Car selling guides for the Netherlands
Each guide below opens with a short, direct answer and links to the RDW, the Belastingdienst or another official source we checked it against.
Part 01
The sale itself
Which route to take, how a trade buyer arrives at a figure, and what the handover itself involves.
- Selling a car here, start to finishWritten for someone who owns a Dutch registered car and does not read Dutch. The routes available, the two documents that matter, who is legally allowed to buy, and the cases that need clearing first.
- Private sale, dealer, trade-in or buyer serviceThe paperwork is the same whichever route you take. What changes is who finds the buyer, who carries the risk on the money, and how many evenings it costs you. With notes on Marktplaats, test drives and payment.
- What decides what your car is worth hereAn indication prices a type of car. An offer prices your car. What the ANWB Koerslijst actually measures, the Dutch words for the different kinds of value, and how to make your own car easy to price.
- What to do once your car is soldSome of what follows a sale happens without you and some does not. The road tax sorts itself out. The insurer and the gemeente wait to be told. Here is the division of labour.
- Selling your car at auction, explainedAn auction sells competition. Who bids, what a platform takes, what the terms have to tell you before a car is registered, and who handles the RDW transfer once a bid wins.
- Selling to a car buyer (opkoper)A trade buyer does the RDW transfer for a living, which is the part of a Dutch sale that trips up newcomers. What to verify first, what to refuse, and how collection day should run.
- Routes to a sale that avoid MarktplaatsOther car sites, dealer consignment, an outright trade sale, or somebody you already know. What each one asks of you, and how long each leaves the car sitting in your name.
Part 02
Campers and bikes
A camper or a motorbike brings its own RDW rules, its own road tax and its own set of buyer questions.
- Selling a camper or motorhome hereA camper differs from a car in four places: the APK interval, the road tax band, a winter suspension and the living area. Here is each one, and how to get an offer from us.
- What is different about selling a motorbikeA motorbike has no inspection record behind it, which puts the weight on your service book and your description. The transfer, the tax, the test ride and the winter suspension, in order.
Part 03
Papers and codes
Kentekencard, tenaamstellingscode, vrijwaringsbewijs: what each piece of Dutch paper is for and when you need it.
- Getting a car out of your name at the RDWOne line in a government register decides who owns your car. Who is allowed to change it, what the buyer needs from you to do so, how to confirm it happened, and why the keys stay put until then.
- The documents you need to sell your carTwo items decide whether a sale can happen at all. What each piece of Dutch paperwork is, which drawer the nine digits are hiding in, and what to do about the one you cannot find.
- Your tenaamstellingscode, and how to replace itThe nine digits that stand between you and a completed sale. Where each half was delivered, how to confirm it belongs to your card, and what ordering a new one does to the old one.
- Vrijwaringsbewijs, the seller's receiptThe register's confirmation that a car has left your name. What it must show, which of the three routes brings it to you, and what to do when it never turns up.
- When Dutch road tax stops being yoursRoad tax follows the name in the register, so the date of the transfer is the date your liability ends. What comes back to you, what you still owe, and how suspending or exporting the car changes the sums.
- The Dutch APK, explainedThe inspection a Dutch car has to pass to stay legal. What the station looks at, how the interval depends on fuel, where to read your own date, and what lapsing actually costs.
- Dutch number plates: colours, codes and lookupsThe plate is an index number, not a description of your car. Here is how the letters and digits are organised, what each colour is for, how much a stranger can look up, and what happens to the plate at the handover.
- Selling a car that is on finance or leaseA sale needs the registration card and nine digits of code. If a lender or a lease company owns your car, those digits went to them, and this guide is about getting them into your hands.
Part 04
Moving abroad
Working out whether to sell, export or schorsen the car before your last weeks here run out.
- Selling the car before you move abroadYour Dutch address is the thing everything depends on, and you are about to give it up. How to time the sale around the day you deregister, and what is left if the car is still yours at the airport.
- Exporting a Dutch registered carExport moves a car from the Dutch register to a foreign one, and only the Dutch half is predictable. What the RDW appointment involves, what you drive away on, which obligations end when, and what the Belastingdienst says about BPM.
- Suspending a car in the Netherlands (schorsen)A suspension trades road use for the three running costs. What the RDW switches off, where the car has to stand while it runs, what the fee rests on, and why a suspension needs no undoing when you sell.
Guides and articles
When none of the guides quite fits
Each guide above runs through a procedure from start to finish. The articles do the opposite: one situation at a time, usually the awkward kind. A registration code that never arrived, an APK that lapsed last spring, a lease you are not sure is yours to sell.
Ready to sell your car?
Your number plate is all we need to start.