ok..so is it ever legal to take an abandoned vehicle?. Basically, there's a car thats been abandoned for 3 years, I think the guy is dead and the car is just sitting there with like 4 inches of dust on it. Is there any way i could take this car (legally)?

 

Too funny.... Here's what you do... knock on the owners door and ask. If it is not immediately apparent just where the owner lives then write down the VIN number from the lower corner under the windshield. Take the VIN number to any licensing office and plunk down $10 for the owners name. That's all you'll get, the name. Go on to whitepages.ca and enter the last name and the area where the car is located. You will see a list of possible owners and their contact information. Starting with the person living closest call each until you contact the current owner. You as a private citizen cannot claim an abandoned car yourself but with a little work you might score yourself a bargain.

 

you can plunk down $20 and get a UVIP which will have the owners name and address.

 

Short answer: NO. How do you know that he hasn't willed it to someone? The only way that I know would be to have the police possibly impound it and then sell it at an auction. Whose land is it sitting on? The land owner might be able to lay a claim on it for "storage" however I'm not sure how successful he would be.

I know of a guy from the 914 Club forum that found an abandoned car that appeared to be a missing prototype car. He did a proper title search - which showed nothing and then went through the process of getting a title in his name. When he got possession of a title for the car he started restoring it and even had an article about it published in Excellence Magazine. The somebody on the east coast read the magazine and claimed it was theirs. He was arrested for grand theft auto and had to go to court. In court it was found that the previous owner had a title for the car also and our friend was found guilty - even though he went through what he thought was the proper way to take possession of an abandoned car. The title search he paid for was in the state that the car was found in (California) but the original title was in another state (Florida?) and didn't show up on the California state computer when he paid for his title search. In this case the owner realized the value of the car only after the magazine article otherwise chances are he wouldn't have found out about it. But would you want to take the chance of a criminal record for what is likely a POS that was abondoned for a reason?

 

UVIP does not have the owners address. Perhaps city and province but not a definitive street address.

 

That is correct. UVIP's list the City only...

Where's Laywers Spirit when you ned 'em...?