How to Get Your Towed Car Back in Deltona: Fees, Paperwork and Florida's Rules

A tow in Deltona usually ends the same way. The car is gone, nobody left a note, and you are in a parking lot working out who took it and what it will cost. Florida answers most of that for you. Chapter 713 and Chapter 715 of the Florida Statutes set the notice a storage operator owes you, the fees it may and may not add, the documents it can demand, and how long it has to wait before it can sell the car. Knowing how to get your towed car back before you drive to the lot is the difference between a frustrating afternoon and an expensive one.

Where Does Your Towed Car Actually Go in Deltona?

A towed vehicle goes to a storage lot the towing company operates, and Florida limits how far that lot can be from where the car was taken. For private-property tows, Florida Statutes section 715.07 requires the vehicle to be stored at a site within a 10-mile radius of the point of removal in any county of 500,000 population or more, and within 15 miles in smaller counties. Volusia County sits in the larger group, so a car pulled off Saxon Boulevard, Howland Boulevard or a plaza near the I-4 interchange should be somewhere in west Volusia.

Finding it is usually a phone call to law enforcement. The same statute requires the towing firm to notify the municipal police department within 30 minutes after the tow is completed, or the sheriff in unincorporated areas. Deltona has no police department of its own: the Volusia Sheriff's Office provides law enforcement services on a contract basis in Deltona, DeBary, Pierson and Oak Hill, and keeps a district office in Deltona. For most Deltona addresses, that is where the tow report lands.

What Does Florida Law Require the Storage Lot to Tell You?

The operator must send you a written notice of lien, by certified mail, within five business days after the date of storage. Florida Statutes section 713.78 sets that deadline at five business days, excluding Saturdays, Sundays and federal holidays, and directs the notice to the registered owner, the insurer and any other lienholders. It must go through a third-party service approved by the Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles, so the mailing is logged rather than left to the lot's word.

That deadline has teeth. Under subsection (9), if the notice is not properly given, the lienor may not charge more than five days of storage. A car that sat three weeks while nothing arrived in the mail is a very different bill from one with a certified notice on file. Check the postmark and keep the envelope.

What Do You Need to Bring to Get Your Towed Car Back?

Bring proof you are entitled to the vehicle, one government-issued photo ID, and two workable ways to pay. Section 713.78 requires the operator to permit inspection and release within one hour after the owner, a lienholder, an insurance company representative or their agent presents the qualifying documents, so the clock starts when you hand the paperwork over, not when the office feels ready.

Payment is where people get stuck. The operator must accept payment in any form from at least two of three categories: cash and paper instruments, bank or credit cards, or electronic payment. A lot may refuse one category, but it cannot be cash-only and lawful at once.

Sort out how the car leaves before you arrive. A vehicle that has sat a week with an alarm drawing current often will not crank, and the yard wants its space back the same day you pay. A jump start may be enough, or the car may need flatbed towing straight from the yard to your mechanic.

Which Charges Can the Lot Legally Add, and Which It Cannot?

The tow and storage rates themselves are set locally, but Florida caps two extras outright: section 713.78 bars a storage fee if the vehicle is stored less than six hours, and holds the administrative fee tied to processing the lien to no more than $250. Those are ceilings, not prices.

For a private-property tow, the rates must exist in writing in two places. Section 715.07 requires a firm that demands payment before redemption to file a complete copy of its current rates with the local law enforcement agency and to post an identical rate schedule at the storage site. You are entitled to read that posted schedule and compare it to the invoice in your hand, and the same section lets local governments regulate towing rates, so the governing figure can be a county or city number.

What If Your Car Was Towed From an Apartment Complex or Shopping Plaza?

Private-property tows run under section 715.07, which adds signage rules the property owner and the towing firm both have to meet. Notice must be posted at each driveway or curb cut within ten feet of the road, warning in letters not fewer than two inches high that unauthorized vehicles will be towed at the owner's expense, carrying the words 'tow-away zone' in letters not fewer than four inches high, and giving the towing firm's name and current telephone number. The sign must carry that wording three to six feet above ground and be in place at least 24 hours before anything is towed.

A sign that went up this morning cannot support a tow this afternoon, and a sign with no working phone number is not the sign the statute describes. If the car was taken from an apartment lot off Elkcam Boulevard or a plaza on Howland, photograph the entrance before anything changes: signage is the first thing a dispute turns on and the evidence that disappears fastest.

How Long Before the Storage Lot Can Sell Your Car?

Sooner than most owners assume. Under section 713.78, a sale may occur 35 days after the vehicle is stored for an older model, or 57 days for a newer one. Notice of the sale goes out by certified mail at least 30 days before, a public notice must be published at least 20 days beforehand, and the sale must be at public sale for cash.

The arithmetic matters more than the deadline. Storage accrues every day the car sits, so on a high-mileage vehicle the charges can pass what the car is worth long before week five. Deciding early is cheaper than deciding late, and walking away from a car that is not worth redeeming is a legitimate outcome. When the title is clear and the math is not, junk car removal ends the meter instead of feeding it.

What If You Believe the Tow Was Wrong?

You can get the car back first and argue second. Section 713.78 lets an owner, insurer or lienholder go to court to contest a wrongful taking, withholding or charge, and it lets you recover the vehicle at any time before it is sold by posting a cash or surety bond equal to the accrued charges with the clerk of court. The clerk then issues a certificate directing the operator to release the vehicle, so you do not have to win, or even file, before the car comes home.

In Volusia County that is a county court matter, and the Clerk of the Circuit Court publishes the form: a complaint to declare a motor vehicle wrongfully taken or withheld by a towing-storage operator, captioned for the County Court, Civil Division, in and for Volusia County. For west Volusia residents the courthouse is in DeLand at 101 North Alabama Avenue.

Two details decide how this ends. If the party who posted the bond does not begin proceedings within 45 days after the clerk issues the certificate, the clerk may release the cash or direct the surety to pay the operator. And the court may award damages, attorney fees and costs to the prevailing party. This page is general information about Florida law, not legal advice; for a disputed tow with real money attached, talk to a lawyer before you post a bond.