Importing a car

[altoid]

So I'm thinking about importing some rather exotic vehicles from a country most of you have never heard of. The cars are Fiat 126 and Lada 1300 and the country is Bosnia. My reasons are of nostalgic nature and I'm not even beginning to hope I could get either to be street-legal here in California (if I'm wrong please enlighten me, thank you).

Thus, I need to figure out what I have to do to bring these two babies over for track-only duty in terms of paperwork and cost of transportation/registration/etc.

Any and all help is superappreciated. :smile:

 

[Geesevs]

track only and only for 1 year.... then its bye bye to them. not worth the $$. if its not sold in the us or not over 15-25 depending if its usa or canada its not gonna happen... you could always go illegal and register it under a different VIN of a similar car of course thats a federal offense and if you get into a crash you are done... also you can import it as parts and make it a Kit car but you live in cali so thats not gonna happen as they only have like 250-500 slots for kit cars or something like that.

 

[MHS216]

Yes, most of us know where Bosnia is. We had troops there and helped end the war. (Washington accords, Dayton agreement.)

You'll likely spend much more importing the car and paying taxes than the car/s worth. It's probably doable, it just depends on how much money you're willing to spend. Try www.dmv.ca.gov If the info isn't there you could probably e-mail someone there and they would help you out.

 

[altoid]

track only and only for 1 year.... then its bye bye to them. not worth the $$. if its not sold in the us or not over 15-25 depending if its usa or canada its not gonna happen... you could always go illegal and register it under a different VIN of a similar car of course thats a federal offense and if you get into a crash you are done... also you can import it as parts and make it a Kit car but you live in cali so thats not gonna happen as they only have like 250-500 slots for kit cars or something like that.

Well, I can get 20+ year old ones for both easily, but there's no point if I only get to keep them for a year. Why can't I drive what I want on a track? :thumbdown:

Yes, most of us know where Bosnia is. We had troops there and helped end the war. (Washington accords, Dayton agreement.)

I'll keep my own thoughts on the topic aside. :biggrin: But yes, I guess I'm best off emailing the DMV. Hopefully their email lines are shorter than the ones at the actual locations.

 

[Jsmitty]

If it's over 25 years old you shouldn't have to worry much about those issues. Taxes and shipping will rape you unless your military and stationed in the country. With proof of owner ship blah blah blah.

 

[itisagoodname]

Old topic but i was searching for it... CA blows when it comes to BS like this. I have a friend in the Navy who has 2 skylines and wants to import them when she gets back. She has space reserved on the boat and everything she just doesnt know what will go on when she gets them back here. I just wanna stuff one in my garage and drive it around the block every now and then (probably not legally, haha).

 

[Plyngntrffc]

Old topic but i was searching for it... CA blows when it comes to BS like this. I have a friend in the Navy who has 2 skylines and wants to import them when she gets back. She has space reserved on the boat and everything she just doesnt know what will go on when she gets them back here. I just wanna stuff one in my garage and drive it around the block every now and then (probably not legally, haha).

use them on the track in the meantime...

 

[Brewski]

of all cars in the world to import, why a Polski Fiat and a Soviet Fiat? We had a 126 when i lived in poland, it was crap. A 500 i would understand but really, i wouldnt bother with these. The only lada i would ever buy would be the Lotus tuned one they did on top gear.