The price of scrap metal is the highest that it has been in years. This means that the demand for scrap metal is also high, as is competition for junk car buyers. Junk car removal companies have been forced to increase the price that they pay for junk cars. There is so much competition amongst junk car removal companies that some companies are offering so much money for junk cars so that they can eliminate competition, but because these companies are offering so much money for the junk cars, the companies themselves are making next to no profit for the vehicles.
Not only are junk car removal companies experiencing competition with other junk car removal companies, but they are also facing competition with fraudulent junk car buyers. Legally, junk car removal services are required to have a business license. However, there are junk car
buyers/towers out there who do not have a license and who continue to buy/tow junk vehicles. These people are not the only competitors.
There are yet other people who, rather than buying and selling vehicles whole to the junkyard, take car parts and sell them individually. Often, these people are crooks who go around and rob car parts off of vehicles and sell the individual parts to the junkyard. The plus side of selling parts individually is that you do not need paperwork to show ownership of the individual car part. (When a vehicle is being sold as whole, the title is required. If. However, the vehicle is at least 10 years old, the registration and copy of the registered owner’s license can be accepted.) So, people go around stealing parts like catalytic converters off of vehicles and bring them to a junkyard to receive some immediate cash.
During hurricane Sandy, junk car removal companies rounded up tens and hundreds of flooded vehicles and packed them into yards so as to round up as many vehicles as they could before other competitors bought the vehicles. Crooks were going around to these yards and stealing car parts to make quick cash. It goes to show you the extent certain people will go to make a quick dollar and that the scrap metal business is extremely competitive.
