Shipping a car to USA

kaktus · 7 Feb 2021 at 20:32

Hey guys

I wondered if any of you have had experience taking a car with you from England to the United States?

I will be moving there permanently (or at least for 5+ years) and I recently bought a new car (before I knew I'd be moving) which was delivered in Jan 2020.

Car values have taken a beating since Covid and so I am thinking I might just ship the car with me to the US and use it for at least 1 year which I understand doesn't incur any fees/conversion requirements. After that, I'll either have to ship it back to the UK and sell it (which hopefully by then used car prices have recovered) or pony up and pay for the conversion in the US to US standards.

Apart from the cost of doing so, which would be about $1100 to ship and about $2500 to get it certified for use in the US (if keeping for more than 12 months in the US), I wondered if anyone else has gone through this and if so, did you regret it? any advice etc? I know it will be RHD in a LHD country...

Thanks

naefeart · 7 Feb 2021 at 20:34

What car is it?

kaktus · 7 Feb 2021 at 20:40

naefeart said:
What car is it?

2020 Countryman John Cooper Works AWD (306bhp) model and fully loaded with options. I was actually going to buy the same vehicle in the States cause it is such a brilliant drive, that's why I figured maybe I should just take it with me instead and not have to eat the depreciation which at current market prices is about 40% in just over a year.

Kenai · 7 Feb 2021 at 20:42

I'd argue whether prices have taken a beating, I would have said most cars second hand have retained value remarkably well actually but even assuming they have taken a beating... Surely it's not enough of a beating to spank thousands getting it to the US and either registered or returned in a years time and that be worthwhile?

kaktus · 7 Feb 2021 at 20:47

Kenai said:
I'd argue whether prices have taken a beating, I would have said most cars second hand have retained value remarkably well actually but even assuming they have taken a beating... Surely it's not enough of a beating to spank thousands getting it to the US and either registered or returned in a years time and that be worthwhile?

I'm not sure about other cars, but this one certainly is a bit of a niche offering and I've been tracking autotrader/ebay listings for about 6 months and have noticed a rapid drop in list prices so at least for this vehicle it seems to be more impacted than others atm.

I suppose the only reason I'd ship it back and eat the fees both ways is if I took there and it turned out to be a total nightmare for some unforeseen reason. I've never gone through the process before so I am just going by what google searches show up and that's basically that I can ship it for $1.1k and use it for 12 months free and clear but then I either need to pay to get it converted or pay to get it shipped back to England. If it's just a case of the one way shipping fee and then 12 months later then conversion fee and it's not causing me issues to have that car, in that variant, in the US I probably would never get rid of it and it will just be with me until it stops working.

In other words:
1. Is the conversion process really that straight forward?
2. Is it easy to service a non-domestic variant? I would imagine it is but not sure
3. Obviously warranty won't be applicable, can I buy a warranty that is?
4. Are there any other "issues" anyone else who's done it before, has come up against that I might not be aware of through googling etc

[TW]Fox · 7 Feb 2021 at 20:53

Can you actually do this? It won't be a US spec car which I gather will cause issues for anything more than a temporary entry, ie months not a year.

Kaeo · 7 Feb 2021 at 21:08

What are you gonna do about fuel? Like will it need mapped or so?

Terminal_Boy · 7 Feb 2021 at 21:10

What state and city will you be living in OP?

kaktus · 7 Feb 2021 at 21:10

[TW]Fox said:
Can you actually do this? It won't be a US spec car which I gather will cause issues for anything more than a temporary entry, ie months not a year.

As far as I know, yes. You can import your car for 12 months into the US for vacation/temporary usage but after that it needs to be certified for use in the US and so needs to go through the certification process with authorised "converters". From what I've seen online, they charge anywhere from $2k-$4 with most being about $2500. If the car is older than 25 years, it is exempt from this

kaktus · 7 Feb 2021 at 21:12

Kaeo said:
What are you gonna do about fuel? Like will it need mapped or so?

No idea? My understanding is that fuel in the US is actually superior to ours despite the lower "octane" rating, their system of Octane rating is different and more rigorous apparently.

kaktus · 7 Feb 2021 at 21:13

Terminal_Boy said:
What state and city will you be living in OP?

Initially, Charlotte North Carolina for a few years then either Denver or Los Angeles

Terminal_Boy · 7 Feb 2021 at 21:17

kaktus said:
Initially, Charlotte North Carolina for a few years then either Denver or Los Angeles

You’ll want a truck for NC and I seem to remember the roads there being dreadful and everyone else driving mahoosive trucks.

mjt · 7 Feb 2021 at 21:23

Just buy one locally? Seems a stupid amount of hassle for a small hatchback.

Can you even import cars this easily into the USA? I thought they had to be "of national interest" or whatever it's called.

Psycho Sonny · 7 Feb 2021 at 21:47

kaktus said:
2020 Countryman John Cooper Works AWD (306bhp) model and fully loaded with options. I was actually going to buy the same vehicle in the States cause it is such a brilliant drive, that's why I figured maybe I should just take it with me instead and not have to eat the depreciation which at current market prices is about 40% in just over a year.

Just sell the car and eat the costs and take it as a lesson learnt.

Your plan has various hidden costs and I imagine it's nowhere near as straightforward as you think it seems neither is it as cheap as you reckon it may be.

How much did you pay and what do they say it's now worth?

K.C. Leblanc · 7 Feb 2021 at 23:48

I really don't think taking it with you is a good idea.

If you ship it back after a year you're still going to take a big hit value wise, you'll have to pay two lots of shipping and selling it from the states will trickier. It will be very hard to sell in the US due to being RHD. It's also very likely their are other differences between US and European versions of the Mini, you're likely to have trouble getting parts and having work done. Have you found out what the situation would be with warranty work?

OllyM · 8 Feb 2021 at 00:00

There are so many pitfalls to this that I can't see it being worthwhile at all. Just sell it and buy something else when you arrive.

https://www.cbp.gov/trade/basic-import-export/importing-car

What immigration status are you going to have? The 12 month exemption is for tourists so I'm not even convinced you'd fall under that for a start...

Trying to bring it into compliance for the US regulations sounds like a nightmare too, even the emissions standards are very different.

wesley · 8 Feb 2021 at 08:09

You'll struggle selling the car in US due RHD. Sell here and buy a car in US.

jpaul · 8 Feb 2021 at 08:36

Insurance word, not mentioned yet ? - what estimated do you have - is NC recognised

Haze · 8 Feb 2021 at 09:01

So you would loose more money selling it in this country, than what it's going to cost you to export it.... I think not lol, just sell it and buy something in the US

MissChief · 8 Feb 2021 at 09:05

This is a bad idea. Needlessly complicated, expensive and overly difficult. As said, sell here, chalk up price difference as a cost to move and buy something over there.