Girlfriend Split and Left Car. Can My Friend Keep It? – Stephanie

“Dear Steve,

I have a friend who split with his girlfriend and she moved back to Florida (we live in California). She left her car and it’s been here for over a year. We are not sure if the car is fully paid off or in repossession status.

Can he register the car here in California?

Stephanie”

Dear Stephanie,

He can, but…

California has a process that would allow the car to be transferred via a lien sale. As you can imagine, getting the title to an abandoned vehicle has a bunch of rules and regulations that go along with a process like that. The rules differentiate if a car is worth more than $4,000 or less than that. You can find a complete description of the process on the California Department of Motor Vehicles site, click here.

Steve Rhode Debt Coach and Author

Steve Rhode is the Get Out of Debt Guy and has been helping good people with bad debt problems since 1994. You can learn more about Steve, here.

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