Update: Overly Generous or Just Plain Stupid

Well, a miracle has finally occurred. The maintenance man paid me most of the money he still owed me on the Tracer. I say most because he did not pay me the $55 for renewing the plates. I am not gonna pitch a fit for the last $55. I am just glad I got the amount he still owed me for just the car itself.

He claims the reason for the payment delay is because the car is not working. The car supposedly died after he drove it for a week. Something about the first & fourth pistons being bad due to a bad repair on the timing belt. That the seals were missing or some such nonsense causing water to get into the pistons and messing them up. So he has been paying a mechanic to fix it. He has currently spent $700 towards the repairs. I was shocked! The car was fine when I had it.

Of course then I could not find the title to the car! So I called the Department of Transportation and they informed me that Ford still showed to have a lien against it. You see what Ford does is when you pay your car off, they give you the title with a notarized letter included stating that there is no longer a lien against the vehicle. Then you are responsible for going down and getting the title changed in to your name. Most people don't realize this and just put the title and letter in a drawer or something and forget all about it. So the clerk instructed me contact Ford Credit and have them send me another notarized letter. Luckily they happen to be down the street from me so I got the letter the other day.

Today I drove down to the Department of Transportation office after work. I filled out a form requesting a title copy. I took my little number and sat and waited. About 30 minutes later my number was called. I filled out a missing part on the form. Then 10 minutes later I paid $5.40 and walked out with a copy of the title in my hands. Now all that is left is me and the maintenance man going down there together to have the title transferred into his name. Then I will officially be done with this ongoing nightmare.

Of course now the obstacle is organizing a time when we both can go down there.