Cash for Clunkers Requirements

Cash for clunkers is a car allowance rebate system sponsored by the US government with the purpose of revitalizing and re-launching the car industry, which has been seriously affected by the financial crisis. People realized that changing their cars every three years is not a must, so they started to reconsider this purchasing behavior. With millions of consumers deciding to keep their cars for 5-6 years instead of only 2-3 years, there's no wonder that the new cars sales decreased drastically. This fact generated unemployment, so the governments had to come up with ideas of stopping the decline and reversing the trend.

With so many people qualifying for the Cash for Clunkers requirements, the White House expressed concerns that the $1 billion budget allocated for the Consumer Assistance to Recycle and Save program was exhausted after one week only. The Cash for Clunkers, or CARS program was signed into law on June 24th by the USA president, and it's supposed to bring a contribution in decreasing the number of old cars which are less energy efficient with new ones, which are better from this point of view.

The Cash for Clunkers requirements are that you own an eligible car or truck, get maximum 18 MPG in combined city / motorway regime, and you provide the dealer your car owner title, the car insurance and the registration proof.

If you want to find out whether or not your trade in vehicle qualifies for the Cash for clunkers requirement conditions, you can check it out here. Anyway, you should know that your car or truck needs to be an 1984 model or newer, otherwise it makes no sense to check, as it doesn't qualify. For detailed information, there's a hot number where you can call and ask: 1-866-CAR-7891.

If after going through the required paperwork you do qualify, you'll get a credit of $3500 for your car or $4500 for your SUV or truck, to count in to the price of the new vehicle you're going to buy. The program beneficiaries don't actually see the cash in hand, because the point of this car allowance program is to renew the US car pool and not to simply buy expensive old cars from the population. At this bonus value, the cash for clunkers makes sense if your old car is not more expensive that $4500, otherwise you'd get more money if you sold it on the market and not trade it in this car allowance program. This is why you need to make some calculations before deciding which way to go in order to replace your old vehicle with a new one. However, if your car is cheaper, and if you have possibilities to cover the price difference to get a new one, then it may be worth for you to check the Cash for Clunkers requirements as soon as you can, maybe you can benefit from the allowance before the funds are exhausted.