Does it make sense to bring my car from Canada to Poland?

8 comments

1. >if a person owned a car for 6 months he can import it duty-free.

   Its not the only condition, you would also have to prove you used it for the whole duration. You will also not be able to sell it for some time as you have to be using it “with the same purpouse as in the third country” so there are some pitfalls here.

   While the customs are something to be mindful of, the biggest payments will be shipping, including a fee for storing the viehicle (this depends on the carries) and the registration tax and duties (18.6 % of the cars value) +fees for translations, technical inspection, insurance and lastly – registration fee (approx 160 pln so the least of all).

   Add to that the cost of modifications to make your NA car road legal in europe (asymmetric lights for example)

   You have to calculate everything quite well.

   Remember that if you move to Poland you will have a lot of other obligations.

   1) within 4 days of the move if you are non-EU you will have to register your address (zameldowanie) and thus obtain PESEL. (withiut this you wont be able to register a car and without pesel live is impossible in general)
   2) after your viehicle is cleared from customs, you have 30 days to apply for registering it counting from the date it hit the border. After that time you are not allowed to drive it and you will have to have it towed. Depending on how long the customs will take, this might increase your cost significantly.
   3) if you want to drive a non-EU car in Poland, remember that you have to have an oval sticker with the country code on it on your trunk
   4) depending on where you have your license from, you might require to have an international driver’s permit
   5) before trying to arrange customs yourself, just call the customs office or leave it to the cargo people. They will help you with everything.

2. Sell it in Canada and buy something from authorized dealership in Poland

3. No!!!! I just did it. All taxes and fees were almost half price of the car. Exactly 32000pln. Car worth around 60.

   Edit. About duty-free. It’s almost impossible to meet all custom documentation. They will always want something you don’t have or don’t know where to get , when you get it it’s wrong one and they don’t care.

4. What engine your car has? North American cars tend to have big ones and this might hurt with polish gas prices.

5. Sell the car and use the proceeds to put down a downpayment on a place to live.

6. My experience was relatively OK. I paid $1,700 to ship it and paid $0 on duties. Main thing was to prove that I owned it for 6 months and that I arrived in the country recently.

   The process is you ship it, then when you pick it up the port (usually Gdansk) you can get the paper work done there or you can choose to drive it to the city you plan to live in and get the paper work done over there.

   I pretty much had to show them the cdn registration documents, insurance, any my plane ticket.

   Only thing will be that you won’t be able to sell it or give it to anybody else (for 2 years I think).

   Not sure why the other posters had such an issue.

   Parts for a Toyota were no issue as they are the same (hybrid engines are the same for rav4).

   If I were you, I would import it, because to buy the same car here, you are going to pay at least 30% more.

7. You’re brown, aren’t you?

8. I did it in the past, it’s called “mienie przesiedleńcze”. Paid 0 tax, basically you declare that and “Urząd Celny” might want you to prove that you were actually living abroad and got the car there (i.e. home bills, home rent contract, work contract).

   In my case they didn’t asked for anything extra. You can’t sell car for the 12 months afterwards. If you sell it before, you will pay back the tax.