Avondale car shipping and auto transport

Avondale runs from the Garden Lakes area in the north, across Interstate 10, down through Old Town on Western Avenue, and south to the Gila River and Phoenix Raceway. The interstate crosses the city at Dysart Road and Avondale Boulevard, and Loop 101 meets it a couple of miles east at 99th Avenue. A carrier can be off the freeway and at most Avondale homes in under ten minutes.

Our office is on Indian School Road in north Avondale. The neighborhoods around it, including Garden Lakes, Crystal Gardens and Rancho Santa Fe, are laid out on a regular grid with room for a truck to stop. South of the freeway, the streets around Old Town are older and tighter, and a driver may ask to load on Western Avenue, Central Avenue or another through street instead of in front of the house.

Most of the price of a shipment comes down to choices you control. If keeping the cost down matters more to you than speed, these are the things that help.

• Give a wider pickup window. A carrier who can fit your car into a load already headed your way charges less than one who has to build the trip around a single date.
• Choose open transport unless the car truly needs to be covered.
• Book ahead. Two weeks of notice costs less than two days.
• Ship outside the rush. Spring and fall are the busiest seasons on Arizona routes.
• Make sure the car runs. A vehicle that has to be winched takes longer to load and costs more.
• Ship it empty. Extra weight in the trunk or cargo area can add to the price.
• Be reachable. A missed call from the driver can turn into a missed pickup and a delay of several days.

None of these change who moves your car. Every carrier we assign is licensed and insured, whatever the price.

Several of the Phoenix area's large vehicle auctions operate in the southwest Valley, a short drive from Avondale, and we move a steady stream of auction purchases for dealers, rebuilders and private buyers. Auction pickups have their own rules. The yard will want your buyer number, the lot or stock number and a paid release before it lets a vehicle go, and most yards load only during set hours on weekdays.

Send us that information as soon as the sale is final. Storage charges at auction yards start quickly, sometimes within two or three days, and they add up faster than most buyers expect. If the vehicle doesn't run, say so. Many yards load non-running cars with a forklift, but the carrier still needs a winch to unload at the other end, and it has to know whether the car rolls and steers.

Salvage and damaged vehicles ship on open carriers like anything else. Point out loose body panels, broken glass or leaking fluids so the driver can secure the car properly and place it on the lower deck.

Phoenix Raceway sits at the south end of Avondale, at the foot of the Estrella Mountains, and NASCAR weekends bring tens of thousands of people down Avondale Boulevard. For residents that means a few days each year when the main route south is slow for hours at a time. We keep the race calendar in front of us and schedule pickups south of Lower Buckeye Road for early morning or for another day.

The track also brings in vehicles that need transport of their own: club racers, track-day cars, show cars and tow rigs. A dedicated race car that isn't street legal usually has little ground clearance and no easy tie-down points, so it travels best in an enclosed trailer with a liftgate or long ramps. Tell us the ride height, the width with wheels and tires, and whether the car starts and steers on its own. Spares, tools and wheels can sometimes ride along, but only by arrangement with the carrier.

When you're the one leaving, the car is usually the last thing to go. A workable plan is to have it picked up one or two days before you hand over the keys to the house, so you still have a ride for final errands and can get to the airport another way. If the truck can't come until after you've left, a friend or neighbor can release the car. Leave them the keys and tell us how to reach them. Your delivery window at the other end is built from the pickup day plus the transit time for the route, so you'll know roughly when to expect the car before you board your flight.