pbee

at the current Euro rate of 1.51 (dealer buy 1.48) it makes importing a wrx and having an alarm fitted come in at about £17500 now assuming you can get £500 of the uk price is it worth frigging about for a 2k saving which may lose more money with depreciation being different.

I order my my03 in october and didnt reserve the euro amount of 1.58 (1.55 dealer purchase) boy am i kicking myself now I have lost about £700 by not doing so.

So unless the pound rises against the euro or euro prices are cut (my benelux dealer says not). why bother ??.

Pro Boy

STi import now only saves you £600 at todays rate

is it worth it?

Did these sums before ordering new Sti 8

Glad i order from a UK Dealer

ian/555

Forgive me for putting a blatant plug here but I think that I should put a bit of balance into this thread.

Emperor Imports is able to supply new MY03 WRX OTR for £16,890 @ an exchange rate of 1.52 Euros (which incidentally was available to us today) so still makes a saving of over £3,000! Plus we are including Metallic paint and free delivery to anywhere in the UK mainland along with our normal OTR package.

Oh one other thing the above price does not even take into account the £250 discount we give to customers if they are Scoobynetplus members!

We are still evaluating the STi price, but rest assured we will be doing our best to give the largest saving possible without any reduction in the level of service given.

I hope that this clears up some of the uncertainty that people are faced with when considering purchasing a new EU import.

ian

http://www.emperorimports.co.uk

chiark

You'll still save money - but as you sort of hint at, you're best off fixing your Euro rate if you want to know what you're paying finally.

I actually bought euros five months before my car arrived so I knew exactly what I would be paying...

Hindsight's great, isn't it?

As Ian says above , savings are still good to very good

hades

Still decent savings. The other thing is that options are often a lot cheaper - eg metallic paint was half the cost from Holland than UK when I got my MY02 last year. Depending on what you are after, it can add up.

When I got mine, there were over 4500 reasons that drove the decision. I've lost most of those "reasons" since by way of mods.

pbee

but you dont buy currency at the live market rate you have to taken into account dealer prices. so 1.52 becames 1.48 which would push it over 17k.

Unfortunatly i didnt reserve the rate (1.57 dealer) when i placed my order so yes hindsight is a very good thing.

just an opinion, it depends how much hassle getting warranty work done, and how the import holds its value, it may not be such a saving if youre car is worth 3 k less after 3 years.

ian/555

Chiark,
you are correct in saying that I would recommend that people fix the exchange rate if they want to be sure of how much the car is going to cost them. Alternatively as you are making a large saving, you could wait and see if the rate changes back in your favour, but I guess this depends on how much of a gamble you want to take.
Hades as you have found out options are usually cheaper as well, so for someone looking to spec their car up it could add up to a substantial saving.

ian

http://www.emperorimports.co.uk

chiark

Cheers Ian, with hindsight I'd have bought an option if I'd have known more about it.

I simply opened a citibank sterling current account, and opened a Dutch Guilder account, which got converted to Euro automatically.

The Citibank account->account rate was phoenomenally good, or it used to be. The rate was significantly better (talking 2-3% here) than what any high street bank would give me on coverting 12 grand!

Might still be worth looking at. If anyone's interested, I can find what the rate is today to see if it's still worthwhile...

ian/555

I did not see your post before Pbee, but can you please stop giving out incorrect info regarding this matter. If you checked you would find out that you are probably quoting the tourist rate you get, when walking into a bank before going on holiday, and not the commercial rate that Emperor Imports obtains when making international payments.

As of 5 mins ago the commercial rate was 1.522 so the price is improving slightly and could go back up.

ian

http://www.emperorimports.co.uk

dsmith

Whats the state of play with dealers and Servicing Euro-Imports ?

Are they happy to service them ? Does it vary between dealers ?

Thanks

Deano

chiark

EU imports have no problems whatsoever with servicing. In fact, if IM tried to discriminate and told their dealers to do so, they'd be on the end of anti-competetive behaviour charges. For this reason, they have a process to follow... You should register your car with IM by faxing them the invoice (hmm, they can see how much you paid...) and CoC. You're then "registered" with them and should be able to have any servicing done at any dealer, and also get warranty work sorted though that can be more fun.

chiark

The rate for intra-citibank accounts is 1.51393 today, so it still looks quite competitive. They only have one rate a day IIRC. No charge for transfers between accounts, either

But still not as good as Emperor's rate

Claudius

Hi Ian

I'm looking for a LHD Impreza GT 99 or 2000 model, up to 12,000 EUR. Could you help me with that? I see on your site you are able to source LHD cars. I'm in France; if there's to be saved on shipping by buying from a Continental European country, that would be great. TIA.