Sell your car in New York City: running, not running or flood-damaged
Sell your car in New York City with a cash offer from our buying partner, then hand it over at the curb in any of the five boroughs and get paid there. Selling ends the alternate-side shuffle, the ticket risk and, if you drive into Manhattan below 60th Street, the congestion toll.
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Pickup day on a city block
- Pick a window around street cleaning. The city suspends alternate-side parking on a published calendar of legal and religious holidays, and sometimes for weather or emergencies; 311 and Notify NYC post the unplanned ones (NYC DOT). On a suspension day the car can stay where it is for the pickup.
- Keep it legally parked. Don't double-park it to wait for the truck. Double parking a passenger car is illegal at all times, even while the street is being cleaned (NYC DOT). If you have to move it, tell us the new spot.
- Stay reachable. Keep your phone on as the truck gets close, then meet it at the car with the title in hand.
Where we pick up around New York City
Pickup in all five boroughs is free, tolls included, from 10001 in Manhattan to 11697 in the Rockaways and across the Verrazzano to Staten Island. Past the city line it runs north into Westchester, from Yonkers up to White Plains, and east into Nassau, from Valley Stream and Hempstead out to Long Beach. The car can stay where it's parked on the street: tell us the block and where on it the car sits.
Mind the 100-day mark. An unpaid parking ticket that nobody disputes goes into judgment about 100 days after it's issued (NYC Finance). With $350 or more in parking or camera tickets in judgment, the city can boot the car and tow it if the debt isn't paid within 48 hours; owing $2,500 or more, or an invalid registration, can mean an immediate tow (booting rules). To fight a ticket, request the hearing before day 100.
Cash for your car in New York City
Street cleaning doesn't wait for a car that won't start, and once its stickers lapse, it can be towed for that alone. All of New York City is a designated tow-away zone under state law, so a car with missing or expired registration or inspection stickers may be towed (NYC DOT). An NYPD tow costs $185, plus $20 for every night the car sits in one of the pounds in the Bronx, Brooklyn and Queens (NYPD).
Taking the plates off early can backfire. The Department of Sanitation treats a car as derelict when it has no license plate, is damaged and is worth less than $1,250, and it removes and disposes of those. Abandoning a car on public property can also bring a tow and a fine of up to $1,000 (DSNY). Cash for junk cars in NYC starts the way any sale here does: one description, one offer, one curbside handoff. For a car no one will fix, start with selling it as junk.
If the engine, the transmission or a crash is what keeps it parked at the curb, see selling a car with a blown engine or head gasket, selling a car with a slipping transmission or no reverse or selling a car with accident damage. If a flood or crash claim ended in a total loss, selling a car your insurer declared a total loss explains the payout, the buyback and the salvage title.
What a car costs you while it stays
- •Driving onto Manhattan's local streets at or below 60th Street costs a car with E-ZPass $9 at peak, which runs 5 a.m. to 9 p.m. weekdays and starts at 9 a.m. on weekends, and $2.25 overnight, charged once a day. The FDR Drive and the West Side Highway are outside the zone (source)
- •That toll is scheduled to rise to $12 in 2028 and $15 in 2031 (source)
- •A rented parking space in Manhattan carries an 18.375% tax, and Manhattan residents who qualify for the city's exemption pay 10.375% (source)
Asked by New York City sellers
How do I sell my car in Brooklyn when it lives on the street?
Pickup happens at the curb, wherever the car is legally parked, so give us the cross streets and the side of the block. If you move it to make the handoff easier, keep it at least 15 feet from either side of a fire hydrant. That rule covers the floating parking lanes next to protected bike lanes too (NYC DOT).
My car got booted a few days before pickup. What now?
Pay the judgment online or by phone, and you get a release code right away to unlock the boot. Then take the boot to a return location within 24 hours, or a late fee of $25 a day applies (NYC Finance). If a City Marshal or the Sheriff tows it first, move fast: a car not retrieved within 72 hours may be auctioned as soon as 10 days after the tow (NYC Finance). Once it's free, pick a new pickup window.
I'm selling my car in Queens and my block isn't in a flood zone. Could the car still count as flood-damaged?
It could. When Ida's remnants hit on September 1, 2021, they broke the city's single-hour rainfall record and overwhelmed sewers that typically handle 1.75 inches an hour, and the outer boroughs were hit hardest. Only 6.9% of the buildings Ida damaged were in the 100-year floodplain (NYC). So the map doesn't settle it; whether water got into the car does. A flood-damaged car sells for less, but it still sells; our flood-damaged car guide has more.
I have the Manhattan resident parking tax exemption. What changes when I sell?
The exemption is tied to the car and its plate. It requires a vehicle registered to your primary Manhattan address and parked in a space rented for a month or more, and a new vehicle or plate number means a new application with all the required documents. If a replacement car is taking the space, apply early: payments made before you give the garage the new certificate aren't exempt, and there are no refunds (NYC Finance).
Which DMV office in the city do I use for my next car's plates?
Any NYS DMV district office in the five boroughs handles registering a car and getting plates, such as the Midtown Manhattan DMV office at 366 West 31st Street, Atlantic Center at 625 Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn or the Richmond office at 1775 South Avenue on Staten Island. As of September 2026 their hours are 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. on weekdays, with Saturdays closed (NYS DMV office data).
Title signatures, the bill of sale and what happens to your plates are covered in selling a car in New York.