I ran my old VIN. I actually felt a little sad when I read that it had been sold at auction a couple weeks after I donated it, and still wonder about every 240SX I see on the road.)
BTW, if the car doesn’t run at all, the charity might not want it.
You should be aware that the rules on claiming a deduction for a car donation have recently been tightened. IRS press release
Starting this year, you can only deduct the gross amount that the charity sells your vehicle for. This is likely to be significantly less than the book value of the car.
Even if it doesn’t run, you can still donate it to a local volunteer fire company for training purposes. My husband is a volunteer fire fighter, and they accept cars all the time, running or not and you can take the Blue Book value (I think, you’ll have to check) as a charitable donation.
They’ll use it for training for new members. They’ll smash the doors in with a sledge hammer, and then rip the doors and roof off and (depending on local laws) set it on fire and show them how to deal with car fires.
It provides invaluable training.
I donated through the Car Talk website so my local NPR affiliate got the proceeds.
i just revamped a local non profit that accepts donated vehicles. You will want to check with the charity first of all to see if they have requirements. Some will not take them if it requires more than $500 in repair work, others will accept it no matter what (see the fire department comment above). They charity must be a 501©3 status for you to claim it as a tax deduction and as alluded to above: the regulations have been tightened as of January 1, 2005. You will only be allowed to deduct what the charity sells your car for–NOT the full blue book value of it.
I would recommend that you check with your state DMV to see what you need to do–typically all you must do is sign over the title–make sure that the charity also signs it to accept it, get a receipt of sale (even a written note is sufficient, provided you have the signature, vehicle information/VIN and date of transfer. Call your insurance company and let them know when the donation takes place. You should be able to have it removed immediately and are no longer liable for anything that happens.
If you do not have the charity receiving the car sign it–for example a charity plans to sell it/auction it/sign it over to a new person as part of a program–you do not know for sure what is happening. If the charity is unaware of how the process should work (and believe me this happens more often than you might think!) and decides to save the trouble and money of transferring the title into their name and then again in the new recipient’s name by “skipping the middle man” and having the final recipient sign the title, it is called “jumping the title” and is in most states, illegal. I am not sure of the legal implications if any for the original owner/donor of the vehicle–I just avoid the possibility of it!
Boring Mom