Bringing Bike from Canada to US

njw

Member
Apr 18, 2001
9
0
Has anybody near the border bought a new bike in Canada and brought if back over to the US. Any problems getting across the border/customs. How about getting U.S. title and registration. I'm looking to do it w/ a WR250F and was wondering what problems I may encounter. thx.
 

tm-enduro

Member
Mar 7, 2001
254
0
You will just have to pay sales tax (for California I suppose), if you want a license plate it will have to be inspected by EPA. Some dealers will bring it to the border for you to simplify the taxes (15% in BC). You might want to call an import specialist.
 

Offroadr

Ready to bang some trees!
Jan 4, 2000
5,227
25
I thought about this as well. Could a Canadian dealership ship to a location in the US?
 

MR.WR

Member
Apr 7, 2000
434
0
I used to work at a Yamaha shop and we did dealer trades with Washington dealers and the bikes we would get were Canadian models YZ's, YZF and WR's! The bikes sold as faster than US models. They would get a green sticker too boot! The VIN was differnt than the US models.
 

ultrachrome

Member
Oct 25, 1999
88
0
Apparently it is very common here in the Northwest. Although I believe you would get the GST back and would only have to pay your local sales tax when you registered the bike.

I have heard stories of dealers in Canada including the shop manual and a piston kit as part of the deal. I also hear Honda XRs are sold at near equal dollar value in Canada as the are in the US making them incredible deals.

Unfortunately all my information is second hand.
 

placelast

Member
Apr 11, 2001
1,298
1
Now I find this out. Way too late; money already spent.

Two years ago, I wanted a '98 Canadian-spec. WR250 (2 smoke) in the worst way, only to surmise the VIN wouldn't permit a CA green sticker.

For those of you outside this, it was = to the YZ, exc. wide-ratio trans, lighting coil, kick stand, 18" rear wheel; in every other way same a YZ tho already enduro-ized, albeit no big, bubulous tank like the earlier ones. Still no lights, but easily hooked up.

MACE (the guy who won't buy gear from 3-world despots, like me) has one (the Hoser?), & he's letting me stew over it. Gesh, my time & money has since gone elsewhere...

There is a dealer here in SoCa (Org. Co.) that gets some from up there; a guy I rode w/2x got a late-model DT200 thru them, CA license plate & all!:think
 

Racers Edge

Member
Jan 22, 2001
81
0
Bringing bikes over

Hi I am a Canadian citizen living in Washington. I bought my 2000 CR250 over fin BC and had no problems crossing the border. It was used however so I don't know how it would go with buying a new one but I doubt if it would be different. I didn't even pay GST when I bought the thing actually hehe. There aren't any "titles" ad there are here on the US in BC anyway. I haven't tried to get mine registered for a ORV license or anything like that so I don't know how that goes, however my insurance provider told me I would have no problems insuring it with theft if I chose to do so. Bikes are actually way cheaper in Canada since the exchange rate, I picked mine up for about $4400 and it was only about 3 months old and in mint condition. Well that's my experience so far, I did get the bike dirty however so It wouldnt look brand new and they wouldn't uestion me when crossing the border.
 

SpeedyManiac

Member
Aug 8, 2000
2,378
0
There are quite a few americans who buy bikes at a local dealership. With the way the dollar is, you can get identical bikes for great prices. Oh yeah, the tax in BC is only 14%
 

rm burn

Member
Dec 27, 2000
7
0
if you buy a bike in canada you can apply to the government to have the gst (7%) refunded, this apply's to all goods and services, i believe you can get the forms at the border,we canadians despise this #@%$^@# tax,its a big ripoff!
 

Streetsquid

Member
Jan 13, 2001
32
0
When I was picking up my TTR-125L from my local dealer here in Vancouver, he mentioned that he had just sold a couple TTRs to the guys at BBR. They should know all about bringing bikes over the border. It's worth a try.
 

nikki

Moto Junkie
Apr 21, 2000
5,802
1
njw - I sent you a message on this - check the bottom of the main forums page for it.
 
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