Holy C**P, a 65 Marlin!
November 22, 2012 7:20 PM Subscribe
Have you imported a 16+ year old vehicle from the US to Canada (BC)? What was the experience like and roughly how much did it end up costing?
I'm considering flying down to Arizona; buying a vehicle; and then driving it home for either use or resale. I'd be buying something older than the 15 year cut off for exemption from meeting MVSS standards.
It looks like I should be able to:
Bonus Question: Where do I get a certificate of insurance for a car that hasn't been safety inspected in BC? Is it just a regular multi day permit? Or is it something I can buy in Arizona?
I'm considering flying down to Arizona; buying a vehicle; and then driving it home for either use or resale. I'd be buying something older than the 15 year cut off for exemption from meeting MVSS standards.
It looks like I should be able to:
- Buy road worthy car after confirming clean clear title
- Email the US border crossing I intend to cross into Canada making sure to attach a copy of the title.
- Drive to the US Border crossing arriving no sooner than 72 hours after email.
- Have the US Border agents stamp the title.
- Proceed to Canadian border crossing where I'll present the stamped title, bill of sale, and a certificate of insurance.
- Fill out Form 1 and pay fee (How much?)
- Pay GST, BC PST, and RIV Fee.
- Wait for form 2 to arive and then take that to RIV inspection centre.
- Have BC Safety inspection performed
- Take forms 1, 2, and safety inspection to ICBC. Pay registeration and licencing fees. Drive Car.
Bonus Question: Where do I get a certificate of insurance for a car that hasn't been safety inspected in BC? Is it just a regular multi day permit? Or is it something I can buy in Arizona?
It really depends on the exact make/model of the car.
If it wasn't manufactured within the NAFTA zone, you add import duty (e.g. ~6% for German cars).
Then you might have to get the car modified to meet Canadian safety standards, such as:
- DRLs
- Child seat anchors
- Metric dashboard
It's often not enough just to make the changes -- the manufacturer might have to certify that the changes meet government requirements. Canadian dealers have become wise to this game and started charging an arm and a leg for this.
You should do lots of research, googling will return a lot of info. The RedFlagDeals forums discuss this a lot. If your car is popular with enthusiasts then there is a likely a forum dedicated to it (e.g. Bimmerpost for BMWs) in which this forum will also have been discussed.
Finally, there are brokers who can handle this for you end-to-end. Drive along No. 3 Road in Richmond, BC and there are at least a half-dozen importing specialists. If you don't want to use them, you can just get a quote from them and then subtract $1000-2000 to estimate the cost of doing it yourself.
posted by wutangclan at 11:53 AM on November 23, 2012
If it wasn't manufactured within the NAFTA zone, you add import duty (e.g. ~6% for German cars).
Then you might have to get the car modified to meet Canadian safety standards, such as:
- DRLs
- Child seat anchors
- Metric dashboard
It's often not enough just to make the changes -- the manufacturer might have to certify that the changes meet government requirements. Canadian dealers have become wise to this game and started charging an arm and a leg for this.
You should do lots of research, googling will return a lot of info. The RedFlagDeals forums discuss this a lot. If your car is popular with enthusiasts then there is a likely a forum dedicated to it (e.g. Bimmerpost for BMWs) in which this forum will also have been discussed.
Finally, there are brokers who can handle this for you end-to-end. Drive along No. 3 Road in Richmond, BC and there are at least a half-dozen importing specialists. If you don't want to use them, you can just get a quote from them and then subtract $1000-2000 to estimate the cost of doing it yourself.
posted by wutangclan at 11:53 AM on November 23, 2012
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by Gungho at 6:21 AM on November 23, 2012 [1 favorite]