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Is this new? I don't remember any newcomer taxes when we moved here in 2004. Though coming from California (don't tell anybody!), the registration fees plus that tax would have still been less than we were paying for registration in that foreign country.

Or is this something that only comes up when you sell the out-ot-state car?

sjfcontrol wrote:Is this new? I don't remember any newcomer taxes when we moved here in 2004. Though coming from California (don't tell anybody!), the registration fees plus that tax would have still been less than we were paying for registration in that foreign country.

Or is this something that only comes up when you sell the out-ot-state car?

Maybe its new(er). We moved here last year. Registration actually cost more here than it did in VA, however, we were paying property tax on our vehicles in the county we lived in. First year we had the Escalade it was about $1300 in taxes. My truck about $800.
Part of why we moved out of VA. At least in Texas, you can move around to find a county with low taxes.

sjfcontrol wrote:Is this new? I don't remember any newcomer taxes when we moved here in 2004. Though coming from California (don't tell anybody!), the registration fees plus that tax would have still been less than we were paying for registration in that foreign country.

You must have paid it too. I just looked it up (Section 152.023 of the Tax Code if anyone is curious) because I had never heard of it. When I moved to Texas, the law as I understood it was to pay the 6% sales tax if the car was less than a year old, but if it was older than that there was no sales tax on it. The assumption was that the older car was clearly not bought to evade paying Texas sales tax.

Apparently the law went into effect back in 1982 and my understanding of the old law may be a myth (I moved in 79). The law was in this form at least in 1999 (based on the amendment date) and was amended in 2005 to lower the fee if the car is allowed parade plates.

You can learn something new here every day, and it is not all firearms related. I am amazed at this law.

jamisjockey wrote:

Salty1 wrote:"We traded in the wife's Escalade in October and got hit with a couple grand in sales taxes. We already paid tax on the darn thing in Virigina. We didn't buy it here. But because we were trading it in, we got whacked anyways"

sounds to me that you were duped by the salesman, when a car is traded in the value of that car is deducted from the purchase price of the new vehicle and you only pay sales tax on the net difference.... if you still have the paperwork I would go back to the dealership and demand a refund

Thats actually what we paid tax on, but it was still a chunk.

Getting the paperwork in order to register my boat. New Resident tax on both the boat and motor, seperately. $15 each.


And yes, we also paid the $90 new resident tax on each of our (2) vehicles.

If I read this right, what you were paying tax on was the new vehicle...the one you got for the trade in. So you weren't paying sales tax on your Escalade again, but were paying on the new vehicle MINUS what tax Texas anticipated getting for your Escalade (from the ultimate buyer) when the dealer sold it. That's actually a good deal since you would have paid 6.25% of the entire value of the new car if you bought without a trade in.

I think it is callous of the State to actually call it the Welcome to Texas Tax.
Rather flippant.
Maybe they think it's funny.
If that's the case, they didn't succeed.