What to do with a dead Honda CRV

One of the favorite alternative uses in my native North Georgia was as a semi-mobile outdoor storage pod...before we knew to call it that. You could always chop the chassis a bit and make the kids an X-Wing fighter out of it. A CRV nowadays....you could probably get maybe $200 or $250 for it from Greenleaf or one of the similar junkyard network companies.

No, it hasn't been put on craigslist yet. The offer was from a mechanic that I had check it out to see what needed to be done to get it running again.

In its current condition, at what price should I start?

Ah, was wondering what happened to you. Glad to see you're okay.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FLUkaySEY8

I bet the timing belt broke cause OP is a dumbass. These cars ARE bullet proof up until you neglect them. Oil change or timing belt...

It's got 240,000 miles on it and had been stolen earlier this year but was recovered.

If you can rebuild the engine cheap you could check this out it might be fun.

http://www.24hoursoflemons.com/

I have personally purchased many non running cars, and got them running again, either I sell it for a profit, or keep it for awhile and drive it. There are people that need cheaper cars out there. Why exactly does it need a new engine? timing belt broken? rod knock? what's the deal? call around to local salvage yards to get the best price, list it on cl as mentioned. or try to find someone who will get it running again for less than a garage will, because a running car is worth more than a non running car.

fatverel said:   My car is a 1999 honda crv. The engine is dead. Also, the front and back bumpers are barely hanging on. Should I donate it or junk it? Are there any other options? Also, a mechanic offered me $300 for it.

Thanks in advance.

My ex had a 2000 CRV and the task of working on it fell to me. The car wasn't great on some fronts (e.g. noisy inside), but it wasn't mechanically difficult to work on. If the engine is dead, putting it on Craigslist is a good idea. In my area (San Francisco Bay Area), old Hondas (Accords and Civics for sure, not sure about CRVs) are still really valuable. Advertise it as a "mechanic's special" with a busted timing chain and I'm sure some weekend mechanic will tow it home.

Other than Craigslist, you could:
1) Sell it to a pick-n-pull type junkyard, although you probably won't get much unless the mechanical components are really good still (e.g. interior, headlights, brake rotors, etc)
2) You could donate it to a charity. In my area, there's one that helps missing kids that advertises in the newspaper and radio a lot.
3) You could also donate it to an auto shop at a high school or vocational school. Lord knows they need money right now.

I don't have a Honda personally, but as others have said, they are phenomenally bulletproof without doing much more than changing the oil and other fluids. That said, if you fix the timing chain or swap an engine in, do a fresh coat of paint, and fix the bumpers, you could probably get another 150,000 miles out of it easily. The 1st generation CRVs had a ton of room in the engine bay -- you could literally put the spare tire on the engine and still close the hood. An engine swap shouldn't be that hard.

Because Hondas are so popular, pick-n-pull junkyards have tons of them so go there if you want to fix your bumpers.

meribona said:   Because Hondas are so popular, pick-n-pull junkyards have tons of them so go there if you want to fix your bumpers.

Or just attach a 2x6 piece of wood and look badass

You'll probably do your best on Craigslist, but another option is:
http://www.damagedcars.com/
Depending on where you live, sites like this may offer more than the local junkyard.

Ditto the above. In the past you could deduct the book value of the car not the actual market value. So that meant you could donate the car to charity even if it had the blown engine and the deduction was worth as much as you'd get selling it or more. Then they changed the laws a few years ago so that now it doesn't make as much sense. Now that you only get the actual market value of the car, if you want to make the most money, you'd sell it privately and then afterwards you can make a donation to any charity you'd like with the proceeds, it's the same thing.

You might try a local auction house. I did that once with this central Florida auctioneer: http://soldfor.com// I just signed the title and a contract with them, avoiding most of the hassles of selling.

If you have manual transmission, you should turn it into an electric car. If you have automatic, you could still make it an electric car, but it's more work.

http://auto.howstuffworks.com/electric-car7.htm

It's better if you sell and donate. Then your chosen charity gets 100% of the donation. Otherwise they get about 15% of what the intermediary they have contracted the handling through does.
henry33 said:   Ditto the above. In the past you could deduct the book value of the car not the actual market value. So that meant you could donate the car to charity even if it had the blown engine and the deduction was worth as much as you'd get selling it or more. Then they changed the laws a few years ago so that now it doesn't make as much sense. Now that you only get the actual market value of the car, if you want to make the most money, you'd sell it privately and then afterwards you can make a donation to any charity you'd like with the proceeds, it's the same thing.

sell it on CL as-is. I bet you could get a grand+ easy for that car.

You'd be amazed how valuable CRV's are regardless of condition. I sold a 2001 for a co-worker just a couple months ago & got $5500 for it. It was a base model with 140k miles in reasonably good condition and I got a ton of phonecalls/emails about it & sold it in 2 days. These cars are probably one of the best-depreciating vehicles out there.

i guarantee you the reason that mechanic offered to buy it off-the-bat is b/c he knows that even after replacing/fixing the engine that he could make 2-3 grand profit off the deal. So list it on CL for like 1-2 grand and see how many people ask about it. If you get no bites lower the price. Be sure to take good photos & not go too far into describing its problems as that will turn people off to even replying to the ad.

Only $1300 to replace the engine and you're thinking of giving it to your mechanic for $300?

That's nuts. He would make several thousand dollars off doing that.

Even if you paid the $1300 to replace the engine I guarantee you can sell it for far more than $1600, no matter how bad the bumpers look or how little window washer fluid squirts out

Modern cars are good, but anyone of them with a quarter million miles isn't worth more than $1-2k if they haven't had virtually every moving part replaced within the last 100k. Quarter million mile cars are money pits unless you can do all the work yourself. And then they are still money pits.

Gift it to Top Gear so that they can run over it with a tank or something.