How do you sell a car that is not in your own name?
You will have to get the named person or persons on the title to sign the title. Then you can sell the car as your own. It will be like you bought the car yourself from them, whether you actually paid them or not.You can also sell the car if you have a power of attorney from the owner(s) for that purpose. Also, if you are the executor of a deceased person’s will. The exact mechanisms of these two will vary by state, in the US.Caveat: If you have a title that has been signed by the owner, legally you are supposed to title that car in your name, paying the fees and taxes due to the state before you resell the car - IF you do not have a car dealer’s license. By skipping this step you are defrauding the state of their tax dollars. It’s called skip titling. It is done all the time, but it is actually illegal.If you are actually acting as the owner’s agent in selling the car, then you wouldn’t be skip titling. In that case, it would be best to simply have the final sale meeting with the owner(s) and the buyer(s) so the owner can sign the title over to the buyer. As a buyer, I won’t buy a car from someone whose name isn’t on the title, though there are many people who will.
How do you buy a car from a dealer in a different state?
Process of purchasing a vehicle from a different state is not difficult at all and the selling dealer should be able to take care of all the hassle if any. If they are not aware of it, you should probably find a different vehicle. In fact, online vehicle sales is growing rapidly year by year and buyers rarely come to see the cars they buy due to the distance. The process usually follows these steps:Dealer will ask for a deposit amount and will issue a Bill of Sale with that amount noted. Make sure you get this to avoid proving that you have made the deposit if it comes to it.Once you are ready to make a purchase by cash or loan check, dealer will ask for pertinent information to be able to assign title to your nameYou make a payment in full (cash, check, loan, etc...)You sign sale documents either at the dealership or sent to you by mailYou pick-up the vehicle with a temporary tag or arrange delivery of the vehicle to you by dealer or yourself. I suggest using FREE INSTANT VEHICLE SHIPPING QUOTE for transporting your car, motorcycle, truck, van, minivan (disclosure: I help running that company)Dealer should provide you with a title documents in your name within 20 to 30 days (in most states as per their legislation)If you decide to purchase from an individual in a private deal, usually there is a spot on the back of the title issued by the state where you are buying a vehicle, where they will assign the vehicle to you and sign as a seller. It is also a good idea to get a Bill of Sale from them. Does not have to be on a form (sample below) and can be hand written with those basic details of the sale.
I have a Tennessee registered/titled car and I am selling my car to someone in Alabama. Is a title good enough to sell the car?
Having sold and purchased many cars and trucks from out of state, i can say with certainty, that as long as your title is a clean, lien free title, and not a rebuilt title, you can sell it safely. Make sure you also provide a bill of sale with the correct vehicle info as well as the date. Also, make sure that you print and sign your name in the section labeled “Seller/Owner” exactly how it is printed on the title. Not how it is on your drivers licensee. If your full name is printed, including middle name, print and sign it exactly the same. If it has just a middle initial, make sure you print and sign with only the middle initial , not the full name. I can not stress the importance of this enough. If it isn't the same as it is printed on the title, they will reject it at the Tag office, when your new baby buyer tries to get it swapped over to his name. Now back to the rebuilt title. If your vehicle has a salvage or rebuilt title, there will be a requirement of the vehicle to pass an inspection in the new state that it is going to be registered in. It must pass everything otherwise they will decline it. I am very well versed with this sort of thing, should you have any questions, tag me in the questions comments, and I will answer as soon as I am able to! And good luck with your sale!
How do pawnbrokers verify that the item pawned is not stolen?
I am a pawnbroker and yes we do have good legal representation. Your stereotypical "Hollywood," view of a pawnshop is not reality anymore. Many pawn stores have been heavily upgraded with more retail friendly looks. One need only walk into some of the big chain pawn stores and you can see for yourself. We have no way of knowing if an item is stolen. We all do our best to weed out goods we think may be stolen. We do this by asking the customer questions about the item. An example: If a customer comes in with a gibson deluxe accoustic guitar we will ask the customer to play something for us. If they can't play a song then that is a red flag the guitar may not be theirs. Another example: 22 year old white kid comes in with an iphone and no charger with it. We look into the iphone and see a picture of a nice black family in it and the device is registered to a woman named Michelle Obama then obviously the phone is not his. Also if a customer tells us something like "Hey I wanna sell this off the books," then we tell the customer to get lost and may even call the police on them. Also alot of states and cities mandate that their pawnshops report everything they take in through police database systems like leadsonline or BWIrapid. Pawnshops do not want to take in stolen merchandise it is a cost to us when police seize the item and we may have court costs to incur should we want to try and get the item back. We do our best to try and ascertain whether the item truly belongs to the person in front of us. Statistically - nationally less than .10% of merchandise in pawnshops are seized as stolen. That is incredibly low. If you are a criminal and you are trying to sell stolen merchandise to a pawnshop you are a complete idiot because you will get caught. It's like raising your hand saying "I did it." The police will get a look at the item and we will often provide the police with a copy of your id, video surveillance of you in our store, and in some states they may even get your fingerprints if the state requires people to be fingerprinted before selling merchandise. Truth is most of the criminals are selling their stolen wares online, at parking lot swap meets, hotels, back alley deals etc.
Do police cars have cameras that automatically scan license plates which trigger a alarm to pull you over?
Mobile Automated License Plate reader (ALPR) systems are expensive, at about $20,000 per vehicle. They’re also fairly fragile, as they use four or more cameras, usually mounted on the light bar or the bumpers. If some yahoo comes along and bashes the cameras, that’s a chunk of money. So, most police fleets have only a few of these vehicles, if they have any at all.The older systems use an onboard database of “hot list” license plates. These are plates of vehicles known to be stolen, or that are driven by people with active warrants, or who have suspended or revoked drivers licenses. The officer operating the vehicle updates the list on a flash drive before he starts work. When the system scans a plate that is on the hot list, the system beeps to alert the driver. He sees a captured photo of the license plate alongside the license plate letters/numbers in text. It’s important to do a manual comparison, as these systems are prone to false positives.If the actual plate matches the wanted information, the officer either tries to stop the car, or directs another officer to do so.The newer systems query online databases like NCIC in real time, so that the onboard “hot list” is just a backup.These systems have made it possible to apprehend far more car thieves and scofflaw drivers than was possible before.They can also be unpopular. The CHP has used ALPR-equipped vehicles to identify drivers who are required to register their cars in California, but who have failed to do so. You are generally required to register your car in the state within 30 days of arrival. However, California vehicle registration fees are considerably higher than those in most other states, so people put it off as long as they can. CHP will put ALPR-equipped cars monitoring feeder freeways, and once they have documented the same car going the same route multiple times over a 30-day period, they’ve got you. People don’t like to get got.
Can I transfer my license plate to a new car?
In most states, yes. If you were the registered owner of the old car, and your are the registered owner of the new car, you can usually just transfer your plates (vanity or otherwise). If either car is leased, you might not have this choice (since you don't technically own the car). There are a number of exceptions though, so it's best to check with your state's DMV website. For example, if you have an outdated license plate series, some states will want your to trade them in. If you go from one state to another, you can't retain your plates.
What parts need to be replaced for a mechanic to legally reset an odometer back to zero? What is the odometer’s reading tied to?
Rolling back the odometer is really dicey. If done with intent to defraud, it’s a felony in most jurisdictions. Serious stuff.Sometimes it makes sense - if you do a full “back to zero” restoration, then maybe it makes sense to re-zero the odometer. Most concours judges frown on that, though, so know your environment before making that choice.As to “how”, it Depends on the car.If it has a purely mechanical odometer, integrated with the speedometer, you can replace the speedo head, and boom, you’re back at zero. Actually, in restoring the speedo head the tech can do that as well. But they’ll probably have questions as to why…And of course, you still need to disclose the mileage that it recorded when you replaced it to any prospective buyer.If it has the odometer integrated into the ECU, you can replace the instrument cluster all day every day and it won’t change the reading. To do that, you’d need to replace the relevant ECU.I’m not sure what the laws are on that, but I’d bet that there’s some sort of “and you are legally required to update the new ECU with the data from the old ECU” clause that compels them to not unlawfully reset the odo.
What happens if you're caught driving with the wrong license plates?
Where I worked, this was called “fictitious plates or registration.” It was regarded as considerably more serious than driving without registration.If an officer found a car bearing plates registered to another car, his first suspicion would be that the car is stolen, because that is frequently the case. A smart car thief will steal a set of cold plates from a car of the same make and model, but most car thieves aren’t that smart. If you run the plates on a Ford and they come back to a Volkswagen, you start thinking, “stolen car.”If the officer thinks he is dealing with an occupied stolen car, he may conduct a high-risk stop, which is where everyone inside the car is brought out one at a time and proned on the pavement, at gunpoint. It will be an event you will not quickly forget.Less commonly, I would stop someone with fictitious plates, and they would tell me, “My plates expired, so I put these on it so I could drive it.” Having the wrong plates on the car might make it less noticeable to the cops, but the consequences of getting caught were considerably more grave.If you were driving a car with no plates or expired plates, we would write you a ticket for “registration required.” That was a $15 fine, and the court would almost always dismiss it if you got the car registered by the time you went to court.If you were driving a car with fictitious plates,The car would be impounded.The plates would be seized.You would get a ticket (or possibly be arrested) for driving with fictitious plates ($375 fine), and probably also for driving without insurance, because unregistered cars are seldom insured.The DMV would suspend the car’s registration, meaning there would be more hoops to jump through to get it registered.You might be on the receiving end of a high-risk car stop.Just get the car registered. It’s cheaper for everyone.