Salvage Vehicles
Insurance companies sell wrecked, recovered, and damaged vehicles at salvage auctions where they can be purchased by individuals, used car dealers, and rebuilders. In many states, the vehicle title is marked "salvage" or "rebuilt salvage." In other states, the title is destroyed and such vehicles can only be sold for parts.
Salvage auctions are conducted on regular schedules by professional auction companies in cities in every state. Most are open to the public.
Such auctions are good place to pick up wrecked and rebuildable cars – and project cars – but remember that there will other people attending and looking for good deals too.
Some auction attendees are professional (or not-so-professional) rebuilders who make a business out of repairing and reselling salvage vehicles.
When an insurance company pays a claim for a vehicle that has been stolen, the owner assigns the title to the insurance company. The insurance company becomes the owner of the vehicle. If the vehicle is recovered, the insurance company must apply for a salvage title if one or more major component parts are missing, destroyed, or damaged and not salvageable. This applies even if the estimated cost of repair is less than 75% of the vehicle's fair-market replacement value. |
