This story begins about three months ago, shortly after I bought my new car. I had decided not to trade it in, thinking I could resell it for a few hundred bucks (I only would have gotten about $200 as a trade-in). I attempted to sell the car a few times by posting ads on
Craig’s List . Each time I would post the ad I would get several responses. Unfortunately there are massive quantities of cars posted for sale on Craig’s List every day, so often by the time I would get back to the people who replied, they would have already purchased another car. In other cases, people would want me to deliver the car to them in East Nowhere, or they would some ask me to make repairs to the car (fixing dents, replacing EGR valve which caused the check engine light to come on but wasn’t quite dead yet, etc). Overall, people expected way more than what is reasonable to expect for a car priced at under a grand.
On one occasion I actually did find a prospective buyer who actually came to look at the car. When he came I moved the car down near the rental office of my apartment complex and told him to meet me there, since it’s easier to find than my building. He ended up not buying the car because it didn’t have air conditioning. Afterwards, I left the car parked by the rental office. About a week after that, my roommate went to drop off the rent check. He informed me that Erica (one of our landlords) wanted me to move my car, that I couldn’t leave it there. For dramatic effect I’ll point out that Erica made no attempt to contact me directly to ask me to move the vehicle, she used a third party as a messenger. I went ahead and moved the car closer to my building, far away from the rental office in a portion of the parking lot which has plenty of space (We’ve had lots of people over and no one has ever complained about not finding a space, even during the week).
Unbeknownst to me, the property managers were not too excited about me “storing” the car in their lot, particularly since the plates expired last month (Is it illegal to park a car with expired plates, or just to drive it?). The first indication things were not quite right was Thursday morning when the roommate sent me an email at work, saying he say a worker at the apartment leaving a note of some sort on my car. I figured it was something asking me to move the car, and I made a mental note to check it out when I got home. Then around noon time I get a phone call from the apartment office. I didn’t answer it, first of all because I was at work, and second of all because I don’t like talking to these people. After my phone rings and I don’t answer a call, it vibrates again a bit later if the person leaves a voicemail. I assumed no message had been left because a ridiculous amount of time passed before the second vibrate occurred. In other words, she left a ridiculously long message. I was not interested. I called up to listen to my message that she left. In it, she described her displeasure with my using their parking lot as a storage facility, explaining that it was unfair and inconsiderate due to the limited parking spaces available and the fact that they had told other people they could not use said lot for that purpose. She went on to detail their notification process whereby they had left a note on my car “oh, I don’t know, at LEAST a week and a half ago.” She informed me another note had been left today, and that if he car wasn’t moved by tomorrow they were going to tow it at noon. This was the first time they had directly contacted me about this. Yes, they left a note on the car about two weeks ago. But think about, they KNOW that I’m just storing the car there. I’m not using it at all, obviously I’m not going out to check if there are any notes on it. Them leaving notes on my car is like doing sign language to a blind person: yes it’s a valid form of communication, but he’s just not going to see it. I was livid.
So now I’ve twenty four hours to do something about this. Given my past experiences trying to sell the car, that’s out. I had at some point given consideration to donating the car, but I’m quite certain that would take more time that I have. Another option would be to bring the car to a junkyard somewhere. Not that I know of any, but maybe I could find one. It’s now 12:45, I’ve got a meeting at 1:00. I do two things. First I send out an email to this social alias at work, where people send stupid questions like “Can you recommend a good dentist?” and “I have family in town, what are good touristy things to do with them?” So I send mail asking if anyone knows of a junkyard that will take an old car, or alternatively if anyone wants an old used car, because I need to get rid of it. Second, I post an ad on Craig’s List with offering a free car.
When I get back from my meeting, I’ve got 15 responses from the first email. One pointing me to a place that sounded like a junkyard, 2 asking for more details about the car because they might want it for someone they know, and 12 (yes a full 80 percent for those of you keeping score at home) telling me “Why don’t you donate it!?”. Please refrain from imposing your sense of moral obligation to help others and/or get a tax break for yourself on me. As Erin pointed out, they are arguably just offering an alternative solution to my problem. However, In my crazy imagination I assume they were more likely offended that I wasn’t donating the car and wanted to make sure I “did the right thing.” Thanks.
The Craig’s List posting was much more successful. I got about 45 replies in under an hour. The first guy to respond said he was in my city, and could come pick it up right now. Ding Ding Ding we have a winner! I called him and met him at my apartment complex, signed over the title and away he went. He was a guy probably late 20s who I’m guessing really needed a car. Maybe not quite as much as who would have gotten it if I had donated through some charitable organization. But I’ve always said if everyone just worries about the worst problems, everything else gets neglected so you have to pick and choose your battles, spread the love out a little bit. So in the end I think this was just as good as if I had donated the car, but I just cut out the middle man, saving them a little bit of managerial overhead.
The End.
