Although my trip wont be happening I feel I should share what I learned as I went through the process of buying a bike in Santiago. There are already some posts out there with a lot of the same info, but I just thought it would be nice to have it all in one. I can´t take credit for figuring much of this out I just want to add what I learned. Hubb and the posts by wicksy1979 and other that made it possible….. Thanks.

Buying a Motorcycle in Chile ---- EXPLAINED
By Wyatt Roscoe
USA

1.) The first thing I did was head to… Alonso De Ovalle #680 (on the south side of the Alameda, close to Santa Lucia Metro Station) looking for a RUT. They were very helpful, but informed me that they had STOPPED GIVING RUTs IN JUNE 2007
to foreigners and that my passport number would be used instead. Good place to know about incase people tell you otherwise.

2.) Second thing is to find a bike. I had great luck online with Chileautos.cl: miles de vehículos nuevos y usados you can also try www.deremate.cl, www.elmercurio.cl, or www.[URL="http://mercadolibre.cl/"]mercadolibre.cl[/URL].
I also spent a fair amount of time looking around for shops as well.
1.Calle Lira – Full of Chinese bikes put together here in Chile. Nothing over 250CC
2.Honda Heurotech
Av. La Dehesa 1326
La Barnechea, Santiago
Fono-2993234
Good place new and used hondas from scooters to Transalp

Av. Las Condes
Tons of Bike shops on alter the other!
3.Honda Colvin and Colvin
Las Condes 8024
Sell Big bikes like Varaderos
4.Pit Bikes
Av. Las Condes 7914
Fone-716197
Chinese bikes 250cc and below
5.Yamaha
Av. Las Condes 8326
Tel -56-2 299 1000
299-1011
Nice Bikes but almost all new, rairly have used bikes.
6.Classic Motos Ltda
Av. Las condes 8482
Tel (56-2) 4538819
56-2 4538826
Had a few big bikes not sure about used. Had Kawasaki.
Vitacura
7.Honda
Av. Vitacura 9388
Fono 220 8059
Good place to start lots of new and used bikes from 250 Tornados to Transalps.
Also have gear boxes, helpmets, gloves ect.
8.Camber Motard
Av. Vitacura 9079
Fono 7103664
Good place to look for used bikes.
Had a good looking transalp and some other big bikes
9.Pro Moto (Suzuki)
Av Vitacura 9096-9102
Fono (56-2) 494 6992
Had lots of new bikes ready to travel.
Vstroms with travel boxes and everything.
10.Bimoto Chile
Av. Vitacura 8641
Tel (56-2) 2243603
Pretty bikes mostly sport. No used bikes.
11.Motoverde S.A. Kawasaki
Av Vitacura 9450
Fono 2433433
or 2433431
Cross and some that would work for travel.
12.Aprilia
Av Vitacura 9000 something #?
F 5965712-13
Nice new bikes ready for travel.

A few places to start.

3.) When you find a bike your interested in make sure the old owner has the following papers.
The vendor needs to have the following documents
*Inscription - (ownership document)
*Permiso de circulation - (road tax)
*Certificado de emisiones contaminantes (emmisions certificate)
* Revision Technica Class B - (roadworthy certificate)
*Certificado seguro obligatorio accidentes personales (third party insurance)
If a any of these documents are up for renewal it is easier if the vendor sorts them out before the bike is sold to you

4.) When you and the vendor have reached an agreement you need to go to a Notaria or as I found out you can now go directly to the Registro Civil this will cost less and you be able to get the inscription quicker. For the different offices of the you can check out: Servicio de Registro Civil e Identificación

Both the vendor and yourselves present all your documentation, (for you this means your passport, RUT number, and a postal address in Chile for the Registro Racional de Veiculos Motorizados to send the original inscription paper to, i used a friends and will pick up the original when i pass Santiago again on my way North)
The Notaria or the Registro Civil needs to give you two documents
1.) The Compra Vente
This is an original document that indicates that you have puchased the motorcycle from the vendor for the agreed amount of money
This document is signed by both the Vendor and yourself
2.) The Carta Poder
This is a declaration signed by the Vendor that will allow you to leave Chile with the motorcycle before the original inscription document is received (10-ish days or if you go to the registro civil right away or a couple days)

After you pay the vedor in front of the notaria or in the Registro Civil and receive ALL documents you should be free to travel with in and outside Chile. Do check about problems entering Peru and Bolivia from Chile. There is a post about not being able to enter into these two counties as a foreigner with a Chilean bike. Argentina is apparently no problem you just have to buy Argentinian Seguro.

I hope this helps.
Although my trip wont be happening do to family issues I do hope to some day ride home from Santiago.

“We are the people we have been waiting for.”


LoveLife,
Wyatt Roscoe

Excellent post thanks. I am wondering about not being able to enter Peru or Bolivia with a Chilean bike? Where is the best place in South America to purchase a bike which lets you go anywhere?

Having just bought a bike in Chile a couple of weeks ago, I'd like to give a big thanks to wyattroscoe and wicksy1979 for the information - it was really useful. I also thought I'd add some information where the system seems to have changed in the last 2 years:

RUT
Rules seem to have changed again on this one, and you will need to get one (I tried 2 different notaries who both said I needed it). The govt office at Alonso De Ovalle #680 is still the right place to get it, it took me about half an hour and was free! The office is open 8am to 2pm.

Using the registro civil to buy the bike
This would seem to be a good idea, as it's quicker and cheaper than using a notary (about 20,000 pesos vs 50,000 pesos). However, to use them your RUT information needs to be already entered into the govt computer system. Apparently this takes 7 days from when you apply for your RUT. So it's worth applying for the RUT on your first day in Chile, and then you might be able to use the registro civil by the time you've found a bike to buy. The office I went to was on Avenida Manuel Rodriguez, #200 and something (but
I got turned away because my RUT was too new!)

Using a notary to buy the bike
You can complete the transaction at a notary directly after getting your RUT so no time delay. But the process isn't instant - they need to take your documents down to the registro civil and pay some sort of tax before they can give you the compra venta. I went to the notary on a wednesday afternoon with the seller, and they had the documents ready friday morning. Maybe other notaries would be quicker, but I was happy with that because
it gave me thursday to get the bike serviced and equipped with luggage!

Taking the bike out of Chile
I tried this to see what would happen. The Chilean customs official at the bolivian border told me unequivocally that you can't leave the country with a Chilean bike unless you have the Inscripcion (not a compra venta) AND you are a Chilean resident. She said that would apply to Argentina as well (which seems a bit harsh since you can't get to the south of Chile without going through argentina). But I guess she might be wrong, you never know. If you really wanted to get into Bolivia the borders are quite porous; lots of cars get illegally imported across the salt flats. But then you won't have the temporary import papers and if you get stopped will need to bribe your way out of getting the bike impounded.

Buying stuff (in Santiago)
I found Calle Lira the best place for bike servicing and bike gear and Avenida Brazil and around is good for non-bike-specific tools. All bike shops seemed pretty useless for second hand bikes, the online classifieds mentioned above by Wyatt were much more useful.

Hope that helps someone. I've had an awesome time riding around the Andes on my 200cc Chinese-made dirtbike!

All the best
Nick

Hi guys,

I am in Osorno and I got a RUT Number yesterday. The nice thing here in Osorno it is a small town, pretty calm. It took me max. 5 minutes to get this RUT Number. They just printed it out - I can use it. The Original plastic card needs 6 weeks, but somebody else can pick it up and send it to you. I didn´t need an address. They took the address of the buliding itself....

Don´t ask me exactly how the place is called, but it is the next buliding to the post office on the main square.

Even here in Osorno the customs are pretty okay, if you have problems...

Used bikes you can find here at:

Alquiler De Moto En Chile,Argentina Motorcycle Rental,Arriendo Motos|Chile|Peru

Ask for Sonia
(Spanish, English and German speaking)

Good luck - Jens

Yep - that's what I got, although there was more of a wait in Santiago. I could use the number in a notaria immediately, but would have had to wait 7 days to use it in the Registro Civil. But you might have better luck than me!

Hi guys,


I got my ID card and details in the easiest way - and possibly the most fun.

I met a Chilean woman - very nice, married her, moved here, bought a dog, got a residency visa - now have my feet up and live like a king!

Anyway... back on topic ..... here is the chile autos search page translated for you - search form

Hope this helps

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hey to those that have shopped for bike in chile, and particularly calle lira, are there any cheap chinese bikes or anything at all for around $1000 USD (or less!)?

i've been looking and chileautos.cl and there are some used bikes but my spanish is not that great and i think it would be more complicated than going to a shop.

Chileautos is simple, just use google translate to send emails to the seller. It´s exactly what I did and I am now almost in Buenos Aires with my Euromot GXT having bought it in Valporaiso. To arrange the paperwork just make sure what you need to have and the seller should arrange the rest. You will both need to go to the Notoria. Buying the bike and getting across the border were both very simple processes. All the best. Ruth

Since I've benefited massively from others' wisdom on this thread (thanks all!) here's a quick write up of my experience buying a bike in Chile in case any of the lessons here are of use to others. I've included dates, as it's over the Xmas period, which might affect the time taken for things to get done by the authorities.

1 Dec - Arrive Santiago, get RUT. Quick and painless - worth getting to the office early as there's quite a queue. Bring a book. While they will tell you that you can buy a bike without a RUT, get one anyway - it certainly seems to help.

2-5 Dec - Find bike. Mine was through a dealer, second hand. I tried bargaining but nothing doing on moving the price. For another bike another dealer suggested that making a lower offer might work, but I never tried. Dealer handled all the paperwork and notorising for me, which made things easier.

5-9 Dec - get money. If you pay for the bike on a card it will cost you 5% extra. This needs thinking about as if you're withdrawing cash there's generally a limit on how much you can withdraw on a card per day.
Also, all the equipment etc. in Calle Lira you get a 5% discount if you pay in cash. Worth negotiating: I bought most off my stuff from one shop and the final discount came to 14% off the original price. I daresay others could do better!

So, the money for the bike and the paperwork was handed over 9 Dec and I could drive the bike away. I had to collect the Compra Ventor a couple of days later once the dealer had taken it to the notary, then I could leave Santiago and start touring Chile.

The plan was to pick up the padron (ownership doc) in a different city, about 10 days later when it had got onto the Chilean authorities' system. In theory this is easy and costs a nominal sum (<1000CLP).

22 Dec - tried to get the padron in La Serena from the Registro Civil, was told that it wasn't on the system and they wouldn't expect it to be until 1 Jan (Lesson 1: things take longer than people say! Lesson 2: it turned out later there was a problem, it might have been worth enquiring harder at this point).

7 Jan - tried again to get padron from Registro Civil, this time in Iquique. Was told that there had been a problem with the paperwork and Santiago needed to see my RUT. At first it looked like I'd have to go back 1,800km to Santiago! However, the (very helpful) Registro Civil managed to find a solution which involved redoing the sale in Iquique and sending a (notified) copy of the RUT to Santiago. The lady in the RC in Iquique had a friend in the Santiago office who was able to speed the process of getting the bike on the system through quicker, rather than taking the 10 days as per normal (Lesson 3: these things can be done quicker, if you find the right person!). Even so, I was told to come back in 4 working days.

12 Jan (4 working days later). Tried again - the sale hadn't gone through. Hung around looking polite but immovable until the Santiago office was called... Told to come back tomorrow...

13 Jan - All on the system, have now got my padron and all the paperwork needed.

So in all the process wasn't too bad. At points I could have done things quicker but wasn't in any particular rush. It did take 6 weeks from starting looking until actually having all the papers though, so - Lesson 4: reckon on the process taking a while!

Oh, and slightly off topic. 14 Jan - find that as a foreigner with a Chilean registered bike and all the paperwork they definitely won't let you leave Chile with the bike at the Arica/Tacna border (Chile/Peru). 15 Jan - start riding to the Bolivian border to see if the same is indeed true there (the locals here think it'll be ok...).

Sounds brilliant!
Let me know if the sister is still free! Lol

Cheers

Matt, I presume you got into Bolivia ? And then into Peru ? Our experience was that getting from Boliva to Peru at Copacabana was possible, *if* the bike padron had been in our name :-).

Good job we did not have a pressing need to keep going north.

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http://www.ytc1.co.uk

To leave Chile was no problem for me even the bike was not in my name (i did not get a RUT without Visa). For Peru you must have papers showing your name or a few dollars bribe...