Ways to Dispose of Old Cars with less Environmental Impact

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Ways to Dispose of Old Cars with less Environmental Impact

If you have an old car there comes a day when you need to put it out of its misery but disposing of an old vehicle in an environmentally friendly way can be challenging and confusing. Many people have no idea how to dispose of a car properly, leading to many being abandoned.

Around 12 million cars per year are scrapped in the USA alone so making sure they are disposed of effectively and in an environmentally friendly way is vital to help reduce the potential impact on nature.

If you need to dispose of a car you need to make sure it’s done officially – the last thing you want is to sell your car to a buyer who promises to scrap it but then uses it and leaves you responsible for potential fines or tickets.

• Sell your car

If you want to sell your car rather than scrap it, then you need to sell it through a reputable channel and make sure you check out the buyer and sort out all of the paperwork properly with them to avoid any potential issues coming back to you after the car has gone from you.

You can sell it online privately, or sell it straight to a dealership, or one of the car buying services if you want to avoid all the hassle of advertising it. If you are selling privately it’s important to have a plan in place about how you will arrange to meet potential buyers, organise test drives and manage the buying process safely.

• Trade in your car

If you want to buy a new car then you can trade in the old one through a car dealership like Big Motoring World, rather than selling it directly. You can then use the value of the old car towards your new purchase, and it saves all the hassle of trying to advertise and sell the old vehicle yourself. That way you can buy a more environmentally friendly car, knowing that your old car will also have been disposed of in an appropriate way.

• Scrap your car

To scrap a car the easiest way is to get a scrap dealer to come out to you and take it off your hands however, it might not be the best way if you want to make the most money from it. You can increase the money you might be able to make by scrapping the car yourself, but you’d need to take a few steps first.

For example, you’d need to take anything non-metal out of the car including the fluids, plastic and glass. Drain everything from the radiator, all the oil etc… as well as the brake fluid and windscreen wash. Then you can take out the car seats, radio cassette player, steering column and panels. You need to remove all of this from the car to prepare it for scrapping.

If you aren’t sure about doing this yourself you can ask someone to do it for you. Once all the removable parts – including the tyres and rims – are off – you can sell on to make money for yourself. Set all the parts you have removed aside and then you can look for garages to sell them to, before then selling the remainder of the car body for scrap.

• Claiming back road tax and insurance

Once your vehicle has been disposed of, you can claim back unused road tax and you might be able to claim back unused insurance if you have paid up front, so make sure you claim back anything which is owed to you.

• Sort out all the paperwork for the car

It’s vital however you dispose of your car, to make sure you sort out all of your paperwork to make sure the transaction is legal. Check the rules and regulations around scrapping a vehicle so you know you are dealing with a legitimate business and make sure they give you the correct paperwork afterwards.

While scrapping a car might be a last resort, it needs to be carried out by legally authorised scrap dealers who are licensed and can provide you with an official certificate of scrappage. There are many charlatans in the trade unfortunately.

There are now rules and regulations in place to help protect car owners against these kinds of problems in the industry so it’s important to do your research and choose a scrapyard which disposes of all the elements of the vehicle in an appropriate way.

Disposing of an old car needn’t be a chore and can even help you raise money for a good cause so make sure you do your research and choose the best option for you and your vehicle.

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