Selling a SORN Car
 

Selling a SORN Car

 bubs
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I need to sell my Dad's old car as he can no longer drive it.  It's currently SORN and sitting in his garage.

Am I right in thinking that I just need to apply for the shortest tax period (6 months) and some temporary car insurance just to get it to WeBuyAnyCar?  The MOT runs out next month and so that should be ok.

Do garages come and collect old bangers or would they not bother with an old car? 


 
Posted : 22/03/2026 11:01 am
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Do you want to get rid for whatever you can get for it? If so just put it on Facebook Market place as a SORN car at a low price, trailer needed or on Ebay as a 99p auction again will need to be towed/trailered in the listing.


 
Posted : 22/03/2026 11:08 am
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If it's MOTd and insured then potentially you'll get more as a private sale if you tax it 1st April.

That means test drives and driving it away are on the table = easier sale.

You'll know more about the faff factor, mot expiry and cost trade off, but you only get tax refunds for a calendar month; tax it now and you'll get a week back in March


 
Posted : 22/03/2026 12:36 pm
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The buyer (unless trade plates?) has to tax it themselves before driving anyway. If it was taxed in your dad's name, that ends and is refunded when ownership changes.

I'm just in the same process with the wife's old car, insurance transferred to her new one with no overlap so had to SORN it. A whole £1.66 refund cheque arrived for the remaining month.


 
Posted : 22/03/2026 12:37 pm
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Posted by: bubs

The MOT runs out next month and so that should be ok.

WBAC will bang you down for short MOT - worth it if you think it should pass a test for the increased value.


 
Posted : 22/03/2026 1:03 pm
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Also WBAC will give better offer if MOT longer than 6 months, don't accept first offer.


 
Posted : 22/03/2026 1:07 pm
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What is it. You could always see if anyone on here is interested!

 


 
Posted : 22/03/2026 1:38 pm
 bubs
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"What is it. You could always see if anyone on here is interested!" 

😁 Stealth ad.  I'll put it in the classifieds if I can't offload it to the extended family. 

Low mileage, scratched paint work, Skoda Octavia 2007. 

Thanks all, good shout about waiting before taxing. 

 

 

 
Posted : 22/03/2026 2:22 pm
hot_fiat reacted
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TBH if it's insured I'd risk driving it a few miles to WBAC without tax. If you're really bothered book an MOT next door to the WBAC place, you can legally drive to a pre-booked MOT without tax. Where I live there are very few ANPRs though, might be different if you live in a city. 


 
Posted : 22/03/2026 3:03 pm
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If you think it'll pass an MOT and unless you are using wbac for the lack of faff, id get it booked in for an MOT (tax not required) give it a years mot & sell it privately for a sensible price on eBay/Facebook - plenty of people wanting a long MOT banger to get them through the next yr on the cheap.


 
Posted : 22/03/2026 4:41 pm
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I doubt WBAC will actually offer much in person - don’t get excited about they offer online the WBAC human gets a cut from whatever they chip off between the online and presented in person. Hateful company (experience dealing with them shortly after FIL death).

Skoda Octavia is the STW choice of car. Post the details here - I stealth sold MrsRNP’s Volvo to a fellow STWer


 
Posted : 22/03/2026 5:58 pm
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I doubt WBAC will actually offer much in person - don’t get excited about what they offer online, the WBAC human gets a cut from whatever they chip off between the online and presented in person. Hateful company (experience dealing with them shortly after FIL death).

Skoda Octavia is the STW choice of car. Post the details here - I stealth sold MrsRNP’s Volvo to a fellow STWer.

I also sold the sister in laws Fiat Panda for her when she emigrated. It was SORN but I allowed the buyer to drive it up and down our quiet road/yard area (with me in the passenger seat). I and the car were obviously a genuine seller and the car sold without hassle.


 
Posted : 22/03/2026 5:59 pm
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If you tax monthly by direct debit online you'll get a few free days of tax before the first debit is taken but it will show as taxed. you could then cancel it before paying....


 
Posted : 22/03/2026 7:45 pm
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just sold a decent* car recently. 

WBAC valued online at 2.3k - so might scrap 2k once they do their thing. 

Sold privately for 4.4k 

 

*unusual i normally sell scrap 

decided WBAC is the last place id sell a car - Few lads at work have had success with motorway - but they are selling 15-20 grand cars. 


 
Posted : 23/03/2026 9:14 am
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As andrewh suggests: book it in for an MOT next to wherever WBAC are. You could drive it to the MOT and then back home accidentally losing it in WBAC in either direction. You don't need tax to get to an MOT as an MOT is generally a prerequisite to being able to get tax. It must be booked in however. You will need insurance, which is what tempcover is for. I was recently overjoyed to see admiral do this online if you've multicar policy, was £15 for a month.

Just beware, for a 2007 skod, WBAC will give you absolute bottom book and then take £50 off for each scratch. It's essentially a front for British Car Auctions. You could legally tow it to a BCA site and abandon it with them for the potential of a slightly better return. Personally, I'd bung it on marketplace and take whatever the first reasonable* person offers.

 

*am aware that with marketplace this is a small subset in the Venn diagram of life.


 
Posted : 23/03/2026 12:44 pm
 IHN
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FWIW, we sold a car to a scrapper and they came and got it.


 
Posted : 23/03/2026 12:58 pm
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Fwiw, if it's within a reasonable distance and decent mechanical nick, a cheap Octavia with slightly tatty paintwork is exactly the sort of thing I'm looking for right now!

If family don't want it, drop me a message.


 
Posted : 23/03/2026 1:10 pm
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Not worth risking any clever ideas for a few quid in tax. 

check the insurance docs - likely that your policy is invalid if not taxed. Wait til April, pay monthly and drive a fully legal car to the MOT. 

those above saying it’ll be fine, maybe it will. Maybe you find out when you have an accident that it isn’t. And you aren’t covered. 

after all who crashes on purpose? Or can controls who else crashes into them?

 

I wish I didn’t have to share the road with chancers. Don’t be one of them !


 
Posted : 25/03/2026 11:27 am
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Not worth risking any clever ideas for a few quid in tax. 

There's no risk, you can legally drive without tax to/from a pre booked MOT. Just make sure it/you are insured.   The more usual caveat on 3rd party cover on your own policy is that the car is insured on someone else's policy not in your household.  My dad recently had to go through this with grandads car, phoned up his insurers as the policy ends when he dies, and they extended it by a month so that it could be driven until things were sorted and transferred properly (there's a complication that gran won't sell it, but is legally blind, so insuring in her name with family members and neighbors as named drivers is dubious).

Although as others have said, where in the country are you and how much do you want?  I think I had a sense of humor failure riding into work this morning in the freezing rain 🤣 !  Someone will almost certainly give you the WBAC price for it, probably more, and then the MOT/Tax question ceases to be a problem for you.

FWIW, we sold a car to a scrapper and they came and got it.

Or this, if it really is a banger or going to fail it's MOT, try a few of the ones that come up on google for the best prices, I think I used a couple of different ones for my last two cars, one was Redcorn can't recall the other (scrapmycar.com?), they paid ~£500 for undriveable cars and took them away on a lorry. 


 
Posted : 25/03/2026 12:28 pm
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there's a complication that gran won't sell it, but is legally blind, so insuring in her name with family members and neighbors as named drivers is dubious

That's easy. 

'Yes gran, it's still on the drive. I know you can't see it, but then you are blind!' 


 
Posted : 25/03/2026 1:20 pm
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That's easy. 

Haha, when he died I searched for it but couldn't find it, there's a (relatively lighthearted) thread on here about a forum members neighbors. It's them, my grandparents 🤣, don't mess with them!

 


 
Posted : 25/03/2026 1:56 pm
 bubs
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Thanks.  I hope to put it in the classifieds over the weekend. It's in Surrey which will probably restrict interest but it was a reliable car before being garaged.  I'll tax it in April if needed and have a bike hauling car for a month just to get it out of my Dad's garage. 


 
Posted : 25/03/2026 2:00 pm
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We did this recently - just make sure you transfter the V5 electronically after the money has changed hands then it is no longer your responsibility.

 


 
Posted : 25/03/2026 5:15 pm