Sell your car in Kansas City: running, wrecked or past 200,000 miles
Selling a car, truck or van in Kansas City, MO? Ask for the instant cash offer online, and if the number works for you, pickup is free anywhere on the Missouri side of the metro.
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Getting a car out of the city Tow Lot
- Beat the 24-hour mark. Every car the city tows goes to the Tow Lot at 7750 E. Front St., just east of I-435. Storage is free for the first 24 hours; after that, a normal car adds $30 a day to the $265 tow fee. Call (816) 513-0688 to confirm it's there. City code holds an unclaimed car at least 30 days before it can go to public auction.
- Bring what the lot takes. A money order, cashier's check or credit card (no cash or personal checks; the card's owner must be there), the title or current registration, and photo ID. The lot is open 9 to 6 on weekdays and 9 to 3 on Saturdays.
- Sending someone else, or it won't drive? The other person needs your signed letter, notarized within five business days of pickup, naming the make, model, year and VIN. A car that can't be driven can be towed off the lot instead.
Where we pick up around Kansas City
The pickup area is the Missouri side of the metro. In the Northland that means North Kansas City, Gladstone, Claycomo, where the auto plant has built trucks and delivery vans, and Liberty. To the east and south it takes in Independence, Blue Springs, Raytown, Grandview and Lee's Summit. Pickup can be set around a work shift, at a workplace lot, an apartment complex or a driveway. If the lot isn't yours, clear it with whoever runs it and have the signed title ready; the handoff fits inside a lunch break.
Tags expired? Sec. 48-27 treats a car without a current state plate, parked outside a private garage in a residential area, as a nuisance. A plate that expired less than a month ago is excepted, so past that, move the car into the garage or set the pickup date.
Cash for your car in Kansas City
A dead car can't just sit in the yard here. Under Sec. 48-27 of the city code, any wrecked, damaged, disassembled or disabled vehicle kept anywhere on a property, other than inside a private garage, is a nuisance. Sec. 48-28 adds that a car parked off the street has to sit on a driveway or parking space, not the lawn. Whether it's on the street or in a driveway, a neighbor can call 311 and city inspectors follow up.
Cash for cars in Kansas City, MO covers exactly that kind of car. Describe it as it sits, including whether it starts; the truck comes to it, so it never has to drive. Work trucks with 200,000 miles and vans retired from a fleet get offers too. When it's worth more as scrap, start with our junk car offer instead.
If your car, truck or van quit with a slipping transmission or a blown or seized engine, selling a car with a bad transmission and selling a car with a blown or seized engine help you decide whether the repair is worth paying for. For a wrecked or damaged one parked in the driveway, read selling an accident-damaged car.
Six police station lots set aside for meeting a buyer
- •KCPD has posted signs marking Internet Exchange Areas at all six patrol division stations, for in-person sales in daylight hours (KCPD, 2019)
- •North Patrol, 11000 N.W. Prairie View Road; Shoal Creek Patrol, 6801 N.E. Pleasant Valley Road; Central Patrol, 1200 E. Linwood (KCPD stations)
- •East Patrol, 2640 Prospect; Metro Patrol, 7601 Prospect; South Patrol, 9701 Marion Park Drive (KCPD stations)
- •In 2022, KCPD detectives were working more armed robberies from online meet-ups, including a carjacking of someone selling a car (KCPD, 2022)
Asked by Kansas City sellers
My buyer lives on the Kansas side. What happens on their end?
Kansas won't title or tag a car carrying a Missouri title until a Kansas VIN inspection is done. In the Kansas City metro, the busiest inspection sites, Olathe, Lamar and I-70, require an appointment, and the $20 fee is collected by the buyer's county treasurer with the title work (Kansas Highway Patrol, Sept. 2026). Take the instant offer and the whole sale stays on Missouri paperwork. If it's your own title that still says Kansas, see how to sell on a title from another state.
I sold my car. How do I get it off my Clay or Platte County assessment?
Clay County works off its assessment form: draw a line through the car you sold, write the date it left, and get the form back to the assessor in Liberty before March 1 to avoid a late filing penalty. Platte County says any vehicle titled in your name must be claimed regardless of condition, so a car that quit in the driveway still goes on the form while it's titled to you.
How long can a dead car stay parked on my street?
Not long. Police can impound a car that has sat in the same place on a street for 48 hours once a citation has been put on it (Sec. 70-642).
Whichever county you live in, the Missouri paperwork for the sale itself is covered in our guide to selling in Missouri.