TL;DR
Bob took his car in to a mechanic (M). After M worked on it, Bob decided to sell it to him. It's currently in his shop but it'll take Bob over two weeks to sign over the title.
In the meantime, if he or one of his employees gets in an accident in his car, will Bob be legally and financially responsible? If so, how does Bob eliminate or reduce that risk to himself?
Additional Context
Bob has a really old car and the check engine light was on. He took it to a mechanic and quoted Bob $2500 for the original repairs: the engine was leaking all over the place, including the oil pan and some broken ignition coils. The car isn't worth that much, but it would last for years after this repair, so it seemed worth it anyway.
Once Bob gave him the go-ahead to work on that, he found $2k in more issues: the radiator is cracked, the water pump is broken, and so is the engine mount.
At that point, Bob decided it wasn't worth the investment. Bob proposed to him that Bob would pay for the work he's done up to that point (M said it was the $2500) and sell the car to him for $2000. Therefore, Bob would end up owing him $500 total.
Both agreed to this, but here's the tricky part: Bob couldn't find his title. Bob also recently changed his address and informed the DMV of that yesterday. According to their website, Bob has two wait two weeks after an address change before Bob can start the process of getting a replacement title then sign it over.
At the moment, the car is in his possession but the title and insurance is in his name. Here's his main concern: if he or one of his employees gets in an accident before the title change, will Bob be legally and financially responsible? If so, how does Bob eliminate or reduce that risk to himself?
Here's the "paper trail," so to speak:
Bob took the car in and signed some paperwork saying he could work on the car. (Come to think of it, he didn't even give Bob a copy!) Bob's been texting him every step of the way to tell him he approves of the fixes he's going to make and saying he wants to sell the car.
But this is all one sided: Bob's been texting M about approving things, but M hasn't been texting Bob about anything; the rest of the details have been over the phone -- including his agreement to buy it from Bob. Bob doesn't even have an itemized list of the amount of work he's put in before the sales agreement (though Bob said he would need to see it before Bob signed over the title).