Aug 02 2007
Vehicle Registration – Answers
I’ve blogged before about difficulty in finding out exactly what is needed to register an out-of-state vehicle. I’m happy to report that we now have accomplished just that, and Her car no longer sports the amusing “Another New York” plates. The vehicle registration process takes two distinctly different steps.
- Pay your excise tax. This is done at the local level, so in Portland, we had to visit City Hall on Congress. In order to accomplish this piece of the registration puzzle, you’ll need the following:
- Proof of insurance
- Your VIN
- Money (they take cash, check, or plastic)
For Her 2002 Subaru Forester S, the excise tax was $91. For my 2002 Subaru WRX, it was $95. Not too bad, but it’s an annual tax, so it will be a bit expensive over the long run.
- Go to BMV and fill out the registration and title paperwork. The BMV/DMV is everyone’s favorite place in the world, right? Unfortunately, there’s no way to avoid it. We’ve gone twice so far, once for our Maine driver licenses and once for registration. We breezed in and out at about 1:30 on a Thursday afternoon (driver licenses). The wait at 10:00 AM on Tuesday was quite a bit longer, but it gave us plenty of time to fill out the paperwork. You’ll need to bring the following with you:
- Receipt excise tax payment
- Bill of sale for vehicle (just in case, though we didn’t actually need this)
- Title from previous state of ownership
- Proof of registration in previous state
- Proof of current insurance
- Your current odometer reading
There are two separate forms to fill out for this part. The first is for your new title in Maine. The second is for the vehicle registration itself. Once your ticket number is called (you’ll need a B ticket for this in Portland–can’t say whether they use the same system at other BMV locations), the actual registration and title process is pretty quick–10 or 15 minutes. The fees are $25 for the registration (annual), and $23 for a new title (one-time).
If you want a special license plate (the have a lobster plate, a loon plate, a UMaine Black Bear plate, and a UMaine System plate available to the general public), there’s an extra $20 charge. After the first year, you pay $15 extra each renewal year. These extra monies benefit various Maine causes.
So there you go. That’s the process. The Maine BMV site outlines the above process, but isn’t particularly specific about what the differences were depending on whether this was an out-of-state transfer or a vehicle purchased in Maine. The big difference is that you don’t need to pay sales tax, as you didn’t buy it in Maine, and you don’t need the green dealer form they mention (though this is why we brought our bill of sale, just in case). I’ve seen a few hits here searching for information about registration transfers, so hopefully this answers all those questions. If you need any more information, please don’t hesitate to leave a comment.