It's happened to me: the spot looked safe, but the next day my car was in a tow lot in an isolated part of town, waiting for me and $165 to show up. Good thing I quickly did. About 40 percent of cars towed in 2003 were sold as scrap, some within less than a month of being picked up. And the nicer ones didn't get scrapped, but rather were sold to used car dealerships at a steep profit. Even if you get your car back quickly, you might be screwed: police recently busted two tow-truck drivers for stealing contents of towed cars.