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I think Ryanne mentions from time to time that their dream is to run their car into the ground, and then to part it out instead of scrapping it. I share the same dream, and love the idea of stripping a car; what a pure expression of scavenging.
A theoretical opportunity has just come up. My dad’s 1999 Toyota Corolla has rust all up its underside, and now its catalytic converter needs to be replaced – a procedure that my dad finally decided isn’t worth the investment. I am handling the search for a replacement car, and the decision for what to do with this one. It runs without issue, and I think I could sell it as a working clunker for about $1000.
Has anyone actually stripped their broken down car? I am neither mechanically inclined, nor do I own a garage to store the body in. It seems unlikely that it would be economical to pay a mechanic to strip it for me, especially since some parts are rusted and I can’t properly evaluate them. It seems obvious that there is more money in the car’s parts than in a direct sale, but the project doesn’t seem feasible. Just wondering whether anyone has actually done this. Is there some middle ground – like offering it to a junkyard in exchange for them removing a few sellable parts for us?
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Don’t know how it works in the US, but in the UK/EU one can’t sell used car parts on eBay without the appropriate licence (that’s from my limited experience, so there might be a workaround).
Having scrapped several cars, if it was my car I’d sell it to a car breakers (who in the UK insist on it being complete). Might not get very much, but it’ll save you getting involved in disposing of the non-saleable parts and the fluids.
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Think about what parts on it you can sell, most mechanical parts are readily available new,
You say it’s rusted so body parts are worthless and are particularly hard to ship.
I’m not sure there are enough salvageable parts to make it worth the time and effort. A running engine and good transmission would be the most valuable parts but removal and shipping is costly.
If you think you can sell a 1999 Corolla for $1000 I’d take the money and run.-
I agree with Steve. If you can sell for $1k with no work. Thats the way to go.
I’ve never parted out a car, but I imagine its all the interior parts that you can pull out yourself. Seats, steering wheel, mirrors. all the little pieces. Or the panels on the body. Things guys need to fix a car. Then just scrap the body for $500 at the scrap yard.
But then again, its a Corolla which is one of the most common cars on the road. Not sure how valuable used pieces would be.
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Jay once interviewed an eBay seller who stripped down cars and sold the parts. I tried using the search function on the right-hand side, but didn’t find the episode. Maybe someone else can find it.
I’ve been thinking about it as well. My husband’s car is also a 1999, and he might need to replace soon because it has an intermittent issue. He thinks it’s the clutch (over 270k miles on it!), but how much is he going to spend on this car that keeps coming up with new issues?
We do have a garage, but what do you do with the skeleton of the car that really isn’t sale-able? How about the engine, which is very heavy, and might not be sell-able whole? I recall that the guy that Jay interviewed had a way to move the remaining metal and sell it as scrap. That isn’t something that most of us would be able to do with normal cars and a handtruck.
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You can get $500 for a car body at the scrapyard? I didn’t get that for two complete high-roof Fiat Doblo vans last year.
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Someone would have to fact check me, but metal recycling companies buy bulk metal. A car is a lot of metal. Scrap hounds in my area collect trailers full of scrap iron for money.
Did you take your Fiat vans to the scrap yard yourself? Or did you hire someone to just take them away?
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‘Phoned up a firm of breakers in Nottingham, and they took them away on lorries. Think they paid £160 each, to be dismantled for spare parts. Weight about 1.25 tonnes, scrap price paid for cars now (2020) £60 a tonne, so they probably paid a small premium for the parts.
We get scrap hounds here, depending on the price. Must be moderately low at the moment- somebody pushed a Sunbeam Alpine out onto the street, and it took two months to disappear!
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Understood. My $500 amount was said out of ignorance and old info.
Here’s what one site says about scrapping here in the US:
https://www.junkcarmedics.com/blog/scrap-car-prices-per-ton/A few years ago selling a junk car for $500 was easy. You could easily net enough for a weekend road trip. Today you’d barely get enough to pay for a hotel room.
Right now, demand for scrap metal is low and supply is high. That means prices are low. In fact, the price of steel scrap has fallen drastically over the past few years.
The Wall Street Journal has called junk car dealers “the latest victims of the commodities bust.” They interviewed several auto scrap yard owners who confirm they’ve gone from paying consumers $400 for the average car to between $50 and $100. The Institute for Scrap Recycling Industries notes that 50 scrap metals yards and recyclers have ceased operations altogether. Others have stopped selling cars and are simply stockpiling them until prices come back up.
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This happened before, probably in the early 1990s (rusty memory). Remember seeing abandoned cars in the streets; think at least three were Volvo sedans. I had a Volvo estate briefly until the clutch failed- learnt two things about Volvos. They run about 10 mpg, and the insurance is really expensive because you can cause a lot more damage with a Volvo.
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For backup, I contacted some scrapyards and dealerships. We were offered about $200 from scrappers, $330 from dealerships.
I agree with the consensus here: If I find someone who wants to give us $1000 for it, we are going to take the money and run. I think the most likely scenario is that I will make a direct sale like this. But it isn’t everyday that I get to sell a car, and my scavenging instincts are always to at least investigate every potential opportunity. Engine and transmission would be worth over $1000 on their own, but it would take hours of expensive mechanic labor to extract them.
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The following is what I did with a car that wasn’t worth attempting to sell. Prior to selling the car to the local salvage yard I searched the make, model and year on eBay and looked at “solds” sorted by descending price. I used this information to figure out what parts I could remove prior to driving it to the salvage yard. I’ve since made more money selling the parts on eBay. Parts that sell include: jack, spare tire, plastic engine cover, A/C control & face-plate, radio, sun visors.
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