People going absolutely Crazy for the early Land Rover 110.
As the Defender gets older and certainly as the early 110 models are now well over 25 years old, it has opened the door to markets not seen before. As a result there has been a marked increased in desire for some people to own one. In the USA, the Defender 110 was only officially imported there as what were called NAS (North American Specification) versions, in 1993. These were especially equiped Land Rovers to meet ever tightening safety, pollution and emission regulations in the USA. Within a short period, the Defender was unable to meet the safety criteria, so export from Solihull to the United States and Canada ceased in 1997. The NAS Defender 110 was imported in 1993 only, whereas the NAS Defender 90 1994 to 1997.
The result was that there were very few Land Rover Defenders offered as an official import to the USA, so today there is quite a following and a premium on these Land Rovers. If one is advertised at reasonable price, it will normally be sold more or less immediately. There is a rule though in the USA that safety and polution restrictions are not applied to vehicles manufactured 25 years ago and older. This has seen a marked increase of buyers from North America looking for all types of early 110, especially the stationwagon. It does not seem to matter if it is RHD or LHD, the demand is so strong, even though the US dollar is fairly weak in value against most European currencies, especially the UK GBP£.
Likewise in Europe, Holland has something similar to stimulate demand for the older 110. Whilst it has always been possible to import and register vehicles in to the Netherlands from other parts of the EU without too many problems, there are extra import taxes called BPM, which must be paid on import. Whilst the amount decreases with the import of secondhand vehicles up to 5 years of age, the least you will pay on importing a car from 5 years of age to 25 years of age is 10% of its total original cost including all existing options (ie aircon, sidebars, winch etc) as of the date it was first registered in whichever country the car came from. As a rough calculation, if you take a new Defender at say €34000 euro without any taxes, you have to add on around 40% as BPM on this price, plus 19% BTW, (value added tax.)
The information on this website is derived from my own knowledge base and experiences as encountered over several years of dealing in Land Rovers. If there are any mistakes or errors, I apologise. I will add more information as and when I get time.
