Beer Baron

exactly. these days there would be at most about $1000 between the most expensive importer and the cheapest. car costs the same no matter who you use to buy it for you. FOB costs will vary depending on how the car is bought and who buys it from as low as 80,000JPY up as much as 180,000JPY Freight costs the same no matter who does it for you Customs costs are the same no matter who does it for you taxes are the same no matter who does it for you broker fees vary from about $900 up to $2000 (but be aware some will do more for you than others and some will have better contacts, eg save you money on compliance if they have a deal with someone) Compliance can vary a little. this is one benefit of a broker if they have an arrangement with someone they can get you cheap compliance, depends on the model of car though and how many people are complying them. obviously the fewer people complying that model the more it's going to cost. supply vs demand. blue slips cost the same and registration costs are the same so the only real variables will be FOB costs, Broker fee, Compliance. and of course even with a broker you are free to have the car complied wherever you want so that's not necessarily a differentiation point between agents. My advice. For a relatively new model like the V36 that is not already here in huge numbers I would always import one. A few reasons why: because there are not many here if you buy local there is not much choice in spec, colour etc. because there are not many here prices are higher due to less competition for sales. Being quite an expensive car (in import terms) there is a fair bit of scope for dealers to add decent margins to the price (including buying lesser quality cars, then tarting them up and parading them as a high quality car. big profit that way). So yeah, for a V36 I would say import one for sure. You will save some money and you will be able to choose from a bigger pool of cars. Just make sure you get a broker who can guide you right through the process. There are some good ones around. Being a very competitive industry with very small margins these days most of the bad ones are gone and those that are left are dedicated to buying good cars for people.

RWD would be awesome. doughnuts ahoy! lol. I guess if you drive in reverse a lot then it's RWD isn't it?

I lol'd! good one troy. Dick Dastardly. I love it!

doesn't make any difference as far as I know. the criteria it needs to meet to get on used are applied the same whether it's been on LV new or not. getting cars on the list is not too hard anyway as long as the applicant makes damn sure they do meet 2 of the 4 criteria. some are rock solid (like kw per tonne) some are a bit more fluid and open to interpretation by DOTARS (like unique features...). but you already know all this monkeh!

in that case knock yourself out. anything built in 1988 or before is fine to import. you still need a Vehicle Import Approval and will need to get the car to meet basic ADRs and get a engineers inspection etc. same as the old 15yo rule.

what ruined the 15yo rule was volume. plain and simple. too much volume. the rule was instituted to allow enthusiasts to import cars in LIMITED numbers. the problem was the only real limit on it was the available supply of 15yo cars and the popularity of the available models. for years that was fine as the number of popular available models was low, their supply was low, and the cost was fairly high. now in around late 2004-2005 as the AUD grew stronger imports became cheaper. At the same time the moving 15yo rule moved into 1989-1990 which was a golden era of car production in japan. So all of a sudden many more models became available to import, demand was strong and there was still lots of supply in japan. this led to big increases in used 15yo imports. However, even with every second 20yo with his hat backwards wanting an S13 the total numbers of silvias, skylines/whatever being imported was not exactly a plague. If you went down to the docks at any australian port around that time you would have been surprised to see a small section with some performance cars and then masses upon masses of four wheel drives, vans etc. many of which were in extremely poor condition. The one thing that makes aussie car dealers and car manufacturers nervous is volume. and small importers who could previously only bring in 3 or 4 performance cars at a time (due to the investment required) could suddenly afford to bring in 20 landcruisers in one shipment as they were dirt cheap and plentiful. They could then dump them on the market with small profit margins for quick sale and re-investment into the next batch of 30 or 40 hilux's or landcruisers. There were also issues with the safety of many of these cars. This also annoyed many of the rule makers as bringing in old hilux's that were already sold here in full volume was not in the spirit of the regulations and it lowered the used car value of the models already here of course. the rules were supposed to be there to allow us to import models that were not previously imported and that appealed to enthusiasts. basically the law was being abused so they put a stop to it. I think in the end the market was changing anyway and once we reached saturation point people would have stopped bringing them in as sale prices and demand both fell, but the rule makers acted before it was allowed to occur naturally and thus we all got punished for a group of people using a loophole to profiteer.

now I feel you. don't know why they bothered with LV new. we all know LV used is where it's at. LV new is a pain in the arse.

a bloke on there posted this back in Jan so given that it's been on the SEVS list for 4 months they might be close to having compliance done? # By Wilko on Jan 6, 2010 Hi there, it was us who applied for the import approval. We are a RAWS Workshop and importing vehicles from overseas. Regards, Wilko # By Wilko on Jan 6, 2010 BTW.. our company is called Australian Vehicle Import & Compliance Company PTY LTD. We are based in Melbourne

if built in 1988 or earlier then yes, piece of cake. otherwise has to be SEVS so you'll need to check the SEVS list to see if they are on it, and who (if anyone) has compliance for them. along with hilux surfs and delicas they helped ruin the 15yo rule.

lol. should be right....

interesting. will be very keen to see who wants to get compliance.

Adam, I don't know why you even bothered reposting that rubbish up here to be honest. It was a response to something that was never even said. Mark has never claimed to be the underdog or any type of dog for that matter. so responding that that clowns rubbish is a waste of time. let mark speak for himself if he wants to. but I doubt he could give 2 shits about what some anonymous bloke on the internet says about him or his car. We ALL have the highest respect for the Japanese, US, UK hell any countries top cars. There are very impressive efforts from all corners and the last thing we would ever do is look down at someone else's efforts. Competition will be absolutely fierce and there are no guarantees of success for ANYONE. nismoman, yes at superlap that year mark was running mediums. we could not buy for love or money the supersofts needed for that track anywhere at the time as all the japanese players had bought them all up months before hand. didn't matter what brand either. with advan sponsorship comes better access to tyres for sure. it's not exactly unlimited supply but I'm sure they will give us the tyres needed for the job. as for the problems with traction it's not a matter of just getting more track or bigger wheels the fact is there are just not suitable tyres available in the sizes needed. if we could run slicks on it then they'd be no problem ordering up a set of nice 315 wide soft compound slicks all round, but part of the challenge is making the car fast on ROAD tyres, so it has to run comparatively narrow radial semi slick tyres.

dunno about that. give seb a few more kicks then we'll talk!

oooohhh. nice one chef. keep me updated about compliance availability if you know anyone planning to add them. I am about to buy a new 'boring' car for daily duties and have lately been tossing up between a Golf R32 or a Golf GTI or a very neat V35 or V36 skyline coupe. BUT I do very much like the scirocco. what are we looking at price wise for a GT or an R FOB? what do you reckon will be best country for export? Need to find out where they sell RHD models in good numbers I guess.

living and working in japan has lots of perks but sadly from what I've seen over the years big bux is not one of them used to be good when the AUD was only worth 50yen but these days it's a different story. Of all the ex-pats I know working in japan as car exporters, parts exporters, teachers, etc the only ones making really serious dough do regular type $$ careers like investment banking, analysts, consultants etc. BUT there is a lot of other good things about being there and you know it!!

VERY neat S3 R33 GTR. would be pretty hard to go past is a stock 33 GTR is what you're after.

have to say mark berry for the outright win. it could be blind faith but we'll see!

agreed. webber passed massa 3 bloody times! poor strategy and a few little fkups cost him any chance of a good finish. couldn't agree more. webber is no worse than any of the guys who get applauded for having the 'balls' to try the shifty moves. sometimes they pay off, sometimes they don't. I've never seen him do anything really bad though like vettel rear ending him that time in japan under safety car, or farking lewis driving into the back of alonso or the time kimi got nurfed sitting at the red light in pit lane... yeah really it was hamilton who fked HIS move which then meant webber arrived there a bit hot with cars where he hadn't expected them, lost front downforce, had no chance of turning in and no where to go. and he came off the worse of the two as well... I was thinking the same thing! the mac looked glued to the track with his front wing flapping around... hmm active aero anyone? deformable wing structure. it certainly wasn't costing him any pace. I thought for sure he'd have to pit to fix it when that big chunk flew off and it started flexing but it certainly didn't cost him... he might have to wipe bits of his wing off on other cars at every race. I know, I saw it in the SMH today. finally someone has the balls to say it like it is. I mean an F1 driver doing a little smoke show for the fans at the exit to an F1 track. really who gives a shit. does that really warrant confiscating the car (not like it affects lewis at all) and fining the bloke and f**king him around for a few hours? I don't think so. Surely there was some ACTUAL CRIMES being committed somewhere they could have been attending to in that time... yeah the strategy was a bit lame. I knew webber was fked when they bought in vettel and made webs stay out another lap. still that's what you get for not taking pole mark. had he been in front he could have made the call. am I the only one who thought it pretty good webber was able to pass massa etc. I'm surprised the RBR can pass anyone given how far down they are on straight line speed. good to see webber get the fastest lap too. well done. oh, and I cleaned up nicely on button. I put some dough on him at odds of 13:1. I thought at that money he was a good bet. still a very lucky result for him. sadly I had some cash on webber too, but my button win more than covers that lot.

d'oh! bad assumption...

LOVE IT! now it's getting very serious mate. no real criticism I can think of. should be very fast. thanks for sharing.

in other news looks like I will go to the Monza GP after all. should be good fun purely for the atmosphere and to see all the tifosi in force.

good man! me too. go webbah!

would explain the km and the C graded interior but I still think probably just 1 owner with a lot of driving to do... Don't think I've seen a bayside blue police model, they all seemed to be custom painted in the black and white scheme. and it would be un-usual for police department to keep a car for 10 years.

yeah but webber is a good aussie (nsw even) boy and will surely show vettel a clean pair of heels. he's just been sandbagging this last year to let vettel have some sun before he demolishes him this year.... yeah that's definitely it.

I'm in dude! pretty much any time in september is on for me. will be in europe (italy mostly) for 3 weeks of sep. time for some ring action. first one to bin any car we share buys the beers....