Street Ready Golf Cart
 

There has been a previous thread on the $4500 rebate for some street ready Golf carts. Someone told me he took advantage of the rebate and bought a street ready cart. His intention is to keep it street ready and pay the registration and insurance for one year and then cancel everything and use it as a golf road vehicle only, no longer street ready. Any comments on whether Motor vehicle would allow him to do this?

If stopped or involved in an accident it would be the same as driving an unregistered vehicle. If it has a title and is used on the road it has to have plate and insurance.
Even if you take it on golf cart paths.
It is not a golf cart. It is a low speed vehicle.

I suspect that this is not correct. All one need to do to convert it to a golf cart in the eyes of the law is to have the computer adjusted to limit the speed to 20MPH. Anything with a top speed of less then 20 MPH is defined by the law as a golf cart and not an LSV.

Lets say I have a plated 90cc scooter and I put a governor on it......can I get by without it being registered? No (maybe if I don't get caught:angel:)
I would suggest anyone thinking about doing that to check with the authorities first. Florida is very harsh when it comes to vehicle laws.
Also if the vehicle was stopped, try and prove it to the officer that it has been adjusted to a lower speed.
HihoHiho it's off to court we go

Let's take the Star car for an example. The exact same cart is used for both golf cart usage as well as street legal. To make it a street legal vehicle they add a few safety items and crank its top-end speed up to 25 MPH. Are the safety items the things that require registration? I don't think so. It's the speed. Hence, to down-convert to a golf cart, all you would have to do is crank down the speed. What's a cop going to do, give you a ticket for having seat belts on an unregistered golf cart? I don't think so.

I just called the Sumter county tax collector and gave her the scenerio of a Star street legal being detuned to go under 20mph.
She told me that it must be plated and registered as a vehicle since it has a title. She also said to check with Lt. Wolfe at the sheriffs dept. because he conducts cart safety programs here and that this is one of the things he lets everyone know......they will cite a person if it is not registered.
I had a street legal (lc3, 4 passenger electric) and got rid of it. I would much rather have a regular golf cart.
People should not take the tax credit and then try to figure out a way to "work" the system. Take the credit, get it registered or just go buy a nice golf cart.

To be truthful, we had also thought about doing that. We were told by the Star car people that they can either make a cart a LSV or a regular golf cart, but that once it is a LSV, it could not be converted to a regular cart as DMV did not allow it.

How does the math work out?
You're going to save $4500 when you purchase it. What's the insurance? What's the annual registration fee?
If any of my back-of-the-envelope calculations are close to correct, you'll save money even if you register it, insure it, and use it the way it was titled. If it cost $200 per year to register and insure, you'd have over 22 years before the cart cost you more as a street legal. You gonna be driving that golf cart around in 22 years?
Just keep it registered and insured, you'll be way ahead of the game, and you won't have to look for a loophole to save you a few dollars.

Steve,

That's what my calculations say as well (except my break even point isn't 22 years since registration and insurance is a bit more than $200/yr)

NJBlue - Approximately how much is it for each per year?

steve, even at $400 per year it's an 11 year pay back.....GN

The quotes that I received for insurance was almost the same as for a car...anywhere between $450-$600 prt year. First time registration is about $300 for the first year and $45 per year after that. The Star people told me to call a certain insurance company who would insure it for $200 per year, but that was for a motorcycle policy with a $1500 deductible. The other reputable insurance companies are the above quoted prices. Also, there is no guarantee as to how long the insurance would stay at that price. All in all, it just didn't seem like a good deal. Bought a 2010 EZGO instead and am extremely pleased.

So it's about $500. Payback in 9 years. Still seems like it may be worth if from a financail perspective.

Still on fence, leaning towards NON street
 

Interesting thread, for what it is worth here is what I found....

I am attracted to the deal so I went down to Par Car. The info I got at Par Car was the tax credit was $5475.71. I was told insurance was around $400 per year and the saleman had heard it would drop to $200 in a few years <wink><wink>. I did a quick call to the Villages insurance and was given numbers that ranged from $600 - $1200 per year, there was no mention of a drop. I did not dig too deep and I would be very interested in anyone that actually has insurance on the real number they pay. There is quite a difference between $600 and $1200.

Based on the numbers I got would be a yearly cost of $600++ for insurance + $ 60 for registration. I figured about $370 in the first year to register it. Call it $700 per year at the optimistic end.

BTW, a new Par Car street cart is $11,551 including ALL costs. A non street cart at Par Car is around $1500 cheaper.

I am not recommending a Par Car, but they offered both a street cart and a non street cart for comparison.

This is a no brainier if you want a street legal cart, but in my case I was looking at a street legal cart for the tax credit only. I am very much on the fence as my decision I have to compare the cost of the street legal cart minus credit + other costs to what I could buy a non street cart for.

Unless I am off I would say the NON street cart starts to become cheaper in the 5 - 6 year period.

Alan

OK folks, time to clear this issue up. I registered my new 2008 Tomberlin E-Merge 2 LSV with Allstate for $210. It would have been more like 180 if I had also registered my full sized vehicle with them too.

The insurance policy is for an OFF-ROAD VEHICLE. That’s important to understand because that’s why it’s so low. Those that were quoted $400-500 for insurance is probably because their insurance company doesn’t offer that kind of policy. Google “off-road vehicle insurance” to find other insurers that offer this and get quotes from them.

So let’s say you’re insuring your regular and LSV vehicles with the same company. $180 for insurance and $45 for annual registration is $225. But since the annual insurance for a regular golf cart is ~ $70 the net outlay for the LSV is $155/yr. So it would take 29 years to offset the $4500 tax credit.

Edit Note: The Off-Road Vehicle insurance was actually the wrong type of policy as noted in another post I made further down in this discussion thread.