What to do after you sell it

Tell the state you sold it

Most states have a filing that takes the vehicle off your record.

A notice of transfer. A release of liability. A seller’s report of sale. The name depends where you are.

Some take it online in a few minutes. Some give you a deadline measured in days.

This is the step people skip, and it is the one that matters most.

Until the buyer registers the vehicle, it can still look like yours.

Your state page says whether yours has one, what it is called and how long you have.

Plates

States split into two camps and it is worth knowing which you are in.

In some, the plates stay with you and come off before the vehicle leaves.

In others they go with the vehicle.

Get it wrong in the first kind and your plate is on a car you no longer control.

Insurance, in that order

Cancel too early and you have a gap on something still registered to you.

Cancel too late and you are paying for a car somebody else is driving.

Hand over. File the notice. Then close the policy.

Tell the insurer the date it actually changed hands.

Tolls and tickets

These arrive weeks later and they arrive at whoever is on the record.

Keep the bill of sale and your copy of the notice. Between them they show the date it stopped being yours.

That is usually the whole argument.

A post-sale checklist

Ours is one page, in order, and the state-specific parts point at your state's own sheet. Free, no account.