I know some of the owners on the forum have bought Euro cars, but what are the experiences of those who imported it themselves? Upsides/Downsides Thanks in advance.
Upside is that you get a car in its proper form (assuming a 348)--no mousetrap seatbelts, original style dash, no third brake light, proper headlights, side indicators. And you can import GTS/GTB tall plenum cars now. Similar for 355 in the sense of side indicators, proper amber turn signals, no third brake light, early cars had no airbags and had a glovebox/better steering wheel. Downsides? Cost of shipping and currency conversion, and waiting 5-6 weeks for it to arrive whilst you're super excited! Image Unavailable, Please Login
Nice pair of 348’s. Where did you find your car? I have been looking on suchen.mobile.de for a few different cars. Did you see the car I person or did you have somebody inspect it for you. What I am most concerned about is getting something that isn’t represented accurately.
My car, wow. Well, I first found it via a random Google image search. Turned out that image was from a 3 year old Sale page at The Ferrari Centre in Kent, England. I asked people here on the 348 group if they knew the car. Nothing. I then asked folks on the UK section if they knew the car, one guy had a photo of its number plate (at the time A4 BLU) From there we could see that UK road tax and MOT were both expired a couple years so we thought maybe it had left the country or gone back to Europe. Then a few weeks later we found it for sale on a UK classic car site. Turned out the guy was more of a Porsche guy and wanted to get a then new GT3. I had to go to India, stopped for an overnight in London, drove to Ferrari Centre in Kent to ask about the car, then continues to the seller's house in Manston to see the car. It was February so I didn't drive it, but I was able to put my hands on it, my eyes on it, hear it run, etc. We did the deal then and there. It was another 4 months or so before it was legal to import to the US (has to be 25) so in the meantime it went to Ferrari Centre (aka Kent High Performance Cars) and had an engine out/belt service, then was taken to the port at London Gateway. From there it was 36 days to Seattle in transit in its own dedicated shorty container. I took the train down to the airport, and walked the mile to the customs warehouse, drove it out of there via a ramp and drove 30 minutes home. It was awesome. For sale photo from I think 2012 or 2014. Image Unavailable, Please Login
I shipped a 348 TB in from holland a couple years ago. The gentleman (a dealer) from the start seemed trustworthy and the shipping company I used knew him and had dealt with him several times which put me at peace. It’s scary because your car passes through a lot of hands in the process but overall the shipping company handled most of it. I got hit with a 7 grand import duty I was not aware of but from memory it seems like I paid 10-12 grand total. It made the car more expensive than what I could have gotten here but it was low mileage, nearly perfect and the seller did a major at a Ferrari shop so I got what I wanted. I would do it again if I trusted the seller. I think it took about a month and a half total and when it finally gets to your driveway it’s very exciting.
Thanks for the reply guys. I am glad that both of you had positive experiences and got nice cars. I was doing some Google searches on importing cars last night. The cars I have been looking at are all over 25 years old so that makes it a little easier.
I would recommend complement www.mobile.de with following sources: https://www.autoscout24.com/ https://www.theparking.eu/ "TheParking" shows also lots of outdated ads but it finds plenty of ads in smaller channels and markets.
worth keeping an eye on the uk indies as lhd occasionally come up. not as many here as there used to be as apparently a lot left the uk in covid due to exchange rates. if you see something, don’t hesitate to shout, happy to comment on indies if i know them, suggest ppi, have a look if local ish etc. (i have a lhd 355 spider, ex usa car, that i might put up next year. )
Thanks for tips. I did a google search last night and came up with a few others, one was autoscout24 which I thought was pretty good but theparking website wasn’t one of them. Thanks for the tip.
Very true. LHD exotic cars in UK have traditionally been anomaly in European market providing meaningful discount compared to continental offerings. After Brexit situation changed when UK cars got customs duty for EU buyers. For US buyers situation haven't changed, though. One point to verify closely with older UK classics is rust. Due to climate and traditional outdoor parking older UK cars tends to be more rust prone than continental Europe cars. Think AZ vs FL in US. And just to clarify, I am not saying that all UK classics are rusty and continental cars are rust free. It is just game of probabilities and anyway PPI and proper due diligence is warranted.
