Buying a secondhand motorcycle with a foreign rider/drivers license in New York State turns out to be an exercise in red-tape management and lengthy bureaucracy. Of course this was all to be expected and since the weather has not been great it's not as if I've been missing lots of ride time.
Before I even had a chance to deal with the formalities of the purchase I was having an adventure of sorts. The bike was found on Craigslist (BTW: good criagslist specials to be had at the moment) by a friend who pointed it out to me and the next day I was in Statten Island checking out the 2008 KLR650. My plan had been to store the KLR in my apartment as I have plenty pf space and an industrial elevator in the building, but I discovered the hard way that the KLR is too big by about 30mm (roughly one inch) and no matter what I attempted the trusty KLR was not going to fit. This sucks because a parking garage spot for a moto in NYC is an expensive proposition $210 at month !!
Next the paperwork...
- With a valid foreign license in hand you are permitted to ride/drive in New York State, they even request that you do not apply for a license if you hold a foreign license as the existing license is valid.
- At the DMV I was informed that it was no problem for me to take ownership title of a vehicle if I showed my passport and foreign license but it turns out this is not possible in practice.
- Before one can take ownership title of a vehicle you must be able to register it and before you can register you must show that you have insurance for that vehicle. This is all good and sensible stuff and perhaps the only surprising thing to me was that the registration and insurance processes are not more tightly coupled in order to prevent uninsured drivers and vehicles. However the problem with this situation is that no insurance company will accept a foreign rider/drivers license!
- This hence means one has to obtain a New York State license which in turn means finding a DMV office, standing in line for 3 hours to do a written test, waiting another hour for the learners permit to become available, doing a 5 hour study program and finally doing a practical test.
- Before you can do that however you MUST have your Social Security Card, and they actually mean you need to have that little piece of cardboard with your SSN on it. Now in my case I'd thrown it away as I thought it was a piece of rubbish once I'd remembered the number, so....
- One must go to the Social Security office to get a replacement card issued. I must say that I was prepared for a hellish experience when I went, but was really pleasantly surprised with both the speed of service and the polite service, damn near impressive for a government department!
- Ultimately, with Social Security Card in hand I was able to get myself a license which later allowed me to obtain the required insurance which permitted me to register the bike and finally take title ownership of the bike - phew!
So I now have a registered bike parked in a garage awaiting to carry me from NYC to SF.