Registering a car in the EU as a non-resident citizen

Question

I am considering a grand tour of the EU by road. This would be in a small electric car; I don't plan on creating lots of pollution as I go. Partly because the car would have a small range and also because I want to see the places and not just speed through ticking them off a list, I would be travelling slowly and trip would be long. Maybe 6 months, maybe a year, maybe even more. I am about to retire and I have the time.

Most of the tour would be in continental Europe and it would be easier to buy the car in the EU. So, I would like to register it there. I am a dual UK / Irish citizen but I currently live in the UK. I have friends and / or family in Ireland, Denmark, and France who I hope would be happy to lend me their address. Obviously, I have the strongest connections to Ireland but it is the least convenient as it is not physically connected to the other countries. I have the second best connections to Denmark (relatives not just friends) but it is also not in an optimal location. France would be the most convenient but I only have friends there.

Hence the question: could I reasonably easily buy a car in France and register it at a friend's address? What risk would they be taking? I won't be committing any serious crimes in the car. Apart from anything else, the car that I am considering would be a lousy getaway car. I don't plan committing even minor crimes but there is always a danger of a parking ticket or something like that.

I also need to check my driving licence, insurance, etc but one question at a time.

Answer 1

You can't actually register, i.e. get a certificat d'immatriculation (more commonly known as a carte grise (grey card)), a car in France without a living in France.

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Justificatif de domicile

DISCLAIMER : I am not a lawyer

You will need to have a justificatif de domicile (address certificate), written in your name at your address (can be a single other address just that it needs your name on it, and no older than 6 months (all requisites are on service-public.fr (fr)).
Which you obviously don't have in your possession.

However, you know people that may give you their address, which makes is way easier though still quite inconvenient and possibly illegal due to the fact that you are misrepresenting the fact that you're living in France.

The easiest way you would have been able to have such justificatif if is for your French friend to write you a attestation d'hébergement, in which they legally certify you live at their place, however this is purely illegal as this is lying and can entice consequences for the signatory.

You can also, this time in a grey area of legality, subscribe to a cheap mobile phone plan at that person's house (like Free's (not affiliated)), get the invoice, and then you will have a proper Justificatif de domicile, but, by using that invoice (getting a mobile plan as a non-resident, and even abroad (nothing prevent you from having only a PO box for that mobile plan) is not illegal), you might be in trouble

BUT, as I said it is a grey area, nothing is written in regulations that you have to actually live at that particular address (many people register cars to their secondary residences and live elsewhere in France), but there is still the issue of deception. Deceiving a gov. is always a bad thing, but again, it is likely no one, except for your insurer, will actually care about that.

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Insurance

This is not France specific but you are required to tell the truth especially to any insurer, you don't live where you tell them you live, and they have extremely large latitudes to stop coverage altogether if you are caught lying.

I suspect some insurers may bend the rules and allow your foreign address somewhere in the registry, but police may be weirded out and willing to investigate if the carte verte (European certificate of auto insurance) has a wholly different address than the registration.

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Conclusion

As the issue is legally grey, I would recommend having a French lawyer weighing the options.

If you choose to go ahead, nothing will likely ever happen on the registration side, but your insurer might not be too happy if they stumble on this.
As most policies are bendable by the agent you may be able to get them onboard, but not guaranteed and not recommended.

Answer 2

A (perfectly legal) alternative would be buying and registering an LHD car in Britain and finding an insurance company willing to cover you abroad all year round (the limit was usually 3months/year when I checked).

An LHD car can be registered in the UK provided it meets some requirements (the spec for head and tail lamps are different from the continent, and you need a speedometer that reads both mph and Km/h). Some cars are already dual-spec so you don't need to do anything, and there are workshops that specialize in this conversion for all others.

The easiest and simplest route would be finding an already converted LHD car in the UK and buying it; buying the car in the continent and bringing it over would mean a lot of import taxes.

Answer 3

According to your comments, you live in the UK and intend to return to the UK with the car at the end of your grand tour.

If your desired model were available in the UK, there would be no question that buying and registering it in the UK would be infinitely simpler and would only cost you one extra channel crossing for the car.

Importing the car would most likely result in a demand for UK VAT and you might have difficulty claiming a refund of the foreign VAT seeing that you might have claimed foreign residence to licence the car and there would be a long delay between the purchase and the importation.

In the pre-Brexit past, there were companies which bought cars in Belgium (low tax) and did all the administration for you for "personal import" into the UK. If one of these companies is still in existence, you might be able to buy the car in Belgium and have it registered in the UK without physically importing it, but I suspect Brexit has made this uneconomic for them.