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2002 Spirit R Type A Purchased / sitting in storage for next 8 years -JDM import scam
Bone stock mint condition gunmetal gray with 24k km (14,900 miles). Importing to Canada and storing climate controlled for 8 years until I can bring it to the US legally (OK - so I'm a little obsessed, but everyone needs a hobby). I wanted to start a clean thread with the purchased car rather than the other thread where I proposed the idea to the forum. Have a cousin near the storage site so will be able to visit once in a while. Also, I'll be working with Rotary Performance on how to store it properly (what fluids to drain / which ones to change, etc.). After looking at a lot of these, it's hard to find an unmolested low mileage car, so I wanted to get one now rather than pick from the Japanese fleet in 8 years where they'll have more mods and more mileage.
The pics were taken at the auction by an employee of the Canadian importer. Whenever I get to see the car in person in Toronto after transport, will post some more pics.
Cool purchase. Much dedication. Will you visit the car intermittently to keep it driven or just for fun, or plan to have anyone keep it running for you? Or, planning to dry store it?
Will definitely drive it once it gets to Canada. The importer is also an auto maintenance facility, so they can start it up (operating temp), and rotate gas and fluids if I want, and can visit it once in awhile when visiting family near there. Will be talking with Chris at Rotary Performance when I pickup the turbos he's porting for my 94 R1 to see what he recommends (dry or wet). Just bought a 1990 ZR1 that was in controlled storage for 17 years and haven't had too many issues getting it sorted out.
Considering LHD, but not sure if I want to make it better for US or keep it stock. It's possible especially living near Rotary Performance.
The ZR1 is good. It's so old there were LOTS of items that didn't fully work even with just 19k miles (and it's a Chevy). Mine had intake porting, head porting, lightweight flywheel, so chipped it for those mods plus the upcoming headers and exhaust that are sitting in my entry way. It's pretty fast now (almost feels like a turbo) and once I get the installed, it should really go. Then I'll do a rolling race against my 2009 Lamborghini Gallardo LP560 (fastest car in the stable).
Last edited by dcarroll95; 01-31-19 at 10:42 PM.
Reason: missed some words
Sure thing. Here are two good websites to see real prices of real cars, but beware that Japan lists them by the year and month the car was first registered, so mine was listed as a 2003 Spirit Rx7 even though it was manufactured in 2002. I don't even know which serial # it is yet but I'm guessing in the 14xx range based on another 2003 Spirit I was looking at. So search for 2002 to 2003, and you'll have to weed out various 2002 Bathurst editions or RZ which are really 2001. Look for the Type A red Recaros, BBS wheels, the Spirit badge on the fenders, or the plate under the hood on the firewall with the sequence # (out of 1500).
https://goo-net-exchange.com https://carfromjapan.com/
If you find a site with too good to be true prices that differ from the above by 50%, then it is truly too good to be true. They know what these are worth in Japan, and I found one website with lots of listings that had previously sold cars and cars at ridiculously low prices (how about a 1999 Rx7 in good shape for $13k USD - yeah right!)
Take the price on these two websites and add about $7,000 (Japan transport to port, boat trip, insurance, loading fee, unloading fee, transport from Canada port to JDM importer, Canadian customs fees, etc, little bit of making the car legal in Canada, etc.) and that's what it would cost to drive it off the Canadian lot. You'll have another 2.5% import fee to pay Uncle Sam (me in 8 years) but on the cars in the table below that's somewhere between $1000 to 1,400. You might negotiate the price down some, but when I tried to buy retail there were unlisted commissions that raised the price over the listing amount plus the $7,000 fees. I feel I definitely did better with the auction purchase as I got a 24k km car for the price of a 62k km car and in far better condition and without mods.
I even bid on one with 7k km (4,300 miles), BUT they changed both bumpers to hack bumpers with badly mismatched paint, had a hideous side skirt kit, and I didn't get my guy to peak under the hood for me (should have done that). I could have gotten that one for about what I paid for mine, but preferred original paint / no mods over the lower km car. Plus when they first send you the auction pictures, it's 3 grainy shots that don't show under the hood that look like they were taken by a security camera. Really crappy shots, then you have to send your guy to the auction and luckily he sent me pics at 11pm and I raised the amount I was willing to bid.
I bid on 2 cars. For the first one it was the 7k km car, and all I ever saw were the 3 grainy shots. I was high bidder but didn't meet reserve. I had a chance the next week to bid more ($5,000 more would have won it), but I bailed because I couldn't handle the hideous bumpers. Not sure if that one sold yet.
Last week I bid on this car and was high bid but it didn't meet reserve again. My guys negotiated with the seller, but they wanted $10k more and my guys didn't even bother to tell me because they knew we had a chance a week later (yesterday) to bid again. I raised my maximum $4,000 and barely won it last night by $250. So their strategy worked and I got the car for $4k more instead of $10k. Or they played me and I'll never know. I am happy with what I paid compared to the retail listings though.
Here's a table I made of some of the cars I was watching that are real cars for sale. First column is the listing in Yen (they may drop the price after 2-3 months, but it's only 2-5%). Second column is the listing price in USD given recent USD to YEN conversion rate. Third column "Total Cost" includes the $7,000 additional costs to get it to Canada lot. It doesn't list the last 2.5% import fee to Uncle Sam. I could have gotten Type B (back seat and no Recaro seats) and even one or two Type C (automatic), but by far the most desirable is a Type A (and most $$)
Here are the grainy pre-auction shots for my car:
Here's the pre-auction grainy shots of the 7k km one that I didn't buy:
Last edited by dcarroll95; 01-31-19 at 10:32 PM.
Reason: Sentence didn't make sense and had the word conversation where it didn't belong
Changing the front and rear on the 7km car just defeats the whole purpose of owning a Spirit-R. The one you ended up with is much better. IMO of course
Originally Posted by dcarroll95
Considering LHD, but not sure if I want to make it better for US or keep it stock. It's possible especially living near Rotary Performance.
I totally get what you are saying. I'm so not a fan of owning a RHD on a LHD country but even I would have second thoughts about doing that to an actual Spirit-R.
Congrats ! lovely Spirit R choice.
I thought of doing something like this also, I have Canadian storage, but not enough cash to buy a worthwhile example, ATM.
We would all benefit from the best professional storage advice you receive, since many here store their rx's a certain % of the time. I hope you find workable solutions that best preserve the rare car's integrity.
Best of luck to you !
Waiting for you to buy one and store it too, Fritz!
LOL..............I have too many already plus I drive them and you can't teach this old dog to drive on the R side but if I was a car collector I can see making space for a late model FD (great conversation piece). Clearly Don is a next level collector.
So basically this was a total scam. Right Drive Canada never provided photos of my car that I "purchased" and is a horrible horrible company, The owner Michael Kent has apparently lied to me for nearly 3 years. I'm working with the Ontario Motor Vehicle Industry Council (OMVIC) who advised me to get a refund. What a bummer. This has happened a lot with these remote Japanese purchases according to them.
I had no issue waiting 7-8 years for my car, but I purchased a fantasy.
They never imported the car. Probably never even bought it at that auction. He recently tried to offer me a different car since there was "so much trouble importing this one". The one he offered me was $135k Canadian, was the wrong color, unknown mileage, single turbo conversion, missing rear carpet, beater. The one I thought I bought was 15k miles, bone stock, spirit gun metal gray. I imagine he wanted me to pay the difference but I declined the offer.
Man that SUCKS! I have heard WAY too many stories of shady importers. It's like the entire industry is a huge gamble. Makes me glad that when I tried to use a Japanese car importer they just stopped responding all of a sudden.
I can't imagine how hyped you were for the car, what a freaking let down.
About 15 years ago I was in touch with someone that successfully imported a 93 when they became legal in Canada. He passed along all the information to me on how he did it. I was on the fence and never went through with it but recently got back in touch with them as I was thinking about importing one a couple of months ago.
The company I was talking to was: https://japaneseusedcars.com/ and the same guy was still there (Tony) and he was very helpful. Once again I did not go through with it as I found something local but I would not hesitate working with this company to import the vehicle. Basically they will help you get the car to port in the US or Canada and after that you need to need to handle the rest. He also mentioned to me that if I was serious about a 99+ model I should move quickly as the price will jump again as they approach 25 years so storage in Canada for a few years would be a good option.
Hopefully you can recover some of the cost and maybe try a different route after the dust has settled. Also probably best to wait until the ports are back to normal...
This was a horrible to read and I am truly sorry that this has happened to you. Having just gone through the time-consuming and often painful experience of buying a car in Japan, I know how you must feel. It's not the loss of the money, either, it's the loss of opportunity, as the cost of these in Japan has pretty much doubled since 2019. I wouldn't just be suing these guys for the cash you paid, but the additional cost you would now incur to buy something similar. A blue one with similar mileage just sold in Japan for around 15M yen (exact price not known as it sold by negotiation after it didn't reach reserve at auction, with a max bid of around 13.5M JPY).
I almost guarantee you they never bought the car. If it sold by negotiation, it might also be hard to verify whether it actually sold as USS Auctions do not publish prices when sold by negotiation after passing in. That said, if you have the VIN (which I assume you do), you can get a Japanese deregistration check and history from these guys: https://www.japaneseodometercheck.com/
If you give me the VIN I can also run a check against the Australian compliance database to see if it is here. Chances are that where a Spirit R Type A sold at auction it either stayed in Japan or ended up in Australia (there are around 150 of them here).
As for any others contemplating buying in Japan, there are a heap of pitfalls. It took me a year to find mine, which is not unusual, and I learned a lot. Fortunately, there is an established industry for importing and compliancing cars from Japan in Australia - it is big enough to have a representative body that lobbies government for regulatory change. This means there are a few highly trusted importers with solid track records. Even still, there are some very dodgy operators who have been caught out bringing in 'R' graded cars which should never be registrable in Australia and pushing them through dodgy compliance shops, faking VIN plates/rebirthing as well as outrageous odometer windbacks.
Here are a few dot points:
Only ever use a broker with an establish business presence and reputation in your own country. That way if someone goes wrong you can actually sue them or get them charged. Don't use a broker based in Japan and trust that they will get your car to your designated country safe and sound.
Never buy a car based on the auction sheet and auction house photos. Maybe 15-20 years these auction sheets were reliable but these cars are getting old now and it is well known that auction houses have links to the Japanese underworld and money passes under the table to get whatever grading you want. You simply must have a trusted person inspect the cars in person on the day of the auction. If you are getting less than 30 photos that is not enough. For some of them, I got 100 photos. Cars that were supposedly rated 4 or 4.5 presented with rust to underbody or chassis components, signs of panel replacement, dents, peeling/faded paint or just generally tired or crap. Increasingly, these defects are not shown on the auction sheet diagram but written in the negative notes in Japanese so you need someone to translate the full sheet for you. These notes might say "some sign of rust". One of those I looked at had holes in the floor! Another had the whole rear replaced and was not noted on the auction sheet. When I got passed in and relisted with a different auction house, the inspector noted it and regarded the vehicle an R. It was promptly withdrawn before auction and remains available through a dealer at a very high price with the note "no repair history" which is plainly false. I noticed the signs of repair first up because the rear badges had been changed and the rear bumper was perfectly colour-matched, which is unusual for factory Mazda paint this old.
In Japan, road registered cars need to get a "shaken" which is basically a certificate of mechanical roadworthiness every 3 years. If the car comes with a shaken, it is generally well maintained. Cars with a shaken go for more as they can bought and driven by someone in Japan. Many cars do not come with a shaken, as indicated on the auction sheet. They are cheaper, but ff it doesn't have a shaken or full maintenance history, buyer beware.
Don't buy from a dealer in Japan. The best cars go through auction and sell at auction. If it at a dealer it either didn't sell at auction because the seller wanted too much for the car (usually because it is a piece of junk) or because a dealer snapped it up cheap and is selling with a huge markup. Often the dealers are the ones who by the cars at auction and they can be hard to compete against. But they also rig the system, I suspect sometimes with contacts within the auction houses themselves. One car I was interested in I couldn't inspect because it was kept in a locked yard and the first person to inspect never returned the auction yard key locking every one out. This car was bought by a dealer well under my budget, then relisted with a 25% markup on private sale. Another was recently bought by a dealer for 9.1M at auction then immediately relisted by the dealer at 12.55M and remains advertised for sale a month later. In another 2 instances I supposedly "lost" the auction only to find the car relisted somewhere else. In other words, the winning bid was a shill bid designed to drive up the price.
Cars that do not sell at auction at first instance often end up at an auction house called JU, the biggest of which is in Gifu (JU Gifu). You might notice cars go up for auction every week at JU Gifu and never sell. There's a reason for this. JU Gifu doesn't charge relisting fees so someone with an unrealistic reserve price can list every week without penalty. If you buy from JU Gifu you are buying at above market value because no one else was prepared to pay that price. Many people who source cars in Japan don't ever bother with JU auctions for this reason.
On the whole, buying used in Japan is not to be taken lightly and you need to be prepared for a lot of stress and heartbreak. Just like buying a house, there will be the "one that got away" and you need to be prepared to say no to cars that don't leave you feeling quite right.
Not for a minute am I suggesting that dcarroll95 falls into this category. Based on his posts above, he did his research well and made sure to get cars checked out. He really is a victim in this. But I hope my notes above help prevent others becoming victims too.
01-31-19, 08:21 AM
- although neither is in driving condition at the moment.
