Guides
Guides: what to settle before buying a car
Long-form answers to the questions that get three sentences on a landing page — from importing through the viewing to the handover when you sell.
Importing
Offering export sales: what dealers need to set
Buyers from across a customs border ask about a net price early on. Whether you offer one is a decision about your own process — because if the export evidence never arrives, you owe the tax regardless. This piece goes through what to settle before the first such enquiry comes in.
7 min read
Importing
Buying a car from the Netherlands: APK, NAP, export
Few countries publish as much about their used cars as the Netherlands: with the plate number, anyone can see test dates, defects and a verdict on the mileage. A buyer from abroad only needs to know how far those entries go — and how the car leaves the Dutch register.
7 min read
Importing
A car from Germany to Switzerland: the process in eight steps
Bringing a car from Germany to Switzerland is not one procedure but a chain of eight, and every link has a precondition. Taking them in the wrong order costs no fee — it costs weeks.
10 min read
Importing
Importing a car into Austria: what the NoVA does to the price
Within the EU there is no customs duty on the way into Austria — and yet the import is rarely as cheap as the price gap suggests. The reason is the Normverbrauchsabgabe, and it hits hardest exactly those cars that are cheapest abroad.
9 min read
Importing
Missing COC: what the import costs then
The certificate of conformity is the least impressive sheet in a car's folder and the only one whose absence visibly changes what an import costs. This piece sets out what it contains, where a replacement comes from, and what the route without it actually demands.
8 min read
Importing
Individual approval: when a car has no European type approval
A European type approval is the reason registering a car is normally a counter appointment rather than an investigation. Where it is missing, individual approval takes its place — a different procedure with its own effort, its own timeline and an open outcome.
10 min read
Importing
Moving the car home: short-term plates, export plates or a trailer
Between the handshake at the seller's and your own driveway lie a few hundred kilometres on which the car is yours but registered nowhere. Which option is right is decided not by price but by the question of whose insurance covers that stretch.
9 min read
Importing
Import paperwork: the list you need at the border
An import rarely fails on the mechanics and regularly on a sheet of paper somebody assumed was in the glovebox. This list orders the documents by the stage at which they are asked for, because that is the only order in which they are any use.
8 min read
Importing
Selling abroad: export, plates, liability
A car that is hard to sell at home can be in demand across the border — four-wheel drive, a tow bar and big diesels find very different numbers of takers across Europe. The premium is real, and the extra steps are manageable if you know them in advance.
10 min read
Importing
Importing a car into Switzerland: what gets added
The price gap between two markets says little until you know what still gets added before the car wears Swiss plates. This piece works through the items in order — and names the two where the sum most often tips.
8 min read