Getting Rid of Complete Junkers
Say that the car is undrivable, and so beat up that you can’t even sell it. You call the charities, and they won’t touch it with a ten foot pole. The choices left:
1. You call the local high schools and vocational schools, to see if they want it for training students in auto mechanics. No luck?
2. You call junkyards and see if they’ll just haul it away for free. No luck?
3. Will the junkyard take it if you deliver it to the nearest garage to them? Then whip out your AAA card and have it towed to that garage. Or if AAA won’t play, then you may be stuck with the cost of having it towed to the junkyard.
4. You clean it out completely, have a friend tow you somewhere with a towstrap, park it, take off the license plates, and sneak away in the dark, abandoning it. (The editors deny ever doing such a thing, even as teenagers.) We’re not recommending it. For all we know, nowadays the cops check the serial number with DMV and come knocking on your door.
Conclusion
Selling a used car is not all that bad, as long as you put yourself in the right frame of mind. Be polite. Say, “No, thank you” a lot. And if it isn’t gone by Sunday evening, shrug your shoulders, say, “Well, at least I got some work done around the house,” and put in the ad for the next weekend.
Last notes on the word “firm”: frankly, if someone offered us $100 below our asking price on Sunday at 5 p.m, we’d take it. Who wants to spend another weekend selling cars?
On the other hand, “firm” prices can bring you several phone calls on Monday from the hagglers who hassled you over the weekend – probably offering even less than their first lowball offer. And then they’ll hammer you some more when they come again. We’d tell them, “No thank you, I’ll be advertising it next weekend.”