14B Auto/The Charlotte Post Thursday November 13, 1997 7 Lexus adds second luxury sport utility ■■ PHOTO/LEXUS : The RX300 should be hitting showrooms early next year, possibly as an early 1999 model. Its a midsize SUV based on the : excellent ES 300 sedan. It”s about the size of a Jeep Grand Cherokee, but not as tall.There are lot standard features, ■, including all-wheel drive. Lexus hasn’t announced prices but look for them to start near $30,000 and climb. CHARLOTTE POST CLASSIFIED CALL 376-0496 FAX 342-2160 S^'FORD’S USED TIRES $1 Tuesday & Wednesday Special Buy 3 used tires & get 1 Free tt20565I5 #20570/5 #2.3575/5 ■ Brake Job - Labor S35.00 ' Oil Change • Labor $17.95 N.(^ State Inspection 3401 Tuckaseegee Rd. ^ Charlotte. NC 28208 (704)393-1109 NFWI.OCATION 2012 Beatties Ford Rd. Chariotte, NC 28216 (704)392-9799 1222 Central Ave, Charlotte, NC 282 (704)377*0870 _ j Texans find being charitable is not easy rjy Melissa Williams /'{/£ ASSOCIATED PRESS DALLAS -The radio and newspaper ads are everywhere: Donate your used car! Tax deduction and free towing! A surprising number of people Who don’’t have stocks or valu able artwork to give away do have a used car, truck or boat taking up space in the garage ot back yard. Give it away, say tl)e ads, and you get a tax bfeak, extra room and satisfac tion of helping a worthy cause like the Salvation Army or local animal shelter. “Charity dollars are so hard to cQme by,” says Patricia Mercer, executive director of the Houston Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, which is just starting a car donation program. “People realize they can”t make ;a; cash gift - but they can make ^e gift of the vehicle.” .VilBut how do you know your 5ft is really going to the chari- y? And just how much is that deduction really worth? 7~!Tax and charity experts I^dvise making sure that the ^cipient charity is what it SSppoars- In some parts of the SJountry, organizations have i^ced civil and criminal investi- '^ations stemming from radio pitches for donated cars. J^For example, the San TFrancisco district attorney’s Office this summer charged the jow-defunct Jewish Educational Center with civil ^aud and false advertising, jnaiming the center illegally %nticed people to donate their PJars in return for an income tax Srite-off. In addition, the state accused founder Bentziyon Pil of diverting $100,000 to pay for a house and a bar mitzvah for his son. According to state doc uments, the Jewish Educational Center had used- car sales of $8.5 million last year, but spent only $1.45 mil lion on charitable efforts. “We’ve always been afraid we’re going to get splashed”” with bad publicity after such revelations, sighs Grant East, founder of Dallas Can! Academy, a charter school for at-risk youth. Its Cars for Kids, started in 1994, is perhaps the oldest car-donation program in North Texas. East says about 70 percent of the proceeds from its donated cars, trucks and boats go to pro grams for the school. The rest pays for advertising, towing and fixing up some cars to make them streetworthy before they are sold at thrice-monthly auctions. Others are sold for scrap or parts. Unlike most charities with car-donation pro grams, Dallas Can handles these chores itself rather than turning vehicles over to a sal vage dealer or auctioneer who takes a cut of the proceeds. Dallas Can is more than will ing to let people see its IRS Determination Letter and Form 990, which support its tax-exempt status and list its income and expenses. Would-be benefactors are entitled by law to see such doc uments and may be wise to do so, says Dan Langan, spokesman for the National Charities Information Bureau in New York. “We say you should be careful to see that the charity is getting the lion’s share of the money,” he said “Look at their 990.” Charity watchdog groups like Langan”s say the percentage of income actually spent on pro grams as opposed to fund-rais ing or administration should be a minimum of 50 percent or 60 percent. Exactly how much the deduc tion is worth depends on the vehicle”s value and the donor”s tax bracket, says Dick Murphy of IRS taxpayer services in Dallas. For example, a taxpayer in the 15 percent tax bracket will save $450 in taxes donating a car worth $3,000. The higher the tax bracket, the more the savings. But the taxpayer gets the benefit only if he or she itemizes and has total deduc tions over the standard deduc tion. For 1997, the standard deduction is $6,900 for a tax payer who is married filing a joint return, has no dependents and is not blind or over 65, Murphy said. Most, if not all, programs require donors to set the value for the vehicles they donate. The IRS says it must be the fair market value as established by the National Automobile Dealers Association’s blue book. If the car”s not running, a donor must subtract the amount it would take to get the car going again. The charity should give the donor a receipt - IRS form 8283 - if the vehicle is worth $250 or more. Craig Tadlock, a Dallas lawyer who recently gave his 1988 Toyota Celica to Dallas Can, said the program saved him the hassle and expense of finding a buyer for a car that stopped running after 105,000 miles. He also got a decent tax deduction from a donation worth about $2,500. “I may or may not have done it without the tax advantages,” Tadlock says. “But it was very satisfying to be able to con tribute to an organization that I know does good work in town.” All New 1998 Volkswagen Passat LIVE LARGE ...Even if your budget isn’t. The all new Passat from Volkswagen. We’ve given you everything you want from a car: comfort, safety, quality and style. And we've taken something away: The high price you’d expect from a car of this caliber. The all new Passat is the car of the future, but you can drive it today. Come see us and prepare to be impressed. Volkswagen -Audi 7401 South Boulevard 552.6500 800.426.5347 |\rab nations loving luxury cars JSy Anwar Faruqi ISh£ associated press ^5 DUBAI, United Arab Emirates - Rolls Royce brought Enly three of its cars to the fiddle East International wotor Show that opened Monday in Dubai. In a region jjfhere disposable income ■founds, all three are likely to ^11 quickly, ^Also on display are two more «iodest vehicles from Iran’s Saipa. They too will probably ^ sold before the end of the six- ^ay show that has attracted EOO participants. 2'JThe Gulf market is all things & all car makers: oil-rich Aieiks are among the largest Sayers of the most expensive .gars; expatriate executives t ant the status of a gleaming erman luxury car; and the indreds of thousands of Asian Svorkers that keep the wheels of The Gulf economies turning also want some cheap wheels to get iound. ^^•An indication of the impor- ;^nce of the market is the man who runs BMW’s Mideast oper ation from regional headquar ters in Dubai, Henrik von Kuenheim. His father, Eberhard, is chairman of BMWs supervisory board. BMW hopes to sell about 5,500 cars in the Middle East this year, about three times what it did when it opened the regional office in 1994, Half of all cars BMW sells in the region are top-of-the-range 7 series, which sell for up to dlrs 135,000. “We don’t have this anywhere else - that 50 percent of all BMWs sold are the 7 series,” said Henrik von Kuenheim, who hopes to clobber Mercedes Benz in sales. “Mercedes Benz has been in the region ever since ... Gen, Erwin Rommel rode in a Benz to the battle of El-Alamein in 1942. We only came in around 10 years ago, but since then we’ve eaten Benz’s lunch big time,” he said. He said BMW now sells only about 1,000 cars fewer than Mercedes in the Middle East, but hopes to leap ahead soon. By 2000, he said, BMW wants to sell 10,000 cars a year. But everyone should have problems like Benz, who can’t build enough to meet demands for its M-class all-terrain vehi cles, the first Mercedes made in the United States, the top line of which sells for about $38,000. “It’s sold out for the next one- and-a-half years,” said Chari Lazaridis, Middle East manag er for Daimler Benz. On the lower end of the all- terrain market, Indian car- maker Tata’s $14,000 Telcosport is making its debut at the motor show. Porsche also is here to offer speed to the Middle East mar ket because, as Porsche spokesman Michael Schimpke put it, “The Arabs like a Porsche as a second or third car, or as a car for their sons or daughters.” Meanwhile, one Arab sheik may be interested in buying more than just a single car. 98 Mark VIII 98 Continental Sunroof. CD Player. Leather Alloy Wheels. PW, PL, Loaded ^34,599 Leather, PW, PL.AM/FM Cassette, Alloy Wheels d.WMI.illll $33,649 98 Mercury Villager^ 98 Mercury Mountaineer* PW, PL. Tilt. 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