What your vehicle pays for, and what comes off the top first

We invest in outcomes, not ad campaigns

Your contribution is not used for paid media. Giving Center does not buy search advertising, social advertising or retargeting, which means there is no marketing budget being recovered from what your vehicle sold for.

That is a structural difference rather than a slogan. Vehicle donation is an advertising-heavy industry, and for many operators acquisition cost is one of the largest line items against every donation. Where that cost does not exist, less sits between the sale of your vehicle and the program it funds.

The costs that come off the proceeds, and why they exist

Turning a vehicle into funding has unavoidable expenses. Naming them is more useful than pretending they are not there:

• Transport. The tow, the trailer, the hauler, the ferry pilot. This is the largest single cost on most donations and the reason location matters so much.
• Sale costs. Auction or brokerage fees, listing costs, and the storage charged between arrival and sale.
• Title and registration work. Duplicate titles, lien releases, transfer notifications, documented-vessel and FAA filings.
• Liens and yard bills where they exist, which must be cleared before an item can be sold.
• Administration, including the IRS filing and issuing your Form 1098-C.

Every one of these falls on Giving Center the moment the vehicle is turned over. That is the commercial reason, alongside the honest one, that we will tell you when a scrap-value vehicle a long way from a buyer would cost more to haul than it returns.

What the remainder funds

Giving Center has been funding its work with donated property rather than cash appeals since 2005. Four program areas are where vehicle proceeds most often land:

• Urgent transportation. Sometimes the vehicle itself is the help. A reliable donated car can go directly to someone with a job or a course of treatment and no way to reach either.
• Veterans. Transitional and adaptive housing, vocational training, and the practical things that decide whether a transition holds.
• Families in crisis. Rent, utilities, a car repair, emergency shelter. Small amounts decided quickly, aimed at the bill that turns a hard month into a crisis.
• Education. After-school and summer programs, youth camps, classroom equipment and school supplies.

Giving Center's work extends beyond these four. Our causes covers the full range, and givingcenter.org is the parent organization's own site.

Why there is no percentage on this page

You will find vehicle donation sites quoting a headline figure for how much of your donation reaches the cause. Treat those carefully. A percentage is only meaningful if you know what it is a percentage of, whether it is calculated before or after transport and liquidation, and whether it is an average across donations that vary by a factor of a hundred.

A single ratio would be misleading in both directions here. A $40,000 excavator carries its transport cost easily and delivers most of its value to programs. A $400 car towed 150 miles can deliver nothing at all, and occasionally costs the charity money. Publishing one number would overstate the first case and misrepresent the second.

What we will tell you is specific and checkable: what your item is likely to bring, what it will cost to haul, and what is likely to be left. Ask on the first call and you will get a straight answer about your vehicle rather than an average about somebody else's.

How to check us rather than take our word for it

Giving Center is a nationwide IRS-approved 501(c)(3) nonprofit, EIN 92-1162407. You can confirm our exempt status in the IRS Tax Exempt Organization Search using that number, which is the check worth doing before donating to any charity.

Form 1098-C comes from the charity itself rather than a third-party processor, which is worth noting: in much of this industry the donor's paperwork and phone calls are handled by a for-profit intermediary. The name on your receipt should be the name of the charity you intended to support.