Avoiding CA Sales Tax

[der Geist]

I went through the same thing. The dealership did offer one other option. They said that after they received payment they could overnight the paperwork to me and I could get my temporary tags in my home state then fly out and drive the car off the lot. It would have worked for me but I am not sure it would work for you. I ended up buying a car in Denver anyway. If you want the name of the dealer PM me and I will be happy to send it to you. They had quite a few nice P-cars in stock.

[Lil bastard]

One thing you can count on, Uncle Sam, or in this case, Aaaahnold, are bound to get their cut.

Unfortunately, as I understand it, when you import a car into Canada, you have to go through the equivalent of the UK's MOT to get the car registered. If I'm correct, that would make it impossible for you to get the registration prior to importing the car.

You could check with Transport companies, but that's likely to equal, or come uncomfortably close, to the sales Tax total anyway.

Maybe, if you trusted someone from there, perhaps a member here, they could pick-up the car in SD and meet you in Las Vegas. Buy them a Bus ticket back to SoCal. It would certainly add some excitement to your trip.

I'd do it, but I'm 1000 mi. away from SoCal and by the time you were done, you wouldn't have saved much, if anything. Sorry, that's the best I can come up with.