tranquility

I've been asking around for new TTS car prices on another forum as well and ppl are telling me to import as the best alternative since our Canadian cars may be ~$10,000 overpriced? I'm just wondering how realistic/troublesome is this and if anyone here as real-life exp? I understand that the warranty must be recognized by Canadian dealerships?

Another issue is how much would it cost to change the speedo back to kph (I would *want* to change it, regardless even if I can keep it as mph)?

AUDIocee

Canadian TTS Loaded = $65,450 CDN
US TTS Loaded = $54,320 US, roughly $55,250 CDN ( Seems like the Cdn model offers more options)

If I remember correctly, taxes, duty and fees work out to be almost 15%, so the total comes to $63,540 CDN.
Add in the costs to ship it, or fly down and drive it back and you are pretty much equal, or maybe even a bit more.
Also, I'm not sure you can buy a brand new car from the States, might have to be used.

To convert the dash/climate control to metric is a programming change that can be done by the dealer, or anyone with a Vagcom. To change the speedo, it is a physical change, basically drop the instrument cluster, pull off the the needles and put on a new gauge face.

Hope this helps,

afretes

Add the 10% to 20% loss in trade/resale in value.

sakimano

just to clarify, having done this myself...

1. can't buy a new car...but you can buy a titled car that is basically new. Some dealers will 'title' new old stock. There are still the odd 2009 model sitting in inventories at Audi dealers that have been titled and have the warranty ticking down, even though they only have 40 miles on them. They're new...but not new.

2. speedometer is not an issue...the US cars have MPH and KPH. Daytime running lights on my S4 were activated by turning a switch on. that's it really. If not, you can VAGCOM it in 3 minutes.

3. hassle - it's not bad. If you're reasonably competent at reading it's real easy. There are a few forms, a few inspections, and a couple of steps at the border that you have to rehearse so you don't fk it up. I bought in Atlanta, flew down to get it (flew aeroplan) and drove back, staying overnight halfway at the 4 star Hilton in Cincinnati for $60 (priceline ftw). Total cost to get it back here including food, gas, hotel, flight tax was $400.

4. costs to import include

• $350 in fees/inspections/etc. including excise tax, RIV fee, Canadian Tire inspection fee to register etc.
• 6.1% of purchase price as 'duty'
• must pay PST and GST with no forgiveness on PST if you are also selling a car (i.e. trade in used to offset your PST). If no trade in, this is no big deal as you have to pay PST/GST on any new car anyway
• exchange rate = 4% premium net to you today

So a $54,320 USD car would cost $60,500 *(i.e. 11% on top of the US cost) + applicable pst/gst. Add in your $400-1000 to go get it, or ship it up and you're $3000 cheaper than here. Not enough to motivate me to do it though. At $7-10,000+ I'd go south (and did).

The other thing to consider is that the availability in canada sucks...there are no cars up here when you compare to the US. That's the real reason I started looking down there for my S4...there were 7 CPO B7 S4s for sale in all of Canada back in 2008...and there were 15 silver ones on the east coast alone in the US. I'm sure with the TTS it will be just as fruitful to plunder US inventories.

A4Audi4Fun

If you end up going the used route, make sure you check with Audi Canada first about the status of US CPO cars - thought I had read somewhere that US CPO didn't apply to Canadian registered vehicles. YMMV.

tranquility

Naw, I'm only interested in new cars. Some ppl in another forum are trying to pimp the method of importing a US car but I don't think it's worth the hassle, esp if the car's not new.

xtr3ma

IMO, it ain't worth the hassle for anything under $100K.