Charitable vehicle donations

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on_the_hill

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Does anyone have experience donating a car to a Catholic charity? I’m trying to decide between Catholic Charities, St. Vincent dePaul…there’s one called Ave Maria Catholic Vehicle Donations…any others?

The vehicle runs and is unbelievably incredibly super-fantastically reliable. The problem is, it needs about $1,000 work to pass state inspection (engine mounts need replacing). It’s not worth that much dough. If it weren’t for the state inspection, I wouldn’t be unloading it.

The last time we did this with one of our cars, we were connected to a needy family through a local charity. But since this car needs $$$, I don’t think a needy family would want it.
 
Some charities might sell the car for scrap metal and/or parts as well, if they are not worth fixing. Parts might be attractive here since the car does run.
 
I donated to Vincent De Paul. They had a driver out to pick it up pretty quick. After they auctioned it I was offered a receipt for the actual sale value. Given the car does need repairs as you state almost any charity will auction it.

The $$ from the auction went to fund Vincent De Pauls charity work though so it was all worth it in the end, to me anyway.
 
You just take the car down to ghetto car inspections and they will “work with you” to make sure that your car passes any inspection you need. 😃 I don’t think that the car inspector I used to take my vehicle to ever even bothered to look at any vehicle that he issued a state inspection for.
 
We donated our last car to St. Vincent de Paul. The engine was ok but the transmission need some work to make it run. They towed away and auctioned it off later, so everyone is happy: we got a tax break, St. Vincent’s got a donation and someone got a cheap car, for whatever purpose. 🙂
 
If it’s not in shape for them to actually use, then I’d consider finding a fellow Catholic mechanic that will donate some time.

Outside of direct use, the car donation business attracts 3rd party scammers where the charity generally receives a flat fee per car, sometimes as little as $45 per car.

Whenever I hear the ‘cars for kids’ jingle, I imagine an SNL skit where the parents donate their kids in exchange for a car - ‘kids for cars’.
 
Theo520 said:
If it’s not in shape for them to actually use, then I’d consider finding a fellow Catholic mechanic that will donate some time.

Outside of direct use, the car donation business attracts 3rd party scammers where the charity generally receives a flat fee per car, sometimes as little as $45 per car
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This is what we did. Our mechanic used to work directly with the local st. Vincent de Paul to fix cars for local donations but they have now gone the national route and use auction them off and use the money earned to help the needy. Our mechanic still is aware of people needing cars so we ended up doing a direct donation to a single mom in need. We did, however, lose the tax donation doing it this way.

Kris
 
I donated one of my cars to the local Catholic radio station. They work with a local car auction place and I was surprised how much credit I got for the donation since the car had major (though fixable) problems and needed more work than I was willing to have done. So, I guess it depends on who the charity works with - it definitely was not a flat rate that the radio station got.
 
I donated one to Hospice, and they sent someone over right away to pick it up.

It’s extremely easy and they’re a very worthy organization, in my view.
 
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