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Greetings hive-mind, I come to you again with further questions regarding selling off inherited assets...
My wife is executor of her father's estate, probate has been granted, the DVLA have been notified and her father is no longer recorded as the current keeper of what was his car, and his vehicle tax has been ended and refunded - all as it should be. She wants to sell the car, most likely via webuyanycar or similar.
The difficulty she is facing is that webuyanycar want her to drive the car to their office, and allow them to take it for a test drive - but obviously* the car can't be driven with no tax or insurance, which (as far as I know) can't be arranged without making someone the new current keeper.
Is the only option for my wife to register herself as the new keeper, tax and insure it for the 5 mile drive to the webuyanycar office? Is there another way to avoid the paperwork and expense (even if some can be refunded) to get the car sold?
Try a different car buying place or ring local garages, or sell it privatley for the same price of WBAC, someone will pick it up surely...
Or a quick call to your insurance company will give you a quote for a day, and if a car that is up for sale in this scenario can be insured.
With my MIL's car, we ended up offering it to the local garage she'd used for years. They picked it up straight away and gave us more than it was worth with a nice note.
Unless it's a really expensive car I would just sell privately
Private sale, easy.
Yep, sell privately. Its reasonably easy to weed out most of the time wasters. Someone will arrive, give you cash and take it away. She should register as the keeper, and it might be worth insuring it if it has value.
Not insured third party as a driver through your insurer? A month's tax won't be much surely - 5 mins online?
We had this. Wife used a company and they came and picked it up. Sorry can't remember the company. But there should be companies out there who will do this.
Always thought webuyanycar came out to you? I've never used them but some mates have and said that they came out, inspected vehicle and took it away
Insurance is easy to fix - taxing it for the short period is the more difficult bit, but she should only have to pay a months worth if she times it right.
Or a quick call to your insurance company
Plenty of places online that offer day insurance - very quick and easy to do
Needs insurance for you to be able to drive on your own insurance i think, however, you can buy short-term insurance for not too much.
Not insured third party as a driver through your insurer?
Most private insurance policies don't allow the policy holder to drive another car third party unless that car also has it's own policy.
This is not going to be a very helpful answer - but when I flogged a car there was a price comparison site for the webuyanycrap market (I can’t remember it’s name but Google should find one - the one I chose was linked to BCA auctions). They collected fro merge house. They were a few hundred £ better than the people with tv adverts and when his boss they tried to renegotiate the price at collection (a tactic I believe they all do) based on things they never asked about in the condition form you complete before hand I said “sorry your boss has wasted your time making you come all this way (he had travelled about 200 miles on the train!) but I’m not selling for less than the price he agreed by email”. I got the amount previously agreed in full.
Things may be different in Covid.
Not much help but when my FIL died I just faked his signature and signed it over to my missus.....then we sold it privately.
Not insured third party as a driver through your insurer? A month’s tax won’t be much surely – 5 mins online?
Third party other vehicles cover (which is less common now anyway) requires the vehicle itself to be covered under someone else’s policy. (Some of the “day insurance” policies are the same).
This is also an issue for any private buyer who wants to test drive. They will not be insured, and if caught (in Scotland at least) is likely to result in the keeper (or presumably in this case the executor) being prosecuted for causing/permitting a person to drive without insurance.
Additional information:
The car is 200 miles away so private sale would be a problem, as that would mean being there in person to meet potential buyers etc. She can't stay there as the utilities at her late father's place are cut off and the flat has been cleared. Due to the no-tax-no-insurance situation she can't drive the car back here either.
The reason to go with a WBAC type operation was that she could go there and do the deal at the time of her choosing. We were also under the impression that they would come out to you and pick it up - this may be a COVID thing.
Paying tax and obtaining insurance on a car with no registered owner does not appear to be a five-minute job, hence the question... all the one-day insurance options appear to apply to borrowing/using a car already owned/insured by someone else.
We would rather avoid having to register new keeper details if possible, but it's looking increasingly unlikely this can be done. Will try calling other quick-sell companies to see if they will come out.
surely an outfit like WBAC or similar have trade plates that would let them test drive it under their own insurance?
Whereabouts is the car, and what is it?
I'm looking for a car, mine failed it's MOT.
Not of any use to the op but for anyone following who might be in a similar situation, don't cancel the tax & insurance while you are still in possession of the car.
As @jam-bo says, any regular trader should have trade plates which make it legal to drive without tax and a motor traders' insurance policy which lets them drive other cars as the sole insurer.
WBAC, may be trying to cut costs by not bothering on the basis that they want to get 90% of the business at 50% of the cost by getting the cars driven to them.
In general, I'd expect it's going to be less hassle for a trader to drive it away than it is to get yourself legal to drive it for one journey. Can you ring round garages in the area to get a guideline collected price given model, age and description?
Otherwise look into the cost of someone with a flatbed or trailer picking it up and taking it to WBAC type place, perhaps? It may well be cheaper and almost certainly less hassle than getting the registered keeper updated, insurance and tax in place for one journey.
It's a Honda Jazz, fairly new, wasn't driven much (and when it was, driven in a pensionerly way - I mean it's a Honda Jazz, favoured by pensioners who don't drive much, and when they do, drive slowly) - and it's in Malvern. I can get more details if you want, Merak!
Thanks everyone for the flood of answers - knew I could rely on the STW Massive!
all the one-day insurance options appear to apply to borrowing/using a car already owned/insured by someone else.
That is not correct. I used cuvva to buy my own cover for a day. I'd just bought the car, taxed it online, previous owner cancelled his policy.
Honda Jazz? A local garage will probably snap your hand off for that! OK you might not get top book, but for example there's a garage near me who sell as many Jazzes as they can buy.
I’d just bought the car, taxed it online, previous owner cancelled his policy.
So were you the registered owner at that point?
Keep it a Jazz is a great car! Those clever folding rear seats.
When my dad died I kept his car for a bit while I fixed mine, his insurance co honoured me as a driver as I was named at no cost "while I sold the car".
Smoked around in it for a few months then sold it privately. Signed the V5 myself as "executor of estate".
Why can't you just get the v5 in your name? I didn't think it was actually possible to have it blank as it doesn't confer ownership, just the responsibility for keeping it taxed and insured. So if you parked it on the roadside the police know who to send the letter to.
V5 is free, tax for a month is just a case of getting 6 months and remembering to cancel it. Day insurance is fairly cheap. <£50 and you could have it on your driveway.
But then any private buyer will probably want a test drive so you'll need to keep it insured for that.
V5 is free, tax for a month is just a case of getting 6 months and remembering to cancel it. Day insurance is fairly cheap. <£50 and you could have it on your driveway.
This. I've just done this with my FiL's car. The V5 and tax really were a 5 minute job.
And if you don't, you'll have to SORN it instead which is also a bit of a pain.
I am now in the process of deciding whether to fix the dent in one of the doors before I try to sell it... :/
My brothers trying to sell his BiLs car under similar circumstances but no-one wants to accept less than pristine book price. So my actual advice is get it done quickly before relatives start oppinioning on it's value.
Anyone want a Cat-n (or d, not sure how long ago it was) Astra VXR near Cannock? Looks mint on the outside but it's not been sat still for almost a year just been started and driven up/down the lane.
As others said my dad's insurer put it into my executor's names and added me as a named driver free of charge until the policy ended (Privilege).
Having done that I took it to a few local dealers to get prices. In the end though using motorway.co.uk got me the best price, a buyer on behalf of the main dealer group confirmed a price, came to view, then got it picked up.
No test drive, no real faff bar waiting for the cash to arrive before the driver took the car away.
In retrospect I should have kept it as a few months on looking for something fairly similar. More fool me.
Not of any use to the op but for anyone following who might be in a similar situation, don’t cancel the tax & insurance while you are still in possession of the car.
In this case we used the Tell Us Once notification so that we didn't have to inform lots of different organisations re. the death - this put the wheels in motion for updating DVLA records automatically.
Also, the car insurance ended on the death of the policyholder anyway - some insurers allow a grace period, some do not.
It’s a Honda Jazz, fairly new, wasn’t driven much (and when it was, driven in a pensionerly way
Phone the nearest Honda dealer to your FIL. Explain the situation and ask for a reasonable offer. They’ll bite your hand off for it. Good used cars will always sell.
Didn't think the car could not have a registered keeper other than when transfered into trade. When my mother died I had to transfer her car to having me as the keeper (even though ownership was split between myself and brother). Insurance company change the existing policy into my name (one unexpected bonus of this was I gained an extra load in NCB).
Where is the "test drive" from WBAC coming from? Used them recently and there was no test drive, and no mention of test drives on their site that I can see?
However, there is this https://www.webuyanycar.com/sell-my-car/case-of-bereavement/#bereavement
FWIW (expanding on the above). I had to sell 2 motorbikes and a car after a death in the family last month. BMW just needed to see the death cert and bought the car back, the bike dealer didn't even need that. His other car was just transferred into my name via the DVLA (Sensitive Cases Team). Was all very simple
If you're not the registered keeper, can you legally sell it?
Cougar
Full MemberIf you’re not the registered keeper, can you legally sell it?
The executor can
Above advice from TiRed is good, we did have the local dealer lined up to buy but they backed out due to staff being furloughed - motorway basically introduced us to another dealer group (and took a fee) but we ended up with same amount of cash from the deal anyhow.
If you’re not the registered keeper, can you legally sell it?
Just because someone is the registered keeper does not mean they are the owner, the wife's car is registered in her name but i paid for it, if a debt collector wanted to take it away because she owed someone money they cant touch it as i paid for it (as long as i can prove i paid for it) but as its registered in her name any speeding or parking tickets are her responsibility
The owner is the person who paid for the car and has their name on the receipt
Have you looked at getting it transported to webuyanycar?
Check local Facebook groups for breakdown/recovery/tow truck mechanics and pay one of them to deliver it to webuyanycar and meet them there, as they are only taking it 5 miles it would be cheaper than taxing and insuring the car for one day
I mean it’s a Honda Jazz, favoured by pensioners who don’t drive much, and when they do, drive slowly)
Ha ha like my mum who drove her Jazz* about 10 miles on two wheel rims when she double punctured after bouncing off a kerb. Claimed not to see or hear the warning lights and beeps.
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.* one careful owner 😁
So were you the registered owner at that point?
Depends what you mean. I had the v5c (the new keeper slip) on me, but dvla wouldn't have known. They were so shit it took 90 days to get the v5 back.
I also test drove the car before purchase and I could have bought the cover for that too, but in the end I drove it TPO on my own car policy and a "if I bend it I buy it" promise.
With the V5 transferred you can tax it online using the monthly payment option, that way you’ll just pay for the month(s) you’re responsible for it.
That just leaves the insurance. Do you use a broker or go direct?
Sold a car yesterday to Evans Halshaw via motorway.co.uk. You definitely won’t be any requirement for a test drive of any sort with Covid.
Get an estimate via motorway and go direct to site offering best price and ask them for an estimate. They’ll want photos of outside front to rear, one internally, service book and photo of odometer for mileage. They’ll make you an offer. If you want to proceed they send paperwork for payment details and want details of name on v5 which must match bank account for payment.
Drop car off and that’s it. Payment will land in the account a couple of hours later. Really simple process. The only physical interaction was a member of staff driving car into compound.
You haven’t mentioned how much it’s worth or posted pics. I’m fairly local to Malvern trying to think if I know anyone needs a car . . .