Do you need an appraisal before transferring an 80s motorcycle? | GTAMotorcycle.com

Do you need an appraisal before transferring an 80s motorcycle?

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pecan_choco_hurricane

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I'm confused here... The staff member at a service Ontario stated I needed an appraisal before transferring an old 80s bike. The mechanic told me the staff member is wrong and he never had to do it for his bikes. I took a glance at the form and it asks for doors/ac/ and other auto features. I'm leaning towards that the staff member is wrong but why the hell would they want one for a cheap old bike?
 
When you transfer a vehicle in Ontario, sales taxes are computed based on the greater of what you paid, appraised value, or FMV. Service Ontario tracks FMV for vehicles up to 20 years old.

Technically the law says you must have appraisal letter OR an insurance document with replacement cost in order to establish FMV on a 20+ year old vehicle. In practice, I have never seen Service Ontario ask for an appraisal (and I have lots of old vehicles). They use the bill of sale.

Try another Service Ontario agent, or ask for a supervisor.
 
When I bought my first Hawk, SO told me I needed an appraisal. But they didn't say where or any details. So I asked a Honda dealer if they could and they said "Sure, what do you want us to appraise it for?" Then I took it back to the same SO office and a different rep told me it wasn't necessary. :mad:
 
Any OMVIC dealer can write an appraisal. There is an appraisal form on the Omvic website... behind a login.
 
Appraisals are only for cars. Bikes and iirc pickups don’t have a book value anyway, so the taxes are always based on the receipt.
 
Bought and sold lots of bikes. No appraisal.
 
JTR said:
Appraisals are only for cars. Bikes and iirc pickups don’t have a book value anyway, so the taxes are always based on the receipt.
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I heard of at least one recent (2022 or 2023) bike that had the value on the UVIP. Not sure if that was a strange one-off or if newer bikes carry an official value.

As others said, SO is a mixed-bag and if you don't like their questions/answers, try someone else and you can probably get a different answer.
 
JTR said:
Appraisals are only for cars. Bikes and iirc pickups don’t have a book value anyway, so the taxes are always based on the receipt.
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By rule all vintage motorcycles need an appraisal. In practice, SO doesn’t usually ask for one.
 
bitzz said:
Ya keep sayin that. Who's "rule" or "law"?
Any sauce yet?
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Ontario.ca says it's required by Minister of finance. No ambiguity. I didn't dig further to find the underlining law or regulation that gave them this power.

Buy or sell a used vehicle in Ontario

Know the steps you need to take to buy or sell a used vehicle in Ontario.
www.ontario.ca www.ontario.ca

Appraisals: If the vehicle is 20 years old or older, you will require an appraisal. For more information please read about Specified vehicles from the Ministry of Finance.

Specified vehicles
A specified vehicle includes:

motor vehicles or other vehicles that require a permit under the Highway Traffic Act to operate on a highway, such as automobiles, motorcycles and motor scooters (including limited speed motorcycles), mopeds, buses, trucks and vans, motorized recreational vehicles (e.g., motor homes), and trailers (e.g., travel trailers, fifth wheel, sport trailer, etc.)
off-road vehicles or motorized snow vehicles that require a permit under the Off-Road Vehicles Act or the Motorized Snow Vehicles Act
boats (e.g., motor boats, personal watercraft, sail boats, canoes, etc.)
aircraft.
 
If you follow your links, there is a requirement for appraisals on cars, vans or trucks with excessive mileage or "antique" cars, trucks or vans... and in the case of "antique" (which is not defined) an appraisal OR an insurance document with a replacement value
I see no LAWS requiring an appraisal on motorcycles... can you?
 
bitzz said:
If you follow your links, there is a requirement for appraisals on cars, vans or trucks with excessive mileage or "antique" cars, trucks or vans... and in the case of "antique" (which is not defined) an appraisal OR an insurance document with a replacement value
I see no LAWS requiring an appraisal on motorcycles... can you?
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I can't find a cleanly worded law requiring appraisals. I think the key is this from Retail Sales Tax Act R.S.O. 1990, CHAPTER R.31:
"1.1) Every purchaser of a specified vehicle shall pay to Her Majesty in right of Ontario a tax in respect of the consumption or use of the specified vehicle computed at the rate of 13 per cent of the fair market value of the specified vehicle"

You are required to pay tax on fmv. Less than 20 years old, they have approved sources for fmv (with cars but not bikes). Above 20 years old, they don't have an approved book value so they need something from a qualified source to generate that number. The same argument could be easily applied to all motorcycles and they don't have an approved book value in Ontario and SO staff cannot be expected to approve/reject the number you present. Thankfully they don't do this. The whole thing seems stupid to me. Hell tax on vehicles that were already taxed is stupid.
 
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Didn't Doug Ford once vaguely hint at looking at fixing the stupid HST on used vehicles?
 
TwistedKestrel said:
Didn't Doug Ford once vaguely hint at looking at fixing the stupid HST on used vehicles?
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He can't really fix HST. He could remove PST so we were left with GST only.

Was it douggie or a previous government that put HST on all private sales as they were only GST and that was unfair to dealers who had to charge both?
 
I believe it was a McGuinty move
 
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