Donate Car to Charity - 10 steps on How to Donate Your Car to the Right Charity and Get the Extra Tax Right Off You Have Been Looking For. 10 Steps To Donate Car To Charity 1) Make sure that if you are donating your car to a charity that they accept car donations because many of the smaller ones you may give money to are not equipped enough to accept such things. 2) The amount the organization gives the charity may not qualify you for a tax refund. Say for example the middlemen gives the charity only $100 for your car or $1000 for all cars turned in that month then that would not necessarily be eligible for a tax refund. 3) Finding and picking the right charity means doing some research and Charity Navigator does a great job looking at many different charities that accept car donations and to show how much each charity spends on administrative cost. 4) Look at how much money actually will go to the charity because many times the middle person will take as much as 50-90% which doesn’t leave much for the charity. 5) When deciding on a charity to donate your car to look at their status with the IRS which must be 501(c)(3). For information on the status you can visit the IRS website and search for publication 78 at www.irs.gov. Typing 78 into the search field will also help you find more non-profit organizations. 6) Increase the amount that goes to charity by driving it to the place yourself. Usually charities have to pay for someone to go out and tow it to them, but if your car runs find out where the charity is and drive on over. 7) Ask for a receipt from the charity stating how much your car was actually sold for at auction if you feel the car was worth more than $500. The IRS is watching this closer now because many people gave themselves a higher tax right off because they thought the car was worth more than $500. If the car was worth less than $500 than you can use the FMV (Fair Market Value) from the Kelly Blue Book but should still get a receipt from the charity. 8) There is a special form that needs to be submitted with your taxes if the car was sold for more than $500 which is called IRS Form 8283. 9) Never ever leave the space blank on the title change form when transferring the title to the charity. If in the future a person gets a ticket or your car is involved in a crime and the title is still in your name you would be liable. Find another charity to donate your car to if they ask you to do this. 10)Keep a good paper trail of the donated car. Pictures of the car, copies of the title change, proof of donation and receipt from the charity are things that will help you in the event that the IRS audits you for your donation. Plus this maybe the biggest donation you give in your lifetime and you want to get to most out of it for yourself and the charity.