Check the vehicle free. Screen the deal against 24 known scams. Sign a real bill of sale from your own phones. And when it is time for the money, move it by bank transfer instead of trusting a stranger's cashier's cheque.
First deal free. No card to start. Signing a document someone sent you is always free.
Illustration of the product interface.
No printer, no notary run for most states, and no need to be in the same room.
Type the VIN or scan the door-jamb barcode in the app. We pull the year, make, model and engine from the federal database, verify the VIN's check digit, and list any open safety recalls.
Add the price and both parties. Paste the listing or the other person's messages and the AI scores the deal, flags pricing anomalies and known scam patterns, and writes the questions worth asking.
You sign, then send a link. They review, can counter the price, and sign from their own phone. The completed legal PDF is emailed to both of you and saved to your account.
The oldest problem in a private sale: the seller does not want to hand over the keys before the money is real, and the buyer does not want to send money before the car is theirs.
1% each. On a $15,000 vehicle that is $150 apiece — and both sides are covered.
Plain about what this is. It is a delayed payout, not an escrow service. Paperwork Max never holds your money — funds sit in the seller's own account and only the bank payout is gated on both confirmations. And it is entirely optional: meeting at a bank and paying in person stays free, and is still what we recommend when you can both get to a branch.
The seller decides who carries the fee when they create the deal: split 50/50, buyer pays, or seller pays. The buyer sees the exact figures before authorising anything.
No credit cards on vehicle payments. A card charge can be reversed months after the keys have changed hands; a settled bank transfer is settled. It is also cheaper, which is how the fee stays at 2% instead of the 4–5% a card-based service has to charge.
Three lookups that cost you nothing, powered by public U.S. government data.
Enter 17 characters and get the year, make, model, trim, body style and engine straight from the NHTSA vPIC database. We also verify the VIN's check digit so a typo does not end up on your paperwork.
Decode a VIN free →See every unrepaired safety recall NHTSA has on that year, make and model — the kind of thing a seller may not know about and a dealer would charge you to find out.
Check recalls free →Screen it against 24 known private party vehicle scams — fake cashier's checks, title washing, VIN cloning, curbstoning. Answer a few questions, get specific warnings and what to do instead.
The National Insurance Crime Bureau runs a free VINCheck for theft and salvage records. They do not publish an API, so we hand you straight to their official form with your VIN ready to paste.
How to check →Built for the parking-lot handshake, not the dealership back office.
Not a form print-out. A formatted instrument with parties, vehicle description, consideration, an as-is clause, an odometer disclosure and an electronic-execution recital.
Each person signs on their own phone, with their consent, timestamp and network address recorded in a tamper-evident log the document references.
Start the deal, send a link by text or email, and let the other person fill in their side and sign whenever they get to it. Nobody has to hand a phone across a car bonnet.
Screenshot the listing or paste their messages. You get a deal score, a potential-scam risk read, the pricing picture and the exact questions to send back. PAID PLAN
What a bill of sale does and does not do in your state, the questions to ask, and a direct link to your state's official motor vehicle agency — because the rules change and only they are authoritative.
The site is built mobile-first for the parking-lot meeting. An iOS and Android app with camera VIN scanning is in development.
Answer a few questions about your deal and we tell you which known scam patterns match, why they work, and what to do instead. It runs in your browser — no AI, no account, no cost.
Screening describes risk patterns. It never claims a particular person has done anything wrong.
Free tools need no account at all. Paid features are marked.
Year, make, model, trim, body and engine from the federal NHTSA database, with the check digit verified so a typo never reaches your paperwork.
Every open NHTSA safety recall on that year, make and model — with the risk and the remedy. Recall repairs are free at any franchised dealer.
The NICB runs a free VINCheck for theft and salvage records. They publish no API, so we hand you straight to their form with your VIN ready to paste.
A fixed checklist of every known private party vehicle scam. Free, instant, and it cannot hallucinate. Run it →
A formatted instrument with parties, description, consideration, an as-is clause, the federal odometer disclosure and an electronic-execution recital.
Each person signs on their own phone, with consent, timestamp and network address recorded in a tamper-evident log the document references.
Start the deal, send a link by text, and the other party fills in their side and signs whenever they get to it. Nobody passes a phone across a bonnet.
The completed document is emailed to both parties the moment the second signature lands, and stays downloadable from your account.
What a bill of sale does and does not do in your state, across ten categories, with a direct link to the official agency. Find yours →
Banks, credit unions, tag offices and police safe-exchange zones near you, ranked by how much risk each one actually removes. Find one →
Which methods are final before the keys move, which only count once cleared, and which are never worth an exception. Read it →
Screenshot a listing and the AI scores the deal, reads the seller's replies as they come, and writes the questions worth sending back.
A boat has a hull number and no odometer. A trailer may or may not need a title. Heavy equipment is almost never titled at all.
Whether a bill of sale is required, whether anything needs notarizing, and how long you have to transfer title are all set state by state — and they change. Pick yours for a plain-English rundown and a direct link to the official agency.
Pay per deal when you need one, or subscribe if you are selling more than one car a year.
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First deal free
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The buyer pays by ACH bank transfer. The money settles into the seller's own account — we never hold it — and the payout to their bank releases the moment you both confirm the vehicle and title changed hands. It is a delayed payout, not an escrow service. See the steps →
2% of the sale price, split 50/50 by default — 1% each. On a $15,000 vehicle the buyer pays $15,150 and the seller receives $14,850. The seller chooses when creating the deal whether to split it, have the buyer cover it, or cover it themselves, and the buyer sees the exact figures before authorising anything.
A card payment can be reversed months after the keys have changed hands, leaving the seller with no car and no money. A settled bank transfer cannot be charged back that way. It is also far cheaper to process, which is how the fee stays at 2% rather than the 4–5% a card-based service has to charge. Cards are still fine for the small subscription and per-deal charges.
No, and often you should not. Meeting at a bank and paying in person is free and is still the safest option when you can both get to a branch — the bank verifies the money while you stand there. Secure payment is for the deals where that is not practical.
Yes. Under the federal ESIGN Act (15 U.S.C. § 7001) and state adoptions of the Uniform Electronic Transactions Act, an electronic signature generally carries the same legal effect as ink on paper. We record each signer's consent, timestamp and network address in a tamper-evident, hash-chained log that the document itself references.
Both parties' full legal names and addresses, the vehicle's year, make, model and 17-character VIN, the odometer reading, the sale price, the date of sale, an as-is clause if there is no warranty, an odometer disclosure, and both signatures. Our document includes all of it by default. Full breakdown →
No, and this trips up a lot of people. A bill of sale is evidence of the transaction. Legal ownership passes through the certificate of title at your state's motor vehicle agency, and most states also require the seller to file a separate release of liability. You need all of it. How title transfer works →
No. One party fills in the deal and signs, then sends the other a link by text or email. The second party reviews everything, can propose a different price for you to accept or decline, and signs from their own phone. When both signatures are in, the completed PDF is emailed to both of you.
Yes, and it needs no account. VIN decoding and the open safety recall lookup both come from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's public databases. The stolen and salvage lookup is run free by the National Insurance Crime Bureau — they have no public API, so we send you to their official form rather than pretending we can query it for you.
It depends on your state, and the rules change. A small number of states require notarization of the bill of sale or the title assignment. Importantly, an electronic signature is not a notarization — if your state requires a notary, you need to see one in person. Check your state's guide and confirm with the official agency before you sign.
Your first bill of sale is free, then $4.99 per deal or $9.99 a month for unlimited deals plus the AI features. VIN decoding, recall checks and the state directory are always free with no account. Billing has not started yet, so everything is currently free and no card is collected anywhere on the site.
No. Paperwork Max is software, not an attorney, and nothing here is legal advice. We generate a document you fill in and sign yourself. If your sale involves significant money, a disputed title, a lien or an estate, talk to a licensed attorney in your state. Read the full disclaimer →
Start the paperwork now, send the link when you shake hands.
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