Bringing boat from Canada to USA?

Is anybody familiar with what it takes to buy a Canadian boat and have it transferred to the USA? Customs enforcement, licensing, etc?

Thanks,
Dan

If you search the archives, this topic has been discussed before.

Here is my excerpt
When I brought my boat down from Vancouver, I used :

http://www.marinedocservice.com/

They are in Anacortes, we cleared in Blaine, but it was irrelevant as the paper was already complete.


They were very efficient and handled all the paperwork as well as the financial transactions smoothly. Back then in 2002, the USD was alot stronger against the CAD(about .60), and by watching the currency market for a couple of weeks, I even saved a bit more by timing the 'date of sale',


The cost to do the paperwork was reasonable. I recommend documenting the boat when you bring it in - just a few $$ extra.


good luck

In Florida many Canadian boats simply use a Bill of sale and obtain FL State numbers.

Doccummentation is a bonus IF you go to s country with problems.

Just the Dom Rep , Bahamas or the Carib , the FL sticker works fine.

FF

Danno said:

Is anybody familiar with what it takes to buy a Canadian boat and have it transferred to the USA? Customs enforcement, licensing, etc?

Thanks,
Dan

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By all means, as suggested below, use a bonded customs agent for your paperwork. They will make the process simple and avoid a ton of heartache for you. If there will be import duty, you can get an estimate from the agent.

As far as the other cost (license and tax) contact your County Auditors Office in your courthouse and they can tell you what you need to know.
Larry B

If the boat was built in the USA there will not be any import duty, but your customs agent will file a "US built returned goods" declaration. If it was built in Canada you should have to pay duty either due to NAFTA. If it was built elswhere such as Taiwan then you will have to pay duty which will be 1.5% of value, but there are some exceptions.

We use DHL as our freight forwarder and customs broker as we import/export world wide. As mention because of NAFTA agreement between Canada and US there may be not duty.


As for transfer of title/ownership, registration/documentation for the Eagle we used Marine Title in Seattle. They can probable recommend a broker and handle the rest.

yachtbrokerguy said:

. If it was built elswhere such as Taiwan then you will have to pay duty which will be 1.5% of value, but there are some exceptions.

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When importing my boat last year, there were additional government import fees in addition to the 1.5% duty charge. The other fees were also based on the boat's value. Don't have the paperwork/memory readily available, but they were significantly less than the 1.5% but were still there, maybe something like 0.5%.

The broker's fees were multiple ($25 for this, $75 for that, etcetera) but minor except for the bond ($4 per thousand?).

Thanks for all the replies. It is a Canadian-built boat, which, as I understand it, means that there is no duty charge due to NAFTA?

Quite a few boats that have joined the PNW commercial fleet in the past decade have come out of Canada. Contact Pacific Boat Brokers (out of French Creek, Vancouver I. and easily googled), one of the main sources for Canada-to-USA boat sales. They will either know the answer or put you in touch with the right people. Good luck -

Christopher