Sell your car in Great Falls: running or not, on PCS orders or not
Before you leave Malmstrom, a car can be driven to the next base, shipped or stored under your orders, parked on the base's Lemon Lot for sale, or sold outright. Selling it to us gets you a cash offer online and a free pickup at your home or just outside the gate, set for the week you leave, whether or not it runs.
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How Malmstrom's Lemon Lot works
- Take the Lemon Lot permit form to the Auto Hobby Shop at 425 74th St. N (Bldg. 1248), with proof of insurance and ownership. It's open Tuesday to Friday 1 to 8 p.m., Saturday 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday noon to 5 p.m., and closed Mondays and federal holidays.
- Park the car on the lot at the corner of Goddard Drive and 77th St. N, a gravel lot with no marked spaces. It costs $10 a month.
- Buyers need a pass or proper ID to get on base. Malmstrom's Visitor Control Center is in Bldg. 192 at 6220 Goddard Drive, open 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. every day except Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve and Christmas. Base decals are no longer required, but drivers must show a valid license and state registration if asked.
Where we pick up around Great Falls
We pick up around the base as easily as around town. If you live on base (59402), the driver meets you just outside the gate or at your residence, whichever access allows that day. Off base, pickup comes to your driveway anywhere in Great Falls, across the river in Black Eagle (59414), and in towns farther out such as Vaughn (59487), Belt, Cascade and Fort Benton.
Meeting at the gate? Malmstrom's North Gate on 10th Avenue North is open 24 hours. The South Gate on 2nd Avenue North is open only on weekdays, 6 a.m. to 6 p.m.
What your orders cover for the car
Orders overseas can include shipping one car at government expense, and PCS orders can include storing one. PCSmyPOV, where those shipments are booked, lists no vehicle processing center in Montana, so a car going overseas is turned in out of state.
If you sell instead, you get a cash offer online, and a car titled in another state is fine. You can accept once your orders arrive and set the pickup for your last week, keeping the car until then at the price you accepted, and you're paid before you ship out. If the Lemon Lot, a shipment and a sale all look possible, our PCS selling guide helps you pick.
Cash for your car in Great Falls
Great Falls city code lets you repair a car at home in public view, but the work has to be pursued to completion. A car that isn't fully repaired within 20 calendar days is presumed abandoned, and a dismantled one has to be covered when no one is working on it.
Cascade County's Junk Vehicle Recycling Program will haul a junk car to the county's vehicle graveyard or crusher with no towing charge. But its form has you give the car up "without payment or compensation," and it won't take one with garbage, extra tires or wire inside. We make cash offers on cars that don't run, barely start or have rusted through, and the tow is free. Before you choose between the county program and us, read how a junk car sale works.
If a driveway repair won't be finished inside the city's 20 days, selling a car with a blown head gasket or knocking engine and selling a car with a slipping transmission lay out the fix-or-sell math before you buy more parts.
Where a Malmstrom car gets turned in
- •The closest vehicle processing center on PCSmyPOV's list is the Seattle VPC, at 7855 S. 212 Street in Kent, Washington. It sees customers by appointment only, with appointments weekdays 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. (PCSmyPOV)
- •The next closest is the Denver VPC, at 14777 E. 35th Place in Aurora, Colorado (PCSmyPOV)
Asked by Great Falls sellers
Where do I go for titles and plates in Great Falls?
What people call the Montana DMV (officially the Montana MVD) handles titles and plates through county treasurers. Here that's the Cascade County Treasurer's Motor Vehicle Department at 121 4th Street North, open weekdays 7 a.m. to 4:45 p.m., with no new purchase title work after 4:30. Its busiest hours, when it has the fewest clerks on hand, are 7 to 8 a.m., 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., and after 4.
Where on Malmstrom do I ask whether my car can ship or be stored?
At the Traffic Management Office, in Bldg. 1191 at 7215 Goddard Drive. It's open weekdays 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. and closed the third Thursday of each month for training. Military OneSource sends members to their local transportation office with shipping and storage questions, including exceptions to the usual rules.
My buyer is stationed at Malmstrom. Where do they register the car?
Members stationed at Malmstrom who live in Great Falls register in Cascade County, at the same treasurer's office. It asks military owners for a current end-of-month LES showing Malmstrom's base code, 4037, and the state they pay taxes in.
How long can a junk car sit on a street in Great Falls?
Not long. City code calls a car abandoned once it has been left on public property for more than 48 hours and can't run. A car on public property without current plates or registration stickers can also count as a junk vehicle. The owner of a junk vehicle gets a notice giving 10 days, not counting weekends and federal holidays, to fix it, enclose it or remove it. After that the city can have it removed, impounded and sold, and charge the costs to the owner.
Your side of the paperwork, the title and the plates, is on our Montana selling page.