Georgia man explains how difficult it is to buy a seized Bugatti Veyron Grand Sport Vitesse from China after trying to buy it for a 'steal'

This YouTuber has laid out how difficult it is to buy a seized Bugatti Veyron Grand Sport Vitesse from China.

You don’t need us to tell you that bringing a car into the US from China is a tricky process.

But did you realize just how many hoops you’d have to jump through?

YouTuber Ed Bolian has explained the process for his followers, and boy, does it sound like a lot of work.

Importing a car into the US from China is no walk in the park

Thanks to tariffs and a whole host of other legal complications, importing a Chinese car into the US is extremely complicated.

There are only four legitimate ways to bring a car in from overseas and get it a title and registration.

The first is if the car is more than 25 years old, which exempts it from most Department of Transportation and EPA requirements.

Then there’s the federalization option, by which a car is brought into compliance with US standards via a licensed agency.

Special exemptions do exist for historically significant cars not sold in the US, like the McLaren F1 or the Porsche 959.

And then there’s the fourth option, which involves obtaining a manufacturer-issued certificate stating the car has been built identically to US-spec models.

As you can see, none of these are particularly easy to work around.

But if you want a car really bad, you’ll jump through those hoops, right?

That’s the position Ed Bolian found himself in with a rare Bugatti that had been seized by the Chinese government back in 2017.

There was something special about this car – it was one of only eight ‘World Record’ Bugatti Vitesse models, finished in black carbon with orange accents.

But as rare and beautiful as it may have been, there was a mountain of things to overcome.

Given that it’d been sitting for years, its registration had lapsed.

When that happens in China, it’s near impossible to rectify.

Bolian was going to have quite the challenge on his hands getting this Bugatti back to the US.

How the auction for this Bugatti Veyron Grand Sport Vitesse surprised Ed Bolian

Because the ECU of this Bugatti Veyron had been tampered with, this car had an aura of illegitimacy around it.

This led Bolian to think that it’d be a pretty easy auction to win, but he was wrong.

“I was surprised by this, because almost immediately, the bids were going well past what I was willing to pay,” Bolian commented.

“It’s not wildly shocking, because it’s still cheaper than what the car would theoretically be worth in better circumstances.”

In total, 12 registered bidders took part and went for $1.9 million – well beyond what Bolian’s bid ceiling of $1.3 million.

This is certainly a situation where the saying ‘You win some, you lose some’ comes in handy.

“Sometimes the best stories are the cars that you end up not getting to buy,” Bolian remarked.