Transfering car from UK to Spain How to do it

Hi Folks,

Hope you can help. We have seen a French registerd car that we wish to purchase and take straight to spain which means it will only be on UK road for no more than 6 hours. What do we need to do to make this car legal for those 6 hours. We are planning to reregister the car in Spain when we arrive. Anybody got the answers as we dont want to have an illegal car on the road for any length of time.

Thank

Alison 

I have heard of a few people bringing a car over and replating it in Spain unless it is something special don't bother it will cost you at least £500 to get it transported over even more if you drive it over then you will have to pay for the Government transfer fee  approximately 4% on what the car retails for in Spain .

itv/mot you will also need the services on a replate company cots about 400eu second hand car are more expensive than the UK for some reason but new cars are the same price as the UK for instance a new Dacia sandero can be bought in Spain for £6,000 on the road the same as the U K.

Not forgetting you will also have to pay french authorties to change ownership and replate the vehicle depending on age.....then de-register it straight away. Plus you will be required to supply certificates of conformity.........

As said, unless a rare beast......buy one in Spain. 

Hi all,

Thanks for replying but have had more positive replys elsewhere with regards this matter. The only cost to get car to spain is petrol and tunnel, car is only 3 years old and conforms with EU regulations. Quite happy to pay £500 to register car in spain as we will recoup this fairly quickly. We are just fed up getting ripped off by car hire companys with fuel and insurance. Looked at second hand cars last Easter in Spain and they were a fortune for scrap metal, high mileage and rusty body work. As part of the EU do not have to notify French authorities as this will be done automatically when we register it in Spain. Dont want to buy a brand new car, its only a run around for us while in Spain, so a new car is out the question.

Thanks for replying but have had more positive replies elsewhere with regards this matter.

I am curious, who do you think has got it wrong?  Because you cannot choose the solution which looks best . Only one solution is correct and that's the one you will have to go with.

Hope you can help. We have seen a French registerd car that we wish to purchase and take straight to spain ****which means it will only be on UK road for no more than 6 hours. **** What do we need to do to make this car legal for those 6 hours. We are planning to reregister the car in Spain when we arrive. Anybody got the answers as we dont want to have an illegal car on the road for any length of time.

Correct me should I be wrong but is this French Reg car in the UK? I ask because I have an English friend that I deal with who lives full time in France and I recently sold him a French Fully Registered car for him to take back home to France, he comes over every now and again to buy from me, now the point is he has to drive from Essex / Suffolk borders down to Dover to catch the ferry which is probably about 3 hours, in all the cars he has bought from me to take back he has never once been stopped or even questioned, and he's bought French / Spanish / Polish / Lithuanian from me.

I even sold him a Belgium reg car that had been driven over here in the UK for 18 months plus on Belgium plates and not a second glance.

I even drive these cars around in the UK for a while and have parked up everywhere, not suggesting you should be as naughty as me but at a guess a French car in the UK heading towards any port would hardly warrant a second look.

Wear a beret with a striped tee shirt and keep some onions in the car as well, forget the light bulb kit.

But and this is a big but...What you would do if you had a prang.....Now thats the BUT.

Hi,

Nothing is wrong just  negative and off puting, where as the other replys I got were more incouraging and positive experiences from people who have already completed this task.

Hi Baz1946,

The car is in the UK but has not been here long, intention is to drive straight to Spain where it will be registered and insured and it will remain in Spain. My next problem is getting temporary insurance for this vehicle as my insurer no longers does this type of cover, do you have any ideas?

Thanks

Alison

"As part of the EU do not have to notify French authorities as this will be done automatically when we register it in Spain".

I'm no expert in these matters, but unless you're buying this car from someone you know who is willing to cooperate, how do you propose registering the car in Spain if it's not already registered in your name somewhere? i.e. you would first have to register it in your name in France (which, if it's like Spain, you would first need the equivalent of an NIE, and presumably an address to register it at). 

Perhaps Baz can explain how this works?

The car is in the UK but has not been here long, intention is to drive straight to Spain where it will be registered and insured and it will remain in Spain. My next problem is getting temporary insurance for this vehicle as my insurer no longers does this type of cover, do you have any ideas?

I did once sell a car to a lady who had never had insurance in her own name but was a named driver on her Dads insurance, and then wrote his car of, she had trouble getting a decent UK priced policy, believe this or not she phoned an insurance company who were based in Calai and got her insurance to drive in the UK, I didn't quiz her to much on the Ins and outs of this.

I am aware so much has changed in the insurance world over the years so this might not happen anymore, it's worth a try though.

As to answer Robertos question you must be able to sort out the ownership of the car somehow as well as the insurance in another country, the person I sell these cars to registers them in France and for the most part they are all right hand drive, his French car insurance covers him to drive the car in France even if it's on UK plates, for how long I don't ask that question, but it happens for sure.

As you only want the car insurance for such a short time it does sound as if you're going to have to fully  explain the need for say 24 hours only insurance.

Just keep trying, even call into brokers and face to face explain what you need and why so.

If you could you insure the car with a French company, take the chance on the UK road for 6 hours, then sort it out, if the UK plod did check it out it would more then likely be via the French DVL, if that exists, or / and explain to that company you will be in the UK for a day, see what they say to that.

Failing all this another way is to get it transported to the docks and dropped of, most here charge £1.50 to £2.50 a mile.

"to answer Robertos question you must be able to sort out the ownership of the car somehow"

So, Baz, do I presume you are either a dealer, or the cars you're selling are registered in your name to start with? How does your buyer register them in his name in France, if not already registered to him in the UK? Just curious, how does this work?

As for the UK plod stopping you, in case the OP is tempted to bring the car to Spain and just leave it on French plates (I know she isn't, she said she wants to be legal), I know that Our Tony from Down The Pub (who I posted about on another thread) isn't the only one getting done here - I saw a rather nice UK reg Audi TT being towed into the pound today. And that defintely isn't Our Tony's style - far too smart! It does seem, at least around here, they're having a bit of a purge on illegals. 

Interesting reading: http://www.driving.co.uk/news/illegal-foreign-cars-have-nowhere-to-hide-in-police-clampdown/

and: http://www.ebay.co.uk/gds/Buying-LHD-Cars-in-the-UK

Yes, Roberto I do own a car dealership and two other car connected business's, I don't have to register any cars in my name unless I choose to, as it is at the moment I can even tax a UK car without my name showing. Might be called illegal but these new car laws are open to many ways of getting around issues.

New car dealers false register cars under the pretence of the model being a good number one seller, so they in many instances do put the car in the garage name.

The chap I know who buys from me drives the UK car back to France then sets in motion the system in France of getting them into his name if he wants to, I know for a fact that he drives some around France for many months still on the UK plates as he often comes back to me with one I sold him ages ago still on the UK plates, to date I know for a fact that he's had no problems, but thats France, what goes on in Spain is no doubt different, but the car mentioned isn't staying in France.

The chap you know "Tony" should really have got smart and worked out that if he kept getting cars taken away (Think you mentioned over the course of ten years) and fines imposed how much he would have saved if he had bought the one, and got it done legal in Spain, if Spain is getting like this.

The original poster wanted to know only how to drive on the UK roads for about 6 hours, that sounds to me like a drive to a port only, getting the car onto new plates in another country I know nothing about because it doesn't concern me. 

In my case I sell the car, to anyone with any address, no law says I have to check an address is legal, I don't even have to know about insurance or road tax for the car, or if they have a current driving license.

I will read your added on bits later.

Hi Roberto.

Have read your added on bits, but nothing in them I didn't already know except the bit that you only have two weeks to change ownership if you're living in the UK, thought it was longer.

But again of all the cars I have sold with non-UK plates I don't know anyone who has been stopped or had trouble with the car concerning these rules.

As far as the car with Belgium plates which was driven in the UK for at least 18 months he also never had a problem, and as for looks he didn't look like any Belgium chap I know, he was Indian, who happened to live in Belgium, bought the car new, and came over here with it, still insured it in Belgium, he was driving from Essex / Suffolk to family in Luton quite regularly.

I have no doubt Spain is having a purge, maybe it would seem for every 1 getting caught 10 might not ever.

You're right, of course, about "Tony", but to do it legally i.e. to register a car in Spain, whether resident or not, one needs an NIE number, & he insists that he will never submit to that. As the first article I posted suggests, many of these people driving cars illegally have connections to other misdemeanors or even organised crime. Now I'm not suggesting Our Tony is an outright gangster, but he is perhaps, as Chas & Dave might say, "a little dodgy maybe"!

You're also right of course about probably only 1 in 10 getting caught, which is why many are willing to take the chance I suppose.

Getting back to the OP, who as we know fully intends to do it all correctly, I still am not sure how you can register a car in your name in Spain if it's currently owned and registered by someone else in France. 

Getting back to the OP, who as we know fully intends to do it all correctly, I still am not sure how you can register a car in your name in Spain if it's currently owned and registered by someone else in France.

That I dont know as I have not come across that or had to deal with it, but I will ask my friend next time he calls in because as I mentioned he has taken cars from me registered from quite a few other countries and he has never complained about the bother of putting them onto French plates...Not Spain I know.

The Belgium car I sold went to Holland and as far as I know that couldn't have caused any problems either because the buyer asked me to contact him should I get others.

Perhaps Spain might like to make it look difficult with a shed load of forms but at the end of the day providing they get the right amount of money changing hands they dont really care to much.