D is moving to Atlanta next month. The current plan is that she will take H’s car with her (registered in MA, under his name). She currently is NOT on the insurance plan for this car.
We will add her to the insurance before she drives down.
Once she's settled in Atlanta, she will change to a GA license and then register the car.
When should we transfer the title to her name? Should we do it here in MA (do we just sign over the title to her?) before she heads down? Can she then take the title to the GA DMV to get it changed?
I read that GA charges a flat tax when you register the car (6.5%?). For a used car, does anyone know how they figure this tax?
I just went through something similar. First, check to see if your insurance company writes in Georgia. My ins. company does not write in MA (where S moved.) I got the name of my cousin’s ins. agent and called him. We had all the paperwork signed (title, plus a bill of sale for $1 and other forms the agent sent S) before he moved. S mailed them all USPO priority & certified to agent but the Boston PO lost it. They lied several times telling S and the agent when they called that the package would be sent the next day. Finally, I called and the supervisor told me they had no idea where the package was. It eventually was returned to my son’s college address after he had already left for Boston. Consequently, nothing was done until he already moved as we had to get dup. title, resign all the forms and get them to agent ASAP because he couldn’t park on street in Boston without car being registered. The agent had a runner take everything to DMV and got the plates, registration, etc and S just had to go to agent’s office to pick them up. Our cost to MASSDOT was $160.
If it wasn’t for the parking permit situation in Boston we would have just had S do it all once he got to MA. Also, our agent in MA told us he has about 1 month to get a MA drivers license.
I would give her the title to take with her, plus a bill of sale, and take it to the DMV when she gets to GA - unless you need to change ins. companies. I would find an independent agent if that is the case.
I clicked on this thread because we went through a similar situation when our daughter moved to Virginia and we gave her an old car. I can’t remember the ins and outs of the process, because they were many and protracted. It involved two Saturday mornings at the DMV for her to end up with a VA title, license, registration, inspection certificate, and license plate. But the DMV folks were very helpful and guided her through it.
I hope things are less time-consuming in Georgia. I wonder what it means that instead of the GA Dept. of Motor Vehicles, it’s the GA Dept. of Revenue, [subdivision] Motor Vehicles? Georgia is more upfront about it than where I live …
hmmm…not sure if I am following this correctly…D has our car in RI (from OR) and we have kept it in our name and our insurance knows that we own it but it is located most of the time in RI. Also, she has to take it for emissions tests there and then send it to our OR DMV every few years.
The cost of registering this 1995 car in RI was more than the car is worth.
So the title is still in our name–which was actually helpful when someone hit her as then we were able to deal with
claims and she is a med student and had no time all.
If your D is an adult with a career and knows this is her home vs a possibly temporary situation…?
I think OP’s D is moving to GA for a job. Since her residency will now be in GA (as opposed to when student who is away at college but residency is still their parent’s home state) car must be put in her name and registered in new state.
S1’s car is in his name. When he was out of state, but still in training mode, State Farm allowed us to keep him on our multi car policy. Now that he is working full time in the Chicago area, they insisted we move him to a local agent. However, his car is still licensed in our home state as is his drivers license. I believe he has 6 months to make the change.
@oregon101 - I was wondering if D could actually do that. Keep the car in our name, our insurance, just note that it is in GA. But I think that is possible ONLY if she was a full time student and unfortunately, she’'s not. She’s moving to GA for a job - so I think @emilybee is right and we need to retitle/register the car in GA and she has to switch to a GA license.
We are just giving her the car - so to transfer the title, do we need to just sign the back and give it to her? She then registers the title in her name in GA? I don’t know if she would need to register the title first here in MA and then transfer to GA. I have to call the insurance guys too…
@arisamp. We gave the car to our son, too, and it was registered to us while he was in college, but we still needed a bill of sale. Maybe that is just a requirement in MA - so check with an agent in GA.
Yes, to transfer title you just sign the back and give it to her. She would take the title with her to DMV. Honestly, if I were you, I would get an indy agent in GA. They will find the best insurance for her (your) needs - know exactly what paperwork you/she will need and email them to you/her and take everything down to DMV for her. Our agent filled in all the paperwork with mileage, vin # etc, etc. etc. so all we needed to do was sign our names where he told us to. If not for the debacle with the PO - it would have been easy peasy.
Also, after his car was registered my son had to mail the plates back to us and I had to go to DMV to turn them in and get tag release - which I had to send to my insurance company before they would take car off of my policy. I would assume you will have to do similar.
When I was considering giving D2 (now working out of state) one of my cars, our ins company said the issue is where it is primarily housed. If I lent it to her for a few weeks, no problem. But if she kept it, that’s different. It would be good to ask your insurer if they would work with you on this- and how. My concern was if there was an accident, not to have the insurer reject a claim, based on any of this.
Depends on the state. Also, some of the states have changed their rules since way back when. This is the second time we are in our present state. The first time they did not require return of license plates but now they do.
Plates must be returned to MVD in CT…where they give you a sheet to take to your town hall so,your car is removed from the tax rolls. We pay property tax on cars here.
Maybe it would be easier to title the car over to your son now…before he moves. And change him to his own insurance with a company that insures in GA. We just got a new car for DD who is relocating as well. We just put it in her name, and got her own insurance here. It will make the process easier when she moves.
definitly depends on the state. In California, it’s really easy to gift a car to a kid with no tax. Thus, if this was my kid, I’d transfer before she left so the title is already in her name when she rolls into GA.
Return the plates regardless. D1 has gotten two tickets from toll runners where the cameras have mistaken someone else’s license plate for her old number. H had been reluctant to return the plates by mail since we also had had some important packages go astray a few months ago. I have since mailed them back.
The toll cameras take their shoddy photos, interpret the numbers as they wish, and send out the ticket notices. They don’t bother checking if your car is still registered in the state or if it even remotely matches up to the vehicle in the photo (one of the vehicles was a full size bus!). Who knows if speed cameras and red light cameras also make frequent mistakes, and you don’t need to deal with that.
“H had been reluctant to return the plates by mail since we also had had some important packages go astray a few months ago.”
After our debacle with the PO losing the package we’ve decided anything remotely important will be sent Fed Ex - which is what he had S do with the plates. More $ but at least things get where they are supposed to go.
For reasons unknown to me, when my daughter and husband went to buy her car, his name went on the loan paperwork (guessing someone told him the rate would be lower). When D moved out of state permanently, getting the title cleared involved having to refinance the auto loan. Oy vey, what a process!
Thanks for all the responses. Hadn’t thought of moving the car to her name right now here in MA - will look into that. I did talk to the insurance company yesterday and they said they would have to write a spin-off policy for her car in GA - she would be on her own policy and wouldn’t get any of the discounts we currently qualify for. But she did say to call back and to talk to the sales guys - going to have H do that next week.
We sent cars from HI to CA. I signed title of the cars over from us to the kids for each of the cars and they drove the cars to the AAA there to get the DMV transfer of title, registration & smog check. It was free because it was a gift from parents to child. Our insurer doesn’t cover CA, so we had to get separate insurance in CA–Mercury for S and USAA for D. Premiums are higher than I’d like but hopefully will drop now that D is reaching age 26 without any accidents or citations.