Driving to Turkey and importing car

If you've to ask here...

...it's because I don't know the answer? 😬

Not my experience, but the Turkish barber I use drives to Gazientep from Brighton in two days (Gazientep is 12hrs drive past Istanbul!).  I didn't believe he could do it that quickly so took photos last time he did it to prove it's possible, so can be less than a week of driving.  For what it's worth he prefers the Serbia / Hungary / Bulgaria route to the Greece one as it's quicker.

You can take a big chunk of by getting the Italy Greece ferry. I too considered this briefly to Georgia. A lot of their cars are jap imports converted to lhd.

I am confused, are you wanting to drive to Turkey to buy a LHD car to then bring back to the UK? And is it brand new or second hand?

Or are you moving to Turkey?

Importing vehicles into the UK: How to import a vehicle - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

I think he wants to go and buy a left hand drive , 12 year old Corsa for £16000...

I'm with @FunkyDunc, are you driving out there to sell a car, buy another in Turkey and drive that back? Or what?

I'd drive there quite happily - in a decent well prepped car I could trust.

But is there high import duty on a car into Turkey? I have a funny feeling there is - I worked in Bursa for awhile. The high cost of cars there will be for a reason.

Oh Ive read it differently now, OP trying to flog his knackerd old Corsa in Turkey ?

I think OP is wanting to buy a cheap LHD car here in the UK and then flog it in Turkey?

Isn't op moving to Turkey? So driving means he can take more stuff & not have to fork out £££ for a car when he gets there.

Mate of mine used to live in Paris & buy a different knackered Brit car every 6 months so the gendarme didn't recognise hime when he got pulled for various indiscretions and claimed he didn't speak French 🤣

Edit - sisters 2nd hand Merc 4x4 cost twice as much as in UK because of high import duty where she lives

Try singleturkforum

https://www.expat.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=917243

Are you planning there permenantly - and I'll assume you haven't tried googling as if that's the case you won't like the answers

You can bring a used car into the country for two years.  After that you have to export it.

You can't permenantly import a used car.  Must be new.  Tax will be 60 or 70% depending on engine size and price

Are LHD cars not too difficult to buy here, and cheaper?

I would certainly expect a LHD car to be cheaper to buy in the UK, but theres not exactly loads of them around, and presumably many of them were brought be europeans coming here so might have high mileage from return trips (and possibly still be on foreign plates making paperwork more complex).  But you might get lucky if you can find someone who is returning but is flying/doesn't want to take the car and wants shot of it quickly.

the Turkish barber I use drives to Gazientep from Brighton in two days (Gazientep is 12hrs drive past Istanbul!).  I didn’t believe he could do it that quickly so took photos last time he did it to prove it’s possible, so can be less than a week of driving.

I believe the OP is starting in Edinburgh so will have another day to get to Dover.  He may also be slightly less insane and prefer not to fall asleep behind the wheel!

You can bring a used car into the country for two years.  After that you have to export it.

Are there any rules about how long you have to export it for before you can bring either the same or another car back in?  The EU (and probably the UK) has some weird rules on boats and planes (maybe cars?) but so long as you can prove it left for 24 hours the clock starts again.

I've driven down to turkey before, was quite a nice journey, however leaving a car there is extremely expensive if you're not bribing someone to make the paperwork go away.

I would certainly expect a LHD car to be cheaper to buy in the UK

Historically yes, but prices have narrowed as there is a profit to be made selling a UK LHD into Europe so demand has put the prices up.

A load of Polish guys where I used to work would get LHD cars here, drive them home & sell at a profit but gradually the price differential closed.

‘Singleturkforum’

*applauds irc*

Distance-wise i'd be happy doing it - we drove from London to Venice last summer  (stopped in Geneva on way down) on the return leg we did lake Garda to home in one hit - 12 hours driving to get up to Calais.

(This was in a 4 year old 2.0 diesel BMW - which was perfect for the job)

Looking at the map Venice appears to be just short of half way to Istanbul - so basically 24-28 hours continuous driving - or 3 fairly easy days if you broke it up.

Previously i've driven as far as Mostar in Bosnia, which was a while a go but no real issues.

I knew a couple who drove to Turkey in an old Toyota celica , it was a fairly easy trip and they took their two kids with them as well. I went to see them safely on to the ferry at Dover.

They ended up leaving the car there too - mainly because of the 14kgs of heroin they tried to stick in a void in the celica’s bodywork to bring back -all got a bit messy for them and there acquaintances. Turkish prison is apparently not so good. Fun times 🙂

@kilo I've seen the film 😮

@wbo has it, cheers - but is @Poly right that I could spend a day with it outside Turkey every 2 years with no bother?

I did a bit of googling but didn't get that far.

And apologies all for lack of clarity - it made sense in my head.

It still obviously does make sense in your head OP, but I think a few of us still dont have a clue.

It still obviously does make sense in your head OP, but I think a few of us still dont have a clue.

He's emigrating to Turkey and wondering whether it is feasible to buy a LHD car in the UK and drive there or whether there are rules regarding importing used cars into the country that will make this unfeasible.

Ah ok makes sense now !

Last time i drove [ was driven] to Turkey we took a ferry from Marseille.
My dad drove back from istanbul a few years later with loads of our stuff. Iirc it was in a rhd car so presumably the one my mum took out via marseille. Which suggests it stayed in instanbul for more than 2 years.

Sorry I'm so vague about it, it was almost 50 years ago. I'd ask my dad for details, but he's dead.

Weirdly enough my granparents drove to Kuwait, which seems like a long way.

Anyway, Im being of no use here.

Bir sedegil.

Could you buy a rhd car and go in reverse?

If turkey is anything like thailand,the rules will all change in 2 years, anything could happen
It used to be that you could bring a bike into the country, as a temporary import for 3months max iirc,then you could get a 3 month extension, after that it had to leave the country, but could come back in the same day.
If it overstayed, it would be fined, at £10/day, up to a maximmum of £200.
So for £200, you could keep it there indefinitely, without it getting confiscated

Ok, I'm curious....why is @cynic-al emigrating to Turkey? And which area is he moving to? (it's a big country!)

I'm moving to Bursa to be with my lady.

Much bike and other crap for sale!

Prepare to find bikes locked to railings all over Edinburgh.

New RHD cars are cheap in Malta. So drive your LHD car to turkey and flog for cash and come back via malta

cynic-al
Full Member
I’m moving to Bursa

I worked in Inegol but stayed in Bursa. It was a good job - I enjoyed it there, nice people but it nearly killed me twice! Once in an earthquake and I got severe sun stroke and ended up in hospital!

I don't think that just nipping over the border counts, else you'd find the borders constantly queued with people exporting their cars for a day to go on holiday.  You won't be registered with the Turkish DVLA equivalent, but you will be on a parking app or camera or something at some point.  Also, if you have a foreign registered car, what's your plan for insuring it for two years?

I don't live in Turkey, I live in another country with high car tax rates, and they're usually designed to be fairly tight to dodge.

If you’re thinking to do a personal import and register there, look out for a minimum amount of time you need to have owned the vehicle for. No idea about Turkey but some countries have that in place to stop people doing the buy, drive in and sell then repeat game.