# bringing a motorhome to Portugal



## markphillip

My wife and I want to bring a motorhome to portugal to live in while we look for a property to buy. 
We have been told that after six months we need to get local insurance as our UK policy will not cover us over 180 days in the same country! this is not a problem, well that's what we thought. Is it true that a UK registered car/motorhome LHD is vertually impossible to insure due to the checks that are required by the garages to register the vehicle in portugal?

If anybody has already done this we would love to hear from you regarding your experience. we have not yet purchased a motorhome so if there are major problems getting insurance we may concider getting a motorhome out there.

We look forward to any comments that can clear up our concerns from people out there that have already gone down this route.

Many thanks Mark


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## omostra06

you are allowed to keep a uk registered vehicle here in Portugal for 183 days in any one year, for longer periods than this you either take a chance on getting stopped and fined or think about importing the vehicle, not easy! costs a lot of money and very stressful. not really worth it, if your plan is to live in your motor home in portugal why not think about buying one here in Portugal then you can keep it and use it here for as long as you like.

what area of Portugal are you thinking about heading to?


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## silvers

It depends if you have owned the vehicle for more than 12 months, if so the import costs will not apply. You could matriculate it here using one of the many agencies for less than 500 euros. This will depend on you becoming full-time residents though.


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## markphillip

omostra06 said:


> you are allowed to keep a uk registered vehicle here in Portugal for 183 days in any one year, for longer periods than this you either take a chance on getting stopped and fined or think about importing the vehicle, not easy! costs a lot of money and very stressful. not really worth it, if your plan is to live in your motor home in portugal why not think about buying one here in Portugal then you can keep it and use it here for as long as you like.
> 
> what area of Portugal are you thinking about heading to?


We are going to be lookig at Central Portugal Tomar or Provance Anova area.

Many thanks for your reply this does change our plans some what, I think we may now go down the route of getting one over there or looking at long term rental. I think the latter would be a last resort as we want to take our time getting to Portugal and have the motorhome to live in on site if needed while we renivate the property.

Mark


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## OrkneytoPortugal

markphillip said:


> My wife and I want to bring a motorhome to portugal to live in while we look for a property to buy.
> We have been told that after six months we need to get local insurance as our UK policy will not cover us over 180 days in the same country! this is not a problem, well that's what we thought. Is it true that a UK registered car/motorhome LHD is vertually impossible to insure due to the checks that are required by the garages to register the vehicle in portugal?
> 
> If anybody has already done this we would love to hear from you regarding your experience. we have not yet purchased a motorhome so if there are major problems getting insurance we may concider getting a motorhome out there.
> 
> We look forward to any comments that can clear up our concerns from people out there that have already gone down this route.
> 
> Many thanks Mark


Hi Mark - I have not personally brought a motor home over to Portugal, but I know plenty of people who have, and have been running around quite happily in them for at least 18 months (the time that I have lived here). Whether they are fully legal or not I could not comment! 

But the insurance should not be a problem. There is a firm called Abbeygate that everyone over here uses for UK registered cars. They are based in Cadiz, but cover France and Portugal too, and are very efficient. Their website is abbeygateinsurance com; and tel.no. in the UK is 01989 565613
It is virtually impossible to insure a UK registered car with any Portuguese insurance company - Abbeygate seems to be the solution!

With regard to registration - in our area of Central Portugal I was under the impression that the police turned a blind eye to cars not being 'matriculated' in Portugal, but recently I have heard of two instances where cars have been impounded for not having been re-registered (after how long I don't know). There may have been other things going on that drew the police attention - I only know that it was hugely expensive to sort out. I always thought that all being part of the EU would make this sort of thing much smoother 

Do come and have a look at the Gois region when you are here - it is just a little further north - a beautiful region of rivers, hills and picturesque villages. The town of Gois also has an extremely nice campsite for your motorhome!


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## omostra06

We live in the Tomar region and have been here for 5 years, we came here after a long drive around Europe and north Africa in our motorhome, we lived in our motorhome here while we found a place to buy and restore, we did have our motorhome here for about one year but in that time we were in and out of the country to Spain and France as well as a couple of trips back to the uk for friends weddings.

I would be careful about keeping a vehicle for over the legal time limit people do get fined or told to take the vehicle out of the country, some vehicles even get impounded, so best to avoid those types of problems.

If you buy a vehicle in the uk, as has been said above you do need to have owned it for one year before you can import it, that could be 6 months in Uk and 6 months here, in order to avoid paying the very high (and its just gone up again) import tax, you can import one vehicle free (almost free) if you decide to become a Portuguese resident, if you dont want to be a resident then its not free, you have to prove you have owned the vehicle for one year, that you lived outside of Portugal in the 6 months leading up to your resident application, utillity bills etc. then you can become a resident and get the free import, you then have to keep the vehicle for a certain period after. if its a rhd vehicle it will not be worth a lot here even on Portuguese plates, so buy a lhd. motorhomes in Portugal are not too expensive and there are lots about to choose from. you can own a Portuguese vehicle with no restrictions on use even if you are a uk resident.

if you would like any information about bringing amotor home to portugal, or indeed on the Tomar region drop me an email, we also have lots of info on central portugal on our gekkoportugal website, the link is below in my signature.

good luck on your plans.

there are some pictures of our renovations on the link below, some before and after pictures, give you an idea of what you can do.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/the_house_on_the_hill/


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