All depends on what car - exact age, engine size, emissions etc. You may also need to change all the lights (front, reverse, rear fog) back to Spanish spec..

Also, you MAY have to pay first registration tax.


A better solution might be to buy a LHD car in UK that's already on Spanish plates but just make sure you buy from a reputable dealer to make sure there are no debts etc.

 

or, better still, buy one in Spain and save the hassle of importing it. try www.autoscout24.es

 

If you buy LHD from an EU origin, it is very unlikely that you will have to change anything on the vehicle itself.

BUT, if you want to go ahead with your plan of buying a UK reg'd lhd and have a simple import / re-registration process, make sure that the EXACT same vehicle was available in Spain in the same year. That will guarantee that an equivalent homologation certificate exists in the Ministry of Industry here is Spain, and hence make it "automatically registerable".

If you buy LHD in the UK from Japan / South Africa origin, you may have problems.

 

Erm, they drive on the left in Japan so use RHD cars

 

Hola

If the car was manufactured in 2012 then it should have a European Certificate of Conformity; If it hasn't, or cannot be supplied with one, I would suggest not buying it.

If it has the certificate then check the lights, both front and rear conform to Spanish standards.

Davexf

 

I'll just chip in with one of my favourite whinges about the EU.

J-C Junquer et al would like full fiscal as well as montary union, from Germany to the economic basket cases like Greece. But after decades, there is still no EU-wide standard for car registration.

Why is there not an EU plate? There's an EU passport for people and they are not rolled off production lines in Dusseldorf or Essen or Modena, tens of thousands of identical objects....

Leaving aside the dopey retention of RHD of semi-detached UK in 196?

 

Thank you all, will keep this in mind

 

Reminds me of my (LHD) US car that I took to the UK. When I left the UK someone bought it to take to Spain and unfortunately don't know how that worked out, but it was to a dealer who made a business of it and he didn't think there were any issues.

First thing I had to do in the UK was put filters over the lights as my US headlights dipped centrally, and the filters made them dip to the left. Also have a fog light added, but that was all.

The guy laughed in the emissions test in the MOT as the emissions gave an almost zero reading - something to do with California emissions, which I guess mean the UK emissions allowance is set much higher (?).

Only thing that I assumed would need to be changed on the car is taking the UK headlight filters off and putting European ones on to get the lights to dip the other way. But don't know.

 

The stick-on beam diverters are OK for holidays but to re-register (homologate) the headlights will have to dip right instead of left and the high visibility rear light will have to be on the left (unless there are two -one each side)

 

We bought a LHD car in UK - was a french car- changed it onto UK plates so we could insure in UK prior to driving to Spain. Then registered onto Spanish plates. Cost through a gestor 700€

 

I looked at the cost and complications of taking a UK car to Spain and then a LHD car from UK to Spain. Both were too much hassle and cost. I hired a car as soon as I arrived in Spain and within 3 days I bought a Spanish car from a reputable dealer, with a year's warranty and all legal stuff sorted for me. Very happy with this decision.

 

Good. That is the sensible way to do it.

 

I have a 2010 Citroen C3 Picasso that was used by my parents in law but they’ve now moved back to the UK. Originally bought in France but re-registered in the UK. Please let me know if this is of interest. Cheers, Paul

 

Do you know that the previous posts are 7 years old?

 

I do now. Cheers