In Hobart, a junked car left out in the open can end up on your property tax bill. That’s how Chapter 96 of the city code works. Junk My Car Inc can take the car long before it gets that far.
Chapter 96 in plain words
Section 96.01 defines a junked vehicle broadly: any dismantled, abandoned, wrecked or junked vehicle, or any vehicle that is legally or physically incapable of being operated. It’s unlawful to park, store or keep one in the open on public or private land anywhere in the city, unless the area is zoned for it. Section 96.02(M) separately lists any abandoned vehicle as a nuisance.
Once notice is given, the vehicle owner and the landowner share the job of fixing it, and there are only two ways: move the car into a fully enclosed garage or building, or move it out of the city. If neither happens, Sections 96.03 to 96.07 let the city clear it and turn the cost into a lien collected on the property tax bill.
Selling counts as moving it out. We tow it away at no charge, nothing is taken off the offer for the tow, and you’re paid when it’s loaded. Send the car through the quote form and the phone rings back inside 15 minutes.
Alleys, trailers and the plows
Hobart’s parking chapter has no stopgap for a dead car either. Alley parking has to leave 10 feet open and can’t block a driveway, and loading there is capped at 30 minutes (Sections 72.04 and 72.05). Mobile homes, motor homes, boats, trailers and RVs are barred from residential streets, alleys and front yards under Section 72.03, and municipal lots have a 2-hour limit (Section 72.07). Under Section 70.06, police may tow a vehicle whose operator broke a state law or city ordinance.
In winter the Street Department plows main roads first, then secondary roads, then the subdivisions, and the plows run right to the curb. A car that can’t be moved out of their path holds up the whole street.
From Ainsworth to downtown
About three quarters of Hobart’s homes are single-unit houses, and a fifth are in buildings of five or more units (ACS 2020 to 2024), so we work driveways mostly, plus apartment lots with the manager’s OK. Ainsworth, near State Road 51 and the Canadian National tracks, joined the city in the early 1990s, and the US 30 strip around Southlake Mall came in through a 1993 annexation.
State Road 51 is the spine. It runs north from US 30 as Lake Park Avenue through Ainsworth, then along 10th, Lincoln and Main Streets and 3rd Street through downtown. US 6 comes south with it from the Borman at Ripley Street, and I-65 exit 258, listed for Hobart and Lake Station, lets out onto Ridge Road. Before the metal goes for scrap, plenty of a car can be reused; our list of scrap car parts that get recycled shows how much.
Papers, and the towns we cover
Indiana handles missing titles its own way. Whatever the car’s age, a recycler must receive the title, a BMV duplicate of it, or a BMV certificate of authority. No title is workable only for a car 15 model years old or more whose seller holds the certificate of authority; anything newer without either paper can’t legally be bought, and the buyer would commit a Level 6 felony. Tell us what you have and we’ll name the route on the call.
As junk car buyers in Hobart we also serve Merrillville, Lake Station and New Chicago. To the northwest we buy junk cars in Gary, further west in Munster, and across the state line in Lansing. The rest of our map is on the areas page.