Thinking about a career change

[Weiser]

Actually, start my own business.

Car importing actually. With the canadian dollar so strong right now, and the way cars / trucks are priced in the US - it is extremely profitable to buy near used cars down there and import them up in canada.

Because I live in Calgary and it is full of money, it will be easy to sell whatever I bring up.

What I am thinking of doing (and what I have been thinking of doing for years now) is heading down to arizona once I get my passport and going to some of the auctions. Most people don't even realize you can pick up CLEAN cars for 50 - 95% off retail value. For instance, one of the auctions I am a member of from when I lived there years ago just recently had a 2002 Mercedes CL600 sell for $32,000. With exchange, fees and taxes, it would cost approximately $39,000 to bring it over to Canada.

You can sell that for $75,000 here easily. You do the math, but that is a pretty good profit margin.

How can I afford this? Well, I can't really - except that I have a no limit credit card that I haven't activated, which means I could buy it no problem and be able to flip it and pay off the bill before they mail it to my house.

Thoughts? I can sell 4 a year before the government gets pissy and tells me to knock it off.

[Vautrin]

Weiser I really can't comment, as I am too unfamiliar with the laws on the American continent. But is it really as simple as you imagine? I am not worried about the currencies, but more about export this and all that. Registration of the cars may prove a bit troublesome.

Otherwise it seems quite viable.

[Weiser]

Registrar of Imported Vehicles RIV: How to import a U.S made vehicle into Canada lists what you can, and cannot import and what needs to be done to make american cars meet canadian regulations. Once you bring it over, you have 45 days to make all the appropriate changes. Certain cars need nothing to be changed, while others may only need child teather restraints installed. The most you are looking at is $600 and a couple days to make the changes.

It really is that easy to do, only canadian residents can do it and the only hard part about this is the time invested in driving the vehicle a couple thousand miles.

[PepsiChic]

hmm how will you travel somewhere to buy a few cars and then get them all plus the vehicle you drove there in back to canada?

its an interesting idea, the problem is tho, having a no limit credit card, if you dont sell cars as quick as you buy them, you could be in a lot of debt

[Weiser]

One car at a time. Fly down, drive back The economy here in Calgary is insane. Money basically grows on trees. It would be fairly easy to dump one car a month, especially when you can sell it for thousands less than anyone else.

[darkangelism]

Sounds like a good idea, though credit cards are not a good financing source, but yeah cars are pretty easy to flip like that...i personally have been wanting to do it with houses, but them at auction, do a little work and resell...but yeah you wouldnt even have to do it that often if you can find good deals.

[Weiser]

No its not but there is no way i can get a loan for an out of country purchase like that

[Duke]

How the hell did you manage to get a no limit credit card, you've worked roughly 3 days in the past 4 years?

If you really want to make the most out of this idea, file for a business license and then you can write off much of your travel expenses and actually receive a tidy tax return next year.

[Weiser]

I still don't really know how I got it. Well, actually I do. I applied for it at the toronto airport when I was making more money than I could spend.

And I am going to file a business liscence once I see how this goes. I just have to wait for my passport and some time off work.

[Weiser]

No limit my arse. Nuts to that idea, apparently there is no set limit, but it varies on your spending patterns. I'm limited to 3,500 a month right now

[Vautrin]

Frak!