Made my compulsory trip to the Indiana Bureau of Motor Vehicles this past saturday to do the title paperwork and put plates on my new F-150 Heritage.

$227.50

Can we say ouch? Scary part was reading on the papers where the actual excise tax was $300 and the 50% tax offset by the Lottery proceeds fund made it $150, then the title fees, plate fees, etc. This was not a "special" plate this is a standard Indiana blue on white truck plate.

[rant] Maybe when Mitch Daniels takes over in January, BMV might get their heads out of their butts and let the dealers handle plates on vehicle sales. That number wouldn't be so bad if it could be rolled into vehicle financing, but buying a new vehicle then coughing up over 1/2 of your payment to get plates is a bit much. And I'd like to see a system where you can go online and just see what your plates will cost before going to BMV!!! [/rant]

 

Here you go:

http://www.in.gov/bmv/platesandtitle...2003html.htm#4

We'll end up paying for roads somewhere. Sure, the larger vehicles do more damage to the roads, but if we "stick it" to the tractor-trailers, we'll end up paying for it in increased prices on goods that are shipped by truck. I'd like to see us move toward more use taxes instead of property and income taxes. Reward those who are thrifty with their money instead of irresponsible.

BTW, it cost me about 2/3 of what you paid to plate my 3 vehicles--older vehicles can have their advantages.

Jason

 

When I bought my Ranger new 10 years ago I paid twice what you did for plates; you're really not doing too bad at all. I live in an "intitative" state and we finally got tired of paying what we did for tabs. After sufficient registered voter signatures were collected, by law, an item must be placed on the ballot. We wanted to abolish the excise tax on motor vehicles and replace it with $30 tabs. We got our $30 tabs (plus a few minor fees). End of problem.

 

That's just the BMV fees. That's only $30 .. I'm referring to the State Excise Tax. That is the big mysterious number that you don't know until you go to BMV and they put it in their computer.

 

Until this year I lived in downstate Illinois. There it's $78 per year no matter what you drive, heck when it went from $48 to $78 under Lyin' Ryan it caused a big time stink.

 

CA charges a wieght fee even on pickups for personal use. At least our tax was lowered from two percent to two-thirds of a percent. Dealers do the paperwork on a sale, but add extra fees to handle it. We have no Saturday DMV office hours.

Jim