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#1
posted to rec.boats.cruising
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Buying a boat without sales tax?
Ahoy, I live in Washington state and am thinking about my first "real"
boat- a blue water cruiser in the $30k-$120k. When I buy a car I pay something like 8% or if it's a gift or a damaged vehicle or you phoney up the bill of sale you still pay some arbitrary made up blue book value the state institutes and which is not insignificant. On a $100k boat this is $8000. Something tells me rich people don't pay this. So what's the scam? Foreign registry or forming your own corporation or what? Sorry to be so clueless. Thanks for your time. |
#2
posted to rec.boats.cruising
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Buying a boat without sales tax?
On Fri, 14 Dec 2007 23:43:01 -0800, ray lunder
wrote: Foreign registry or forming your own corporation or what? You need to form a corporation in a tax friendly country and register the boat to the company. You will be required to obtain cruising permits to use the boat in the US, follow all US regulations pertaining to foreign registry yachts, as well as paying fees to maintain your offshore entity. The break even point is somewhere north of $1M for most boats. |
#3
posted to rec.boats.cruising
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Buying a boat without sales tax?
Delaware Corp.
"ray lunder" wrote in message news Ahoy, I live in Washington state and am thinking about my first "real" boat- a blue water cruiser in the $30k-$120k. When I buy a car I pay something like 8% or if it's a gift or a damaged vehicle or you phoney up the bill of sale you still pay some arbitrary made up blue book value the state institutes and which is not insignificant. On a $100k boat this is $8000. Something tells me rich people don't pay this. So what's the scam? Foreign registry or forming your own corporation or what? Sorry to be so clueless. Thanks for your time. |
#4
posted to rec.boats.cruising
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Buying a boat without sales tax?
As I understand it, even if you have out of state registration, if you stay
in specific waters longer than (30-90 days), you will be required to pay the state duties. Typically the harbor masters continually watch for this kind of use abuse. This is true even if you have foreign registration. Even worse, with foreign registration, you will be required to exit the country and make to a foreign port after typically 90 days. If you find a way around these rules, please let us know. I'm in the same boat. (So to speak) Steve "ray lunder" wrote in message news Ahoy, I live in Washington state and am thinking about my first "real" boat- a blue water cruiser in the $30k-$120k. When I buy a car I pay something like 8% or if it's a gift or a damaged vehicle or you phoney up the bill of sale you still pay some arbitrary made up blue book value the state institutes and which is not insignificant. On a $100k boat this is $8000. Something tells me rich people don't pay this. So what's the scam? Foreign registry or forming your own corporation or what? Sorry to be so clueless. Thanks for your time. |
#5
posted to rec.boats.cruising
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Buying a boat without sales tax?
This may not help you, but it may help others.
Here in the northeast, I live in MA (5% sales tax). I purchased a boat from a dealer in CT (6%). I keep the boat in RI (NO SALES TAX on boat purchases). After extensively researching the legal twists to be sure that my plan was sound, I formed a personal corporation in Delaware. This costs me about $150 each year for corporation tax and a registration fee. My dealer wrote the bill of sale to my Delaware corporation and filed the necessary forms with CT to exempt me from paying sales tax. This required that the boat be delivered to me outside of CT, so the delivery was done 15nm away from the dealer in RI. Now my own state, MA, would want to be paid the sales tax on this boat that I bought in another state (CT) just because they feel deserving I guess. Since I keep the vessel in RI, they can't collect. However if I were to spend 60 days or more in MA waters, they would demand payment. The same is true for CT- if I were to spend more than 60 days, CT would want to be paid. I think the number is 60 days, but it might be 90- I'm not completely sure. Now RI knows where their bread is buttered. RI does have a sales tax of 6%, but they exempt this tax on all boat sales. This includes all equipment, outboards, etc. purchased with the boat. I think the only requirement is that the boat be kept in RI waters for 2 years. Now RI isn't dumb. They have created a tax-friendly environment where boaters get a break on a purchase but then pay taxes directly or indirectly on boating supplies, meals in restaurants, and in general contribute to the economic health of the state. Well, it works. I've kept my boat in RI for 10 years, and have no intention of ever moving to one of the money grubbing states. |
#6
posted to rec.boats.cruising
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Buying a boat without sales tax?
Steve ,, take Portsmouth, NH. One side of the river is NH, the other is
Maine. So,, you get in the boat and go 100 yards .. That takes care of the "stay in specific waters" problem. PS.. just one more reason to leave the USA. The country I once knew ..? It does not exist. In my humble, dumb, simple, opinion.. The USA can kiss my oversized, ASS. Hear that George .. Go F..k yourself ,, you phony. And take the fat lesbian, Hilary with you.. And all the other morons who are standing on street corners trying to get my vote. I am wearing out my middle finger telling the likes of Edwards, Obama, the right wing, the left wing, the nut cases .. Remember that song.. Take this jog and shove it.. Well, that is what I say to the USA.. Take this Country and Shove It. ========================== "Steve Lusardi" wrote in message ... As I understand it, even if you have out of state registration, if you stay in specific waters longer than (30-90 days), you will be required to pay the state duties. Typically the harbor masters continually watch for this kind of use abuse. This is true even if you have foreign registration. Even worse, with foreign registration, you will be required to exit the country and make to a foreign port after typically 90 days. If you find a way around these rules, please let us know. I'm in the same boat. (So to speak) Steve "ray lunder" wrote in message news Ahoy, I live in Washington state and am thinking about my first "real" boat- a blue water cruiser in the $30k-$120k. When I buy a car I pay something like 8% or if it's a gift or a damaged vehicle or you phoney up the bill of sale you still pay some arbitrary made up blue book value the state institutes and which is not insignificant. On a $100k boat this is $8000. Something tells me rich people don't pay this. So what's the scam? Foreign registry or forming your own corporation or what? Sorry to be so clueless. Thanks for your time. |
#7
posted to rec.boats.cruising
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Buying a boat without sales tax?
ray lunder wrote:
Ahoy, I live in Washington state and am thinking about my first "real" boat- a blue water cruiser in the $30k-$120k. When I buy a car I pay something like 8% or if it's a gift or a damaged vehicle or you phoney up the bill of sale you still pay some arbitrary made up blue book value the state institutes and which is not insignificant. On a $100k boat this is $8000. Something tells me rich people don't pay this. So what's the scam? Foreign registry or forming your own corporation or what? Sorry to be so clueless. Thanks for your time. I just went through this in Pt Angeles Wa. They determined the value by going to Yachtworld and Boattrader and based the value on the lowest price they could find for the same boat and comparable year. As for who checks the boats in the marina, here, the state has people who walk the marinas looking at the boats for stickers. They don't do it often in Pt Angeles as witnessed by the number of boats with tags 2 or 3 years out of date. Gordon |
#8
posted to rec.boats.cruising
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Buying a boat without sales tax?
The USA can kiss my oversized, ASS.
Hear that George .. Go F..k yourself ,, you phony. And take the fat lesbian, Hilary with you.. And all the other morons who are standing on street corners trying to get my vote. I am wearing out my middle finger telling the likes of Edwards, Obama, the right wing, the left wing, the nut cases .. What I don't understand is why anyone would vote for anyone from the present congress. This is a despised do nothing group on both sides and if you're running for prez, it must be you think you are the creme de la creme when it comes to leadership. But if you can't lead in congress, how can you lead the country? G I know, I know! |
#9
posted to rec.boats.cruising
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Buying a boat without sales tax?
"ray lunder" wrote
Something tells me rich people don't pay this. Not until they get caught, anyway: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/...revenue12.html Ken Williams, former CEO of the software company Sierra On-Line, said he has no idea how the Department of Revenue caught him when he moored his unregistered 62-foot yacht at his waterfront home in Mercer Island for a year in 1998. "They nabbed me," he said, adding that he was willing to pay the $130,000 in past-due sales taxes immediately. He was philosophical about it, saying, "There's got to be schools and a lot of things. Government can't run without something." After paying, he took his yacht the Sans Souci -- which is French for "carefree" -- to Europe for a visit and later sold it. Now living in West Seattle, Williams intends to buy another boat and this time he said he will pay the tax right away. Use taxes also apply to out-of-state boat owners who stay in Washington too long, over a six-month limit for a visitor's permit. Silicon Valley financial executive James Heffernan got caught with a 58-foot yacht he has since sold, lingering too long in Roche Harbor in 1999, he said. His boat the Andiamo -- which is Italian for "get going" -- didn't get going soon enough to avoid the tax, he said. He was less than a month over the six-month visitors' limit and had to pay a tax of a little less than $100,000. He figures agents were walking the docks. "They caught me. I was wrong and frankly, you don't have too much defense for ignorance," he said. Fortunately for the state, Williams and Heffernan paid promptly. Several cases on file with the state board of tax appeals show that collections can take years. The most notorious case in recent years was the saga of tax cheater Michael Albert Price. Price, now 59, bought a 53-foot yacht in February 1990 and claimed it was a charter boat, avoiding state sales tax. But revenue agents discovered he was far too frequently using the boat himself, not strictly chartering it. Price, the owner of a large Tacoma equipment leasing company, was assessed a tax of $24,600, with interest, in March 1992. He took seven years to pay, filing lengthy appeals before the Department of Revenue's Interpretation and Appeals Division and then the state Board of Tax appeals, according to court documents. A month after he paid, revenue agents discovered he'd already bought a 73-foot yacht that he called Price's Waterhouse. Once again, he cheated on his taxes. Court documents show that he filed false papers to support his assertion that he'd bought the vessel for $690,000 when in fact the price was $3.2 million. This time he faced criminal charges. It took another two years before the executive pleaded guilty in King County Superior Court to tax evasion, agreeing to pay $442,661 in restitution, including taxes, penalties and interest. He couldn't be reached for comment. |
#10
posted to rec.boats.cruising
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Buying a boat without sales tax?
ray lunder wrote:
Ahoy, I live in Washington state and am thinking about my first "real" boat- a blue water cruiser in the $30k-$120k. When I buy a car I pay something like 8% or if it's a gift or a damaged vehicle or you phoney up the bill of sale you still pay some arbitrary made up blue book value the state institutes and which is not insignificant. On a $100k boat this is $8000. Something tells me rich people don't pay this. So what's the scam? Foreign registry or forming your own corporation or what? Sorry to be so clueless. Thanks for your time. Not sure what you'd do in WA, but in San Diego, and often in LA, big buck boat buyers take possession of the boat in Ensenada Mexico. They keep it there in a marina for 91 days, then sail/motor it home. Avoids the 8% sales tax. CA still hits you for the 1% annual property tax, however, and they have a special crew wandering marina docks checking for boats not on the property tax list. BTDT. Lot of hassle, but when you're talking $10-20K sales tax (no, not on *my* boat :-) people seem to think its worth it. I bought my boat used in Arizona where there's no sales tax on resales by private owners. I moved it to San Diego in under 90 days, and a year later got a sales tax bill from CA. Charming chaps that they are, if you don't have a notarized bill of sale (which I didn't feel the need for at the time since the boat is documented), they determine the value for which you're taxed. Keith Hughes |
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