@julien
Hi, I imported my car just before Easter. Took less than 2 weeks to pay the import tax and get the plates.
I used a lawyer as an agent as I don't know Portuguese and was in a hurry paying for rental cars, paid around 600 euros for the agent. Slightly cheaper is faotir.pt and that automobil club ACP which I think you got 10% off from this forum.
Important points:
1. The trick is to get the correct paperwork from the German car seller. The import agent will give you the list.
2. When you're searching for a car, autoscout24.de is good and also main dealer websites, and of course study hard the fantastic import tax calculator to help you chose a car with low import taxes, I gave the link on another post on this thread.
3. Plug in Hybrid cars are fantastic (I drive 90% on electricity on mine), and pay about 5 times less import tax (paid 1013 euros on mine and have 292 hp on a 10 month old very fast car). BUT under new regulation it has to be able to drive on electricity for minimum 50km on the paperwork, so no more Porsche Panameras on the cheap! 😀
4. BMW main dealers can be trusted to sell car unseen (well with videos + photos) and usually know English, but flights are open now.
5. Now there is this very annoying problem with German cars, they are sold *without* plates. So you have to either go there to buy "30 day transit plates", or have the seller do it for you (mine did it 400 euros) and takes a week.
It's not good idea to bring car without plates, as you need to drive it over here, minimum for the import check. Plates come with 30 day insurance, but it's minimal 3rd party only which cannot be upgraded.
6. To bring the car into Portugal, you can either drive it from Germany with the mentioned 3rd party insurance only, or have it transported which I did due to lockdown. They picked it up Friday morning and delivered on the back of a truck on Sunday afternoon. Paid £1300 on shiply.com a middle-man service on where I found a Polish transport company with very high reviews.
7. Oh and licence plates apparently need to be screwed on (done it myself as I didn't want to wait, I'm good with a drill) in Portugal cannot be stuck on like everywhere else! 🙁
@gerry perhaps this needs to be on it's own threat to help people as a guide, as it's very doable to import a good car from Germany, even for me who am only months in Portugal.
I saved over 15,000 euros by doing this instead of buying nearly new in Portugal. And the spec is sooooo much better, the choice is HUGE, you can find your favourite spec and colours and car is like new.
Best of luck, Michael.
