Family visa and Importing car
Hi everyone,
Greetings to all. I live in US and will be moving to Qatar very soon and have couple of doubts. I read some of the answers and posts in this forum and found to be very useful. May be this question had been asked earlier, but I would greatly appreciate if someone can answer this.
- I would like to bring my family along with me on residence visa (rather than me coming in first to get the RP and then bring my family). While my company will take care of the visa process, I just wanted to know if it is possible to arrive at Qatar together (on residence visa) or not.
- I have a 2005 Corolla here in US and would like to bring it to Qatar instead of selling it here for a ridiculously low price. I have seen some restrictions about the car being less than 3 or 5 years old and one another post saying that car should be MINIMUM 3 years old. Also I am confused about the customs duty of 5% (as to whether it is applicable for a car brought in for personal use or not). Can anyone shed some light on the process.
Thanks in advance to all who take some time to read this and post reply too. This forum has been doing a great job in clarifying lot of doubts to new people and keep up the great work.
Thanks for such an explanatory advice to Kofe & Karamix. That helps in my decision. For all the hassles I will just sell it here. I will shoot you folks separate email for further clarifications. Thanks again!
Malibu
We have just relocated from Florida (September 06) and I can share my experience.
Regarding the VISA and bringing Family
It all depending on your employer and the Offer package that you received. Due to the High cost of living in Qatar (housing) some people are coming to Qatar for few months and returning to the USA. It also depends on the schools and if you have kids.
I recommend that you come by yourself for few months and then see for yourself and determine if it is worth it to bring the family. Anyway, you will be in the summer months and you don’t want the family here in the summer.
You did not mention the job that you got and the Money and the package. If you are still negotiating insist on a villa (not housing allowance) Qatar is not worth it for American unless you are given a key to a villa with paid utilities.
Regarding the Car. We brought a 2005 Honda odyssey minivan. It was allowed in but that was in 2006. My shipper told me same thing about the car being “minimum” 3-5 old. That is a mistake.
Given the year, size and value of the car, I recommend NOT bringing the Car UNLESS you have room in your shipping container. We had a 40 foot container and had space in it and the minivan costed 35,000 USD. if you need to ship it separately, it is not worth it. In any case the car value is not much and there are plenty of Toyota is the leading dealer in Qatar with reasonable prices. Sell the 2005 in USA, you should get a good price, and buy new 2007 in Qatar and save the hassle.
Yes there are customs duties on the car (4-5%) however that is based on the depreciated value of the car. In Qatar they depreciate 20 percent for the first year and probably 20% for the second year. So you will pay customs for about half the value of the Corolla.
They will also charge legalization Fees for the car Papers. You could do that in the USA, but it can be done by customs in the Doha PORT. Legalization fees run about 350-450 USD. To legalize the car in the USA. You need a clear title, send to Arab Chamber of commerce in Houston, LA, or New York, and Then to the Qatar Embassy in Washington DC. Regardless what your shipper tells you. DONT DO legalization in the USA. They will legalize here in one shot for the same fee.
Also remember if you employer is asking you to get any paper certified by Qatar Embassy in the USA, That is a major effort. Regardless of the paper (police report, fingerprints etc.). The embassy of Qatar will only notarize any papers UNLESS they have been notarized by the US Department of State. and that require notarization by Secretary of the State where you live, and that require notarization by a notary public in your county where you live.
Regardless; DO NOT SELL YOUR HOUSE and Always Have an option for Returning to the USA return.
The more important discussion is not the “Corolla” . What is important ( critical) is the compensation Package that you will get in Qatar. (housing, kids education, allowances, etc). As we say the corolla issue is “Peanut’ in comparison to the big picture.
I shipped a 2005 VW beetle turbo convertible from the US to Qatar. Its not cheap and since that same model is already available here you might as well just sell it there.
I paid $1200 shipping from newark, NJ to Qatar. another $1200 for insurance(i seem to recall its 2% of the vehicle value) Then once it arrived i had to go through customs (i don't recommend trying it by yourself unless u speak arabic) I paid the guy that did all the running around 500QR ($160ish)and customs cost another % of the vehicle's value, (5% I believe) but the good thing is you can pretty much set the value of what the car is worth as long as its realistic. All said and done it was a total cost of nearly $5,000 (on a $30k car)to get the car from the US to Qatar and through customs. Also another thing i neglected to mention, you have to own the title of the car free and clear in order to ship it, so basically it has to be 100% paid for with no loans still active.
In conclusion I recommend having a friend try to sell the corolla for you, the process to get it here is cumbersome, expensive and slow. It took 3 months for my car to arrive in port (i think it sat for 3 weeks before they decided to call me)During that time your probably going to need to rent a car which just esculates the price even higher. Not trying to sound pessimistic just telling you the expereince i went through.
If you do decide to buy a car in qatar, a problem you might run into is banking: i personally didn't want to relinguish my paycheck to a bank in Qatar because for investment reasons it would make it difficult to get a loan in the US if i ever decide to buy a house or whatever. Obviously, the banks here are leery of giving out loans to individuals that don't have solid income coming in every month to THEIR bank. The solution? Allotments will take care of that problem, allot a portion of your paycheck to a bank here in qatar and the rest to your account in the US.
Actually you know what.. I think I'm assuming to much, are you working for a qatari firm or a US company? Send me an email (can be found on my profile) if you would like to keep it private.