spainrico

Just seen this in the Guardian expat section

"Also, remember that, since January 2009, you cannot 'own' a car in Spain, for example, unless you are resident there and domiciled there for the purposes of taxation on your entire worldwide income. "

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/p...be-taxing.html

This surprises me because so what if you are non resident you can obtain an NIE and pay the taxes on the car so it is as legal as a residents car - ??

I thought EU was supposed to give us more freedoms?

Fred James

It's Guarniad rubbish!

Many non residents own Spanish reg cars in Spain.

It's the residents who own British reg cars that create all the problems!

spainrico

Thanks Fred, I agree.

I have some Irish neighbours who spend more than a few weeks here and also because their relatives use the house they bought a Spanish registered car ages ago which I know is registered with traffico and they pay the SUMA tax on it.

THORTENERIFE

you cannot own a car without a NIE so you must live,work OR own property here
dont have to be resident

Fred James

That is the key. Even a rental agreement may be enough.

I seem to remember that officially you have to be a permanent resident but that has been ignored for some time - just producing an escritura is usually sufficient.

Why on earth would the Spanish want to prevent anyone from buying a car?

EsuriJohn

Guardian or Telegraph???

Lis48

In the article "own" is in apostrophes and does not mean own in the general sense. The whole article is about buying a car tax-free from the UK to use in Spain.
As I understand it, it emphasises that while it sounds a great idea to save money, you can only do it if you are resident in Spain and therefore would be paying tax on world wide assets anyway.
You don´t need to be resident just to buy a car in Spain but do if you want to import one from the UK tax-free.

snikpoh

Not true - you CAN have an NIE without living, working or owning property here.

ballin

Correct, but you cannot register the car with Traffico without proving your address in Spain.

jdr

This came up on another thread a short while ago ( maybe on Mitzy`s one about reg his car in UK) and you can only own a car registered where you live.

Mitzyboy

Yes ...... unless you tell porky's
Where you been then?

jdr

Checking out the waves on the Med and Atlantic on the Fantasia.
So rough on the way to Civitavecchia though and cold, madeira and Canaries was much better.

lic

Not true!
I have just re-registered my English car to spanish, insured and taxed it.
I did not have to prove I was a permanent resident of Spain; I do however own a property in Spain, so that may be why I was able to do this.

VFR

To do that you had to produce a Spanish tax number (correct)
So as far as Spain is concerned, you do live here

Fred James

I assume that you mean an NIE number.