Border crossing with purchased appliance

[colleen]

We've brought tons of stuff down and had many experiences. Once brought a trailer w/o a household visa and went in to the Something To Declare lane at the 20some mile checkpoint. I had a list just like the one used for a household visa, with rummage sale prices. They really didn't want to deal with it. They looked in the trailer and sure didn't want to deal with that. Finally they agreed to take the aduana based on my values. The only hassle was that after the man did all the paperwork for me he made me leave his office, walk around, enter thru a different door and then pay him the aduana.

Next adventure was bringing down a hot tub in the back of the Ford Explorer. Of course it was sticking out. I thought we could bring $1000 per person across the border or I would have gotten a receipt for $999. It was near $2000, much, much less than the price here. Well, I had to pay for the other $1000 and not only that, I had to hire one of their buddies stationed just outside the office and pay him very well for his filling out a form. It was still a good deal.

We will be going to McAllen next month with a shopping list. We plan what to buy and how to pack it. All labels off clothing and packed in the empty suitcases we take up. (The US authorities don't take kindly to the empty suitcases and sometimes search the whole car including the engine) We pay for things separately at Sam's Club or wherever. If it is something that will raise eyebrows and isn't easy to hide, we keep that receipt handy in case we are searched and they decide we need to pay. All toner cartridges are unpacked. Everything is taken out of it's store boxes. We are libro traficantes for the bookstore, Donkey Jote. If we get caught we'll pay the aduana and those receipts are kept separate. Books cross w/o aduana under NAFTA but only if you are a licensed importer. (well you may choose to ignore that part of the email since last time I mentioned it, I was put in my place by someone from Mazatlan. I can only speak to my experience)

The cheapest hot tub I could find back then was $6000 so I still had a good deal. I would never bother w/ a large appliance that I could buy here for even triple the price. You never know what kind of jerk you might run into. And then consider if your time is worth anything because you may spend a great deal of time hassling. Over all, we haven't had problems. Now let's see how it goes with Mexican placas on the car. They love to search the Mexicans and take everything out of the car and place it on a table. So who knows?

Good luck w/ your adventure.