What do I do with this?

[Tsubaki117]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? New York

3 Years ago before my divorce, my ex gave my son (his step-son) a car through his name as long as my son paid the insurance on his own. My son was intending on getting everything signed over to himself but my ex just stalled. It's pointless to even bothered to bring it up in court because on paper it is still in his name. Recently it broke down and so now depending in the weather, it rarely starts. My son had to finally give in and purchase a new one, (this time all in his own name) and so he managed to drive the other one to my ex's house. We basically had no choice since we assumed that if we did anything other than that, he'd somehow just use that against me in court. That same day, my ex got AAA to tow it back to my driveway (after he took the plates and everything else off) because he doesn't know where my son lives and so he couldn't put it there. Is he allowed to do this?

 

[dad43]

AAA will tow a car to any place you tell them too, so in a way, yea he can dump it at your house.....if the car is in your ex's name only, i'd call and have an unauthorized vehicle towed from the property

also, a vehicle without tags is considered illegal, and i don't know if you live in an HOA, but they'll look at it the same way...meaning you can catch fines for an unauthorized, illegally parked vehicle in the neighborhood...stupid, yes-viable, yes...i don't think he can use it against YOU in court. the car might be driven by your son, but your ex is legally liable for everything attributed to the vehicle(repairs, etc, i don't know anything about accidents and the like)...is your son still paying the insurance on it? and who makes the payments? is the vehicle paid off? your son could talk dad into giving him the title, then just junk it if the repair costs are off the chart for anyone to afford...

 

[mistoffolees]

AAA will tow a car to any place you tell them too, so in a way, yea he can dump it at your house.....if the car is in your ex's name only, i'd call and have an unauthorized vehicle towed from the property

also, a vehicle without tags is considered illegal, and i don't know if you live in an HOA, but they'll look at it the same way...meaning you can catch fines for an unauthorized, illegally parked vehicle in the neighborhood...stupid, yes-viable, yes...i don't think he can use it against YOU in court. the car might be driven by your son, but your ex is legally liable for everything attributed to the vehicle(repairs, etc, i don't know anything about accidents and the like)...is your son still paying the insurance on it? and who makes the payments? is the vehicle paid off? your son could talk dad into giving him the title, then just junk it if the repair costs are off the chart for anyone to afford...

But one way or another, you need to do something about it. If you continue the game of musical cars and leave it at your stbx's house, then it's just going to escalate things and create far more problems than it's worth. You really need to be an adult and talk with him about it and ask what he wants to do with the car - and cooperate to get it done. If it's really not worth fixing, tell him you'll pay to have it towed to the junkyard if he'll sign the title. If it's worth fixing, then work out an arrangement to sell it (with stbx presumably keeping the $$ since your son didn't want the car.

Don't get caught in the emotional trap of "well, I'm going to be a PIA because he was a PIA first". He didn't have to let your son drive the car. (Yes, one might legally get into a battle that by stating that he GAVE the car to your son and try to enforce that, but I can guarantee the cost will be far greater than the value of the car - and it will make it impossible to amicably resolve ANYTHING down the road.

Oh, and if the car has no insurance, you need to do something about it quickly. An unlicensed car in your driveway needs insurance. If someone steals or takes the car for a joyride and has an accident or tries to lift the car to steal the wheels and has the car fall on him, YOU would be liable since it's in your driveway (your ex would also be liable since it's his car).

 

[LdiJ]

But one way or another, you need to do something about it. If you continue the game of musical cars and leave it at your stbx's house, then it's just going to escalate things and create far more problems than it's worth. You really need to be an adult and talk with him about it and ask what he wants to do with the car - and cooperate to get it done. If it's really not worth fixing, tell him you'll pay to have it towed to the junkyard if he'll sign the title. If it's worth fixing, then work out an arrangement to sell it (with stbx presumably keeping the $$ since your son didn't want the car.

Don't get caught in the emotional trap of "well, I'm going to be a PIA because he was a PIA first". He didn't have to let your son drive the car. (Yes, one might legally get into a battle that by stating that he GAVE the car to your son and try to enforce that, but I can guarantee the cost will be far greater than the value of the car - and it will make it impossible to amicably resolve ANYTHING down the road.

Oh, and if the car has no insurance, you need to do something about it quickly. An unlicensed car in your driveway needs insurance. If someone steals or takes the car for a joyride and has an accident or tries to lift the car to steal the wheels and has the car fall on him, YOU would be liable since it's in your driveway (your ex would also be liable since it's his car).

That is why she needs to call the city or county (whoever handles that) and have it towed off as an abandoned car.

Legally it belongs to her ex...there can be an argument that it belongs to her son (who does NOT live with her), but it definitely does NOT belong to her and her ex had no business leaving it in her driveway.

This is not her problem. I have been through this when my granddaughter's father abandoned a vehicle on my property and refused to do anything about it. I couldn't get a junkyard to tow it because I didn't have the title. I ended up with fines as a result and was FIRMLY told by the authorities that I should have called the city to have it towed as an abandoned vehicle.

 

[mistoffolees]

That is why she needs to call the city or county (whoever handles that) and have it towed off as an abandoned car.

Legally it belongs to her ex...there can be an argument that it belongs to her son (who does NOT live with her), but it definitely does NOT belong to her and her ex had no business leaving it in her driveway.

This is not her problem. I have been through this when my granddaughter's father abandoned a vehicle on my property and refused to do anything about it. I couldn't get a junkyard to tow it because I didn't have the title. I ended up with fines as a result and was FIRMLY told by the authorities that I should have called the city to have it towed as an abandoned vehicle.

Legally, she can do that.

But just how well do you think she's going to be able to sit down and have an amicable discussion with her ex after she gets him slapped with a few hundred dollars in fees and fines for having his car towed away?

Sometimes, it just doesn't pay to take the hard-a$$ed solution to a problem. Simply discussing it with him and agreeing to have it towed to the junkyard if he'll sign the title would be far less stressful and expensive for everyone. Even the biggest PIA would probably cooperate with that (especially if she states that she can't have the car in her driveway for liability reasons and will have the city tow it at his expense if he doesn't sign over the title).

They will have many other issues - some of them likely to be far more important than what to do with a junked car. She can either chose to make every issue into a legal battle over who has the legal right to do what OR she can try to resolve issues in a manner that works for both of them. In the long run, the latter makes far more sense.

 

[Tsubaki117]

The Papers...

I was under the impression that when he brought it back to my house and with nothing on it, that it was intentional and he left it for me to deal with. I am well aware that it is now illegal since there is nothing on it, but what can I do with it? I'm pretty sure that one act told what his position would be if tried to discuss the matters of the car with him like an adult.

My son had decided it was time to finally ask him to sign over the car when I discussed with him the possibility of a divorce if he (my ex) didn't start shaping up. My son even got the papers for my ex to sign it over and my ex said he'd take care of it all. Meaning that we don't even know if he ever signed them. My son believes he even threw them away somewhere once he had his papers served.

So now if either of us asked, he'd probably deny ever getting such papers.

 

[mistoffolees]

I was under the impression that when he brought it back to my house and with nothing on it, that it was intentional and he left it for me to deal with. I am well aware that it is now illegal since there is nothing on it, but what can I do with it? I'm pretty sure that one act told what his position would be if tried to discuss the matters of the car with him like an adult.

My son had decided it was time to finally ask him to sign over the car when I discussed with him the possibility of a divorce if he (my ex) didn't start shaping up. My son even got the papers for my ex to sign it over and my ex said he'd take care of it all. Meaning that we don't even know if he ever signed them. My son believes he even threw them away somewhere once he had his papers served.

So now if either of us asked, he'd probably deny ever getting such papers.

You've already got your options:

1. Have your son ask him to sign the papers again.
2. Call the city and ask to have the abandoned car removed at the owner's expense.
3. Talk to him about it

Choose one.

 

[nextwife]

Son wanted use of a car, but what about the need for servicing it as needed? I have a 96 van I still use, and it stalls in damp weather, or at least it did until I serviced it. Did son expect free use of a car AND no responsibility for servicing it? What did he DO about the stalling issue?

IMHO: simply towing it to dad is not very responsible.

 

[LdiJ]

Son wanted use of a car, but what about the need for servicing it as needed? I have a 96 van I still use, and it stalls in damp weather, or at least it did until I serviced it. Did son expect free use of a car AND no responsibility for servicing it? What did he DO about the stalling issue?

IMHO: simply towing it to dad is not very responsible.

Well, its not dad its stepdad, and stepdad didn't cooperate with getting it signed over, legally, to ex adult stepchild...so ex adult stepchild returned it to its legal owner, and the legal owner had it towed to the driveway of his ex wife...where the ex adult stepchild did not live...stripped of anything that could have avoided a fine.

Its still not the ex wife's problem. Its between her adult son who does not live with her and her ex husband.

 

[mistoffolees]

Its still not the ex wife's problem.

Want to bet?

LEGALLY, it's not the ex-wife's problem. But if ex-wife has the car dragged to stbx's home, she's looking at a lot more difficulty in getting through the divorce negotiations. IMHO, antagonizing ex over something stupid like a used car that doesn't even work when all the other issues remain open is just plain foolish.

 

[BL]

Depending on where in NY one lives ,it's possible to have one unregistered vehicle store on property .

If the Mom is worried about amicable divorce ,she can check to see if one unregistered vehicle is legal until the divorce is final .

She shouldn't have to rack up fines meantime though .

 

[mistoffolees]

Depending on where in NY one lives ,it's possible to have one unregistered vehicle store on property .

If the Mom is worried about amicable divorce ,she can check to see if one unregistered vehicle is legal until the divorce is final .

She shouldn't have to rack up fines meantime though .

Legally, she may be able to do that, but it doesn't solve the liability problem mentioned above. She really needs to get it off her property using one of the methods mentioned earlier.

 

[Tsubaki117]

My ex helped my son get the car by using his name on all of the papers. Other than that, it was my son's responsibility and so it was him that paid for all of the expenses like repairs and insurance. When my son got it, the car was basically a means of transportation back and forth from work. When fisrt got the car he started saving up for a better one. Yet when he had enough money he refused to buy the said car, until he was absolutely sure that spending the money on fixing his old one was more expensive than just getting another.

When it finally keeled over he got his new one and gave the other one back to my ex because there was really nothing else he could do with it since it wasn't ever changed to his name. My son called me and told me he was goind to do it that morning and when I returned home that afternoon, it was sitting in my driveway.

I asked my 17 year old about it since she was with her father (my ex) that day and she said that my son returned the car and the keys to my ex. Then a few hours later AAA came and her father went with them to take the car somewhere. She thought it was going to a junkyard so she didn't mention it to me or her brother earlier. She had no idea it ended up in my driveway but quickly put the pieces together because she said "it sounded like something he'd do"

It's broken, it's officially illegal to be on the road and it's becomming an eyesore. I'm not going to lie to myself and believe that we can sit down with my ex and talk like adults, since he's already shown what type of person he's gonna be about this. I want to know my other options even though I understand that I may have to speak with him either way...but I prefer the ones that involve limited interaction with him.

 

[mistoffolees]

My ex helped my son get the car by using his name on all of the papers. Other than that, it was my son's responsibility and so it was him that paid for all of the expenses like repairs and insurance. When my son got it, the car was basically a means of transportation back and forth from work. When fisrt got the car he started saving up for a better one. Yet when he had enough money he refused to buy the said car, until he was absolutely sure that spending the money on fixing his old one was more expensive than just getting another.

When it finally keeled over he got his new one and gave the other one back to my ex because there was really nothing else he could do with it since it wasn't ever changed to his name. My son called me and told me he was goind to do it that morning and when I returned home that afternoon, it was sitting in my driveway.

I asked my 17 year old about it since she was with her father (my ex) that day and she said that my son returned the car and the keys to my ex. Then a few hours later AAA came and her father went with them to take the car somewhere. She thought it was going to a junkyard so she didn't mention it to me or her brother earlier. She had no idea it ended up in my driveway but quickly put the pieces together because she said "it sounded like something he'd do"

It's broken, it's officially illegal to be on the road and it's becomming an eyesore. I'm not going to lie to myself and believe that we can sit down with my ex and talk like adults, since he's already shown what type of person he's gonna be about this. I want to know my other options even though I understand that I may have to speak with him either way...but I prefer the ones that involve limited interaction with him.

See post #7. Your options aren't going to change if you keep reposting the same information over and over.

 

[LdiJ]

My ex helped my son get the car by using his name on all of the papers. Other than that, it was my son's responsibility and so it was him that paid for all of the expenses like repairs and insurance. When my son got it, the car was basically a means of transportation back and forth from work. When fisrt got the car he started saving up for a better one. Yet when he had enough money he refused to buy the said car, until he was absolutely sure that spending the money on fixing his old one was more expensive than just getting another.

When it finally keeled over he got his new one and gave the other one back to my ex because there was really nothing else he could do with it since it wasn't ever changed to his name. My son called me and told me he was goind to do it that morning and when I returned home that afternoon, it was sitting in my driveway.

I asked my 17 year old about it since she was with her father (my ex) that day and she said that my son returned the car and the keys to my ex. Then a few hours later AAA came and her father went with them to take the car somewhere. She thought it was going to a junkyard so she didn't mention it to me or her brother earlier. She had no idea it ended up in my driveway but quickly put the pieces together because she said "it sounded like something he'd do"

It's broken, it's officially illegal to be on the road and it's becomming an eyesore. I'm not going to lie to myself and believe that we can sit down with my ex and talk like adults, since he's already shown what type of person he's gonna be about this. I want to know my other options even though I understand that I may have to speak with him either way...but I prefer the ones that involve limited interaction with him.

Again, call the city and have it towed as an abandoned car.