Thoughts On Left Hand Vs. Right Hand Drive Z

[gav240z]

$14k usd. Wow! that's a lot of car for its current bid.

What do you think it will go for.

$34,000 USD. Not bad for a 280z.. Prices are changing obviously even in the North American markets where they were historically cheap!

[Knight240Z]

^{Now that I got the plates on the car I imported from the US I just wanted to give an estimate on how much it will cost you in time and money to get a LHD all ready to hit the roads. I hope this will be helpful for you to have an idea for your budget.}

  

^{Firstly, to say, the process itself is fairly easy, especially in my case the car is all original and had no modifications and matching numbers. Therefore, that takes a lot of the hassle away.}  

 

^Costs:

• ^{Vehicle Importation Approval = 50$ (will take about 2 weeks)}
• ^{Transport (California to Melbourne) = 5,200$ (4 weeks transport time)}
• ^{Insurance (for trasport) = 750$}
• ^{Cleaning for Quarantine and inspection charges = 350$ (you will need this no matter how clean the car is before shipping) (1 week max in Melbourne port)}
•  ^{Trucking the car from port = 75$ (you could get an Unregistered Vehicle Permit for a week which I didn’t know at the time I could do with a freshly imported car)}
• ^{Unregistered Vehicle Permit (for 1 week to do VASS & RWT) = 53$}
• ^{VASS inspection fees = 500$ (below are things you will always need to change on a US car to pass VASS inspection. If the car is modified it can be more things to changes but thankfully I didn’t need to buy anything other than the below)}
  • ^{Seatbelts = 375$}
  • ^{Front headlights = 250$}
• ^{RWT = 220$}
• ^{Total = 7,823$}

 

^{Things to add is 10% GST on the value of the car (including shipping costs), registration & club fees. If you are thinking of getting a car away from the US South West I know it costs about 500$US more. However, my advice do not get a Zed from anywhere outside of the known dry states. I have seen many cars in person and after further inspection, they all had rust issues that in some cases were very hard to find and fix.}

 

^{In Victoria the club plates for LHD will always end with M "Modified" rather than H "Historic" as all LHD cars will need to pass VASS and are "modified" to drive on RH roads (the lights and so on..).}

 

^{I hope that gives an idea of the costs and time for the dreamers out there. In addition, for me personally it was a great experience overall, everything from shipping to registration went very smoothly and driving a Series-1 LHD on Melbourne roads is a dream come true now. I must say I really like it more than I thought I would, maybe because I am used to driving LHD cars overseas but it actually feels special when you do so on our roads.}

Edited November 4, 2016 by Knight240Z

[gav240z]

Perfect and this is why all the dreamers need to pay attention. I've had so many people tell me importing a car to Australia only costs $1500 or so... But that is just 1 part of the costs. Hence why RHD cars are more expensive, although lately LHD is catching up...

[Knight240Z]

Perfect and this is why all the dreamers need to pay attention. I've had so many people tell me importing a car to Australia only costs $1500 or so... But that is just 1 part of the costs. Hence why RHD cars are more expensive, although lately LHD is catching up...

 

You need to give me the details of the guy that can import a car for $1,500 Gav, I have a business plan for him!   

 

I had an estimate of bout 6k before I started this and I went over that even as you can see. That is the reason I think no one should do this for just any car. For it to make sense 1- the car your thinking of importing should be a good one with some prospect of value increase because getting the costs covered will take some time and 2- it has to be a good deal (which is starting to become hard to find)

 

I was thinking of just brining in a project car, something solid and cheap to work on from ground up. That will save you on many things like with shipping RORO, saving on insurance and small somethings that can make a difference.

[Webby]

Thanks for the breakdown, great to hear from someone who's done it recently - my estimate was closer to $6000 as well so that's helpful to know. While I'm still interested, I've realised that this will certainly be a more expensive endeavour than I first thought. Unless a really good deal presents itself (unlikely), I'm probably going to hold off until I become a bit more stable with my personal and career circumstances.

 

The amount of money I'd need to drop on a Z that meets my standards is not out of the question, but would certainly mean sacrificing travel and other financial goals. Of course, it's probable that they're only going to become even more sought after with time but that doesn't really affect my decision making process for what I can justify spending today. (Good for current owners though!)