Buying an airplane and keeping it on US registration

[UnderneathTheRadar]

I looked at importing fairly seriously a couple of times over the last few years. The abridged version is:

1. There is a rule that mandates a maximum number of days an N- (or any other reg) a/c is allowed to stay in Canada per year. It's a cumulative total and taking a complete guess it's about 90 days - so flying it out of Canada into the US every 3 months will not fix this issue.
2. However, that rule seems to be fairly much ignored so long as you pay customs duties (including Ontario luxury tax) on import. In my experience, most Canadian airports - especially in the south have many N-reg aircraft sitting on ramps, in hangars etc. As stated above, if you don't pay the import duty/luxury tax then you're probably toast - note that this isn't Transport Canada collecting the money - it's the CRA - and they don't care where its registered, only where it is owned out of/lives.

I wouldn't consider that there is a big price disparity between the US and Canada markets. You will probably pay a premium in Canada because:
1. No import duty payable - so anything you buy south of the border needs that price added so a local seller to a Canadian buyer can charge that premium
2. Part 91 maintenance in Canada is far more thorough than in the USA. Many of the things that older US aircraft are allowed to pass 'on condition' are not accepted as such by TC. My experience was more in the turbine/higher performance areas where, for example, it's (almost) impossible to operate a turbine PT6 on the MORE program as TC won't generally accept it. Licensing standards for engineers are higher and so you might argue that a C reg aircraft has a higher standard of airworthness than an N-reg (that's a broad generalisation and I'm sure there are many examples where this can be demonstrated to be false).

If you're comfortable with US maintenance the keeping the plane on N-reg is good because you can avail yourself of all the opportunities to use US Part 91 maintenance regs to your advantage. You may also have a selling advantage later as you have the whole US market to sell to - which is easier with an N-reg rather than having to reimport it back to the US.

The final factor (and I'm a little hazy on this) - I don't think Canadian's can own N-reg aircraft themselves - (but I'm not Canadian so don't know for sure) - and may have to own it through a shell company in the USA. This would add a couple of $000's to your annual fixed costs. But like I said, this may not apply to Canadians.

So plusses and minuses each way. But you won't avoid the import and luxury tax - at least not for long.