bastien

iTrader: (1)

Hey,

I am thinking about moving back to my home country, Belgium, in couple years and I will be bringing back my T/A. I am sure I have to go through all kind of vehicle inspections, etc, and probably pay some sort of tax. I know it's not easy to drive a vehicle that is not sold/exist in that specific country. I've seen some of you guys from germany, england, and finland post on this board. How do you guys manage to drive your cars?

Ruhrpott

Hi,

you will move to europe- why? If I could I would move to the USA! In germany it's very expensive to drive cars with big engines. We must pay taxes per 100ccm so a 5.7l engine is around 419€ car tax/year. There are tax classes so newer cars with good emission are much cheaper then older cars with lower emission. A 91'GTA 5.0l is around 750€ tax/year and a Caddi Eldorado 8.2l without catalyst is around 2100€ tax/year.

Insurance is around 450€ per year for a LS1 TransAm depends how long you drive without an accident.

Gas is very expensive in germany around 1.26-1.46 per liter premium. Also we have a 2year car inspection/emission inspection called TUV. The TUV sucks most! We can't change wheels/tire size without spezial papers, it's not allowed to tint the side windows- it's not allowed to change everything on a stock car without spezial papers of the part. Any mode will be recorded in the title- of course you much pay a lot of €'s for an record.

Another though part is that US GM dealer / GMparts direct not ship oversea- so when you need orginal parts from GM it's very expensive. Thank god we get the most standard parts without problems and cheaper then for the most german cars.

So, the only great thing in germany is the autobahn with no speed limit .

Greatings from germany,

Andy

bastien

iTrader: (1)

thanks for the reply. What I was interested to know though is, how you got your car to germany. For example, what did you pay at the customs, etc.

and I know it would be very expensive to drive it in europe, i was born and raised in belgium till i was 15, then moved to fl for 5 years.

roy

A quick check produce a import duty tax up to 17% and a Value added tax up to 21 % for belgium.

Breathtaker

iTrader: (31)

Agreed.

I'm from Europe, and I was thinking of going back with my camaro.
For instance, from Houston, TX, to Le Havre, France, it costs about 1500 bux to ship it in a container w/ insurance. Then, you have to go through the customs, but no worries, if you lived more than a year in the U.S., then, you don't have to pay anything. What's more, to legalize it, there are some professionals who can take care of all the papers for ya (2000 bux) such as www.americancarcity.com, coz it takes quite a while to do it on your own, a real pain in the neck man (don't know about Belgium tho).
Good luck!

bastien

iTrader: (1)

thank you

RedWS6 00

I brought my car on Ebay, was in Pensacola, Florida. Found a shipping company to ship it to Southampton, England, the car went on a roll on roll off ship. Cost $700 to ship inclusing insurance. Then got charged £4000 import tax. I was expecting the import tax, you get charged 10% because its less than 10 years old, then you get taxed 17.5% on top, so it more like getting taxed 30% in all.

Fuel over here is about 91p per litre. Works out to be £4.13 per gallon, which then translates to $7.43 per gallon. So its over $80 just to fill up. I use the car as a daily runner, nice to have a great looking car with a 5.7 engine, not worried about fuel cost.

Insurance is about £500 a year, road tax is £170 a year.

Breathtaker

iTrader: (31)

700 bux is cheap, but it depends of your location and its final destination I guess and if u wanna put it in a container or not; there are many shipping companies with different rates (it goes from 800 to 1500 bux at the most), you just have to look for the right one for you and your car.

30% tax??? (remember, England is one of the most expensive countries in Europe, isn't it RedWS6?)

Fuel is what's gonna kill ya overthere!

Charging TA

Bastien,

I just moved from Florida back to Finland after living in Florida for the past 13 years. Brought my TA and Charger with me.

The Trans Am... I did not have to pay import-tax on it, because I have owned it for a minimum of 6-months overseas (and this means it cant be sold for another 2 years either). ("Moving Vechicle tax-exemption" - if you move and want to bring your car with you... without using it, its almost impossible to get a car newer than 1997 into Finland)

Vechile inspection... I was afraid my TA would not pass the emissions part, it passed in flying colors (and I still believe my cat is gutted - you can see its been removed before, and it has a good rumble). The car was put on a "shaker" to test suspension, lights were inspected (some lights such as the rear side markers had to be "blacked out", and the front turn signals have to be changed to clear because parking lights cannot be orange/amber here... also small turn signals have to be installed on the fender).

Insurance... If you can get a record from your insurance company over there of how long you've been accident free, you should save a good amount over here. If youve been driving safe for 13 years or more, you save 70% of your insurance. But getting that proof from a company over there is a real PITA. I pay about 1000e for full-coverage insurance for the TA a year, and I dont get any discounts.

Shipping it over for me wasnt bad, I shipped 2 full containers with 3 18 foot boats, my Charger, Trans Am, my dad's Valiant... and the furniture and such in the left over space. (And yeah, we had to lift the boats into the air, build "racks" under them, then load the cars under the rack.)

In Finland its about 1.20e for a liter, so about $1.45 which is about $5.80 for a gallon. On the highway in 6th the mpg beats alot of 4-cylinders here.

Any modifications you want to do Id do over there before inspecting it over here... They didnt give me any trouble about going with a bigger tire size (I would have told them that you can get the bigger tire as an option on the car, it has no safety issues).

bastien

iTrader: (1)

thank you very much, Charging TA. very helpful.

92SilverSHO

iTrader: (3)

man i used to live in philly and moved to montreal, to get married, its to much like Europe over here with the damn taxes and gas prices, and cost of registraton and extra tax on big engine vehicles. A lot more money comes out of my pocket! if i could move back to the states(money being the only reason right now) i would.