I bought a used car (BMW M3) from private owner. got two questions right now.

I already have a 93 maxima. might sell it. Now can I transfer licence plate to the new used car ? Is it in anyway beneficial?

I guess I have to register the M3 any way and pay for that.

Other tricky question is seller hasn't written price for the car. What is fair price for title (tax)? 50% ? i bought it for $10K +.

I am not going to write $500.. I know that is not good.


Thanks for the inputs...

 

I'd think you'd need to check with your state on the specifics on transfering/titlle your new car. I konw in Oklahoma they use either the value of the car or the price you paid - whichever is highest. I always just write an amount less than what the car was worth or what I paid and they use the value - that way people can't "cheat" the cheats.

and a blue SE huh - hrmmm.... me likey!

 

In IL. they go by year of used car when bought from a private owner.
They kept seeing 10k cars bought for 500 when it was the price. lol

If I had a m3 I would put a personalized plate on it,
but if that's not your cup of tea, I would at least get a new plate
maybe special edition and a nice plate holder with stainless steel
bolts to prevent rust running down the plate.

 

It's up to your state on how the plates work.

State of TN requires that the plate stays with the original owner, even if that person sells the car. While the State of SD requires the plates to stay with the vehicle.

As for the price, if the owner didn't put the price down, it's fair game. But I'd be careful just in case the state ever found out.

 

to clarify, IL uses the year when it is bought from a private party and the sale price is less than 15k.
if it is bought from dealer (in state or out of state) you pay full sales tax, even on a $400 car.

Look up the car's Trade-In value on KBB or Edmunds in fair condition and that is a number they may be willing to let you pay tax on and it will be realistic enough not to set off a red flag.

other states will vary, check with your local authority for more info.

 

When I bought my M3, I just paid the $35 for the new plate vs. transferring the old plate from my Maxima. That way I had my Max on the road legally for a month while I tried to sell it and I didn't have the M3 on the road illegally for any period of time (basically if I did a transfer and drove to the RMV w/ the Max then the second I walked out of the building my Max would be on the road illegally). Mass is a b1tch when it comes to car registrations though, they don't have temp plates. So....bottom line for me was it was worth the $35 to just get a new plate.

And.....an M3 attracts enough attention, so I opted not to get a vanity plate because it would just be that much more recognizable to cops in the area. Not that I ever break any laws or anything.

 

I posted in another thread about when I had to deal with registering my max, I paid $2500 for my car and the lady at the DMV was trying to tell me it was worth $5000 and so I just came back the next day and talked to someone else and there wasn't a problem at all. Just write something reasonable in for a price and save your self at least little money they probably won't give you any trouble about it. If you write in $500 or something they will.

 

so are the DMV value guides "fair" or "too high" to boost tax revenue? If a DMV lady said 5 grand to me, I'd tell her SOLD! some 10 year old cars are nice shape, but some are total junkers.

 

Shouldn't matter what it's worth. TAX is supposed to be off what you PAID for an item, not how much it COULD be worth. If that was the case, we'd pay full taxes on any sale items in a store.

 

Except that private party sales are hard for the state to verify. I could have written up a bill of sale saying I paid $500 for the car; they do it to cover their a$$es. If you truly did pay $500 for it (blown engine, etc), you can fill out additional paperwork and have to prove why it was valued so far below book value.