Hi, i'm wanting to import a Land Rover to Canada from the UK and was wondering what peoples experiences are of car importing?

Is it worth it, do's don'ts, best companies and rough prices would be a great help

Thanks

BSF5048 : Importing a Vehicle Into Canada

And

Importing Vehicles into Canada - Transport Canada

Unless it's more than 15 years old, it's essentially impossible unless it was built (and labelled) to Canadian specifications from new. In which case you might as well buy it here.

Assuming it qualifies, a Land Rover would be a good candidate. If you're bringing it with you, ship it in a container with all your other worldly possessions. If that pushes you to a bigger size of container, the incremental cost will not be as high as the cost of shipping separately.

After that the process of insuring, inspecting and licensing depends on your destination province. I did this in Ontario a few years ago, and this is what I remember...

It'll probably need to be inspected by CFIA on arrival, who will likely find an excuse to require it to be cleaned (at considerable expense). Once you've cleared customs you'll need to arrange insurance (complex but not impossible if you find a helpful broker - I insured mine on its UK plates for getting it from the container yard to my home and thence to the inspection station). If that's not possible you'll need to trailer it to a local inspection garage, to be issued a safety certificate.

This shouldn't be much more than a formality. ALthough, depending on age and nature of the vehicle, it may require some modifications. For a UK vehicle the speedo probably already shows km/h, so that's OK. The lights will need to dip the other way (although my inspector missed that). The requisite number of mirrors and lights must be fitted and working. If the car's old enough to import easily it's old enough to be exempt from emissions testing, so that's one less thing to worry about.

Make sure all the import paperwork is completed accurately. If the car has been in your ownership for a while, you'll need to prove that and have it documented on your goods-to-follow list and vehicle import form, in order ot avoid paying provincial sales tax on the book value of the vehicle. You'll need to then take all the import documentation and proof of insurance to the local Service Ontario office to register it and get your license plates.

There is a poster somewhere on here who brought in a highly modified Defender - which met the 15 year rule. Might be worth a search to see if you can identify them and ask directly.

EDIT: Searched for you. Paging "Withabix".....

My Mini was built in purchased in Germany, imported into the USA and then imported to Canada by the previous owner and is 5 years old, so it is possible

Much easier that way. Canadians are ****s when it comes to this sort of thing.

Im betting the compliance label on the vehicle shows manufactured in Germany but built to meet US Motor Vehicle Safety Standards and also qualified under the Transport Canada RIV programme possibly with slight modifications being needed i.e. daytime running lights etc.

Vehicles manufactured outside of NAFTA must be OVER 15 years old or NEW and manufactured to meet CMVSS and the compliance label bears that by the original manufacturer.
Your vehicle would have been classed as a motor vehicle imported from the USA and manufactured for the US market so the 15 yr old clause is not applicable.
Not all vehicles that are manufactured for sale in the United States can be imported into Canada. As a general rule, if the vehicle you plan to import was manufactured for sale in the United States and is less than 15 years old, or is a bus manufactured on or after January 1, 1971, you need to find out if it qualifies for importation under Transport Canada's Registrar of Imported Vehicles (RIV) program. The RIV program ensures that qualifying vehicles imported into Canada are modified, inspected and certified to meet Canadian safety standards.

One of those things that sounds like more work than the money you save.

Not always about saving money.

A lot of decent vehicles were never available in Canada, and some people have attachments to vehicles for different reasons that they wouldn't want to sell it.

If this LandRover in the OP is something like a Defender, then I can see why they'd want to bring it...but if it was like a Freelander, then your point would stand

I wish I'd been able to bring my Civic Type-R with me, but it was nowhere meeting the age regulation, and needed far too much to bring it into Canada via the USA, as they built them slightly differently in the UK vs the North American model

Yeah, there's tags somewhere in the glove compartment the guy gave me, but interestingly, the daytime running lights have to be switched on manually, which I rarely remember to do unless it's dark

It's not.

The Americans crush things that don't comply, without giving you a chance to apologise and re-export offending vehicle...

Mini:


Defender:

I would have thought the difficulty with bringing vehicles through the US is that vehicles age out of US federal import regulations at 25 years rather than 15 for Canada. The ones being squished are newer are were never eligible for US import as they're not on the list of special interest vehicles for which exemptions are available (and they weren't intended for sale there and so haven't been crash tested).

The difference in import regulations depresses the price of many vehicles in Canada (they're worth more at 26 years than 21) but oddly, with Lotus, it's the other way around; fewer models are road legal in Canada than the US so the ones that are cost more here.

Honda Civics are, of course, not worth much to anyone anywhere.

Those ones were much newer than they were supposed to be, with chassis and engine numbers from older vehicles.

Because Americans want Minis and Defenders that aren't over a quarter of a century old...

It's not impossible. It depends on the car. Some models just need minor modifications before being imported.

For a Landy, 15+ years is your only option, as indeed it is in reality for almost every vehicle unless it was coincidentally made for the USA market or was entirely homologous with a USA vehicle. You would likely spend many thousands of dollars proving this....

To bring one over from a UK port to Halifax will cost you about £1000. Similar cost to go from a 20' to a 40' sea can if you are bringing it over with your possessions either as a TFW or PR.

No taxes or duties to pay if it is part of your Goods To Follow, however you will pay a lot for the privilege of having it taken out of your sea can and inspected.

Cleaning is a meticulous job, especially for a LandRover. Mine was very clean before I cleaned it for import and I still got a huge amount of soil out from behind the wheel arch liners. Import some dirt and you will pay $1000+ for steam cleaning and disposal of the (apparently lethal) dirty water.

Then you've got to get it over to whichever Province or Territory you are in.

Provincial Inspection (certainly in BC) is a formality as there are several Land Rover specialists who are also inspection facilities.

There are quite a few Landies available in Canada - more in the East, but still plenty in Alberta and BC.

Try joining the local forum for your Province - for example The Rover-Landers of BC | Land Rover Enthusiasts in British Columbia for BC. There are often members selling vehicles and/or are previous owners of ones that are for sale.

You can get good ones for reasonable money that are already in Canada. With the current exchange rate, these may work out cheaper than importing a fresh one anyway.

As for countries to buy one from, Netherlands is a good source currently, apparently due to tax legislation for older vehicles. Otherwise Germany, Spain and Switzerland are also good options, variously due to climate, lack of road salt usage or vehicle regulations.

There are UK specialists who will help you out too, but a LHD vehicle will have come from Europe and so will have had margin added on at each change of hands.