Why Chinese cars in Russia are twice as expensive as in China

In Russia, they began to closely monitor the latest automotive industry in China. And this is not only about the products of Chinese brands, but about all in general. In the Middle Kingdom there are Fords, Kia, Lexuses and everyone else. That is, you can order from a dealer and take any model from any manufacturer.

In addition, the Chinese car market is huge – it is now the largest in the world (almost 27 million new cars were sold there in 2022). This means that there is no reason to fear that the authorities of the Celestial Empire will ban the export of cars to Russia due to their shortage in the domestic market (as was the case with Belarus and Kazakhstan).

How is the markup formed?

It would seem that you can save money by ordering a budget car in China, which costs 600 thousand rubles there, but during customs clearance the price of the car will increase by one and a half times. Let’s take a sedan with a 1.6-liter engine with 120 horsepower. Having spent 600 thousand rubles on the purchase, you will also have to pay a fee (3,100 rubles), a customs duty (324,000 rubles) and a disposal fee (3,400 rubles). Total 330,500 rubles. Plus delivery is about 150 thousand rubles (to Moscow). And the price of the car has gone up. up to 1,080,500 rubles.

And if the dealer imports and resells such a car, he also pays VAT. As a result, the car turns out to be almost twice as expensive.

Expert opinion

Sergei Zinoviev, expert “Behind the wheel”:

– Budget models do not come to us. Neither by parallel imports nor by anything else. The reason is simple: it is unprofitable to import them. Customs and recycling costs, shipping costs and legalization costs (e.g. obtaining SBKTS and EPTS) are added to the initial cost of the car. For a new car with a 1.5 engine, more than 600 thousand rubles are automatically collected. Plus VAT.

Many dealers include any cost of warranty support (two-year “dealer” warranty) included in the price. And the dealer also needs a margin, don’t trade at a loss. That’s why everything from China costs almost twice as much as in China.

So, the main price range for most “parallel” foreign cars from China is 2.5-3.5 million rubles.

How the Chinese versions differ from American, Japanese and Korean models, you can read in the February issue of the magazine “Behind the wheel” – already on sale.

The material was prepared on the basis of Sergei Zinoviev’s article “Packages from China”, published in issue 2.2023 of the magazine “Za Rulem”.