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JustaQ

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jun 15, 2011
2
0
Hey everyone (sorry if this is a repost, i tried searching but didn't come up with anything)

Anyways next year i'm starting university and i've always wanted a macbook pro, one of the 15 inch ones would be perfect

Now this weekend im taking a trip to New York (i live in Ontario, Canada) and I was wondering if it would be smarter to purchase the macbook from the states or from where i live in canada?
I'm going to be purchasing it from an actual apple store and not online..

And also if I buy it from the states can I get the student discount still? (im going to attend uni in canada but can i just lie about going to some u.s school?)

And lastly would it be cheaper to purchase it online or buy from the actual store?
 

imorton

macrumors 6502
Aug 21, 2010
275
22
I know that Microcenter has the base 13" model for $999, but I think you wanted the 15"

Just to let you know.
 

Chiuy

macrumors 6502
May 24, 2011
305
0
NorCal, Bay Area
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148a Safari/6533.18.5)

How much is tax in Canada? Ours is 0.0975% here.
 

TuffLuffJimmy

macrumors G3
Apr 6, 2007
9,022
136
Portland, OR
How much is tax in Canada? Ours is 0.0975% here.

I know what you're trying to do here (key word trying), but it doesn't work if you add the percent to 0.0975. Just a little helpful math hint. 0.0975% of $999 is about 97 cents (not .97 cents ;)).

OP, just make sure you won't have to pay any sort of importing fee when crossing the border. Tell them it's your machine that you brought with you from Canananadadadada
 

MJNBGA

macrumors regular
Mar 26, 2011
136
0
New Zealand
crossing the border. Tell them it's your machine that you brought with you from Canananadadadada

Yeah, just buy it there, unbox it and all that crap, and if the border police ask you, just tell them it's your laptop that you got from Canada. Prices are better in the US I think.
 

snaky69

macrumors 603
Mar 14, 2008
5,908
488
Yeah, just buy it there, unbox it and all that crap, and if the border police ask you, just tell them it's your laptop that you got from Canada. Prices are better in the US I think.

That would be fraud, and is illegal.

Don't forget that you'll have to pay import duties when you bring it back, which amount to roughly 15% of the value of the item. In the end, it isn't really worth it.
 

Wildhorses

macrumors newbie
Feb 23, 2011
11
0
I'm from Ontario!

Hey there fellow Ontarion lol

I bought my computer in the states, let me show you how I saved my $ on a baseline 13inch macbook pro.

(Keep in mind, if you buy from BestBuy or Microcenter, you can still buy the apple care from an apple store in Canada like I did... also, your student discount will not work in the States)

Canada
$1249 + 15% tax = 1436.35 (someone has to pay for our 'free' health care)

Went to NY for 2 days, and took a 15 min drive to Microcenter in New Jersey for their lower tax rate

$999 + 3% tax = $1031. some change

Upon returning, I declared the laptop and the booze I was allowed to bring in... Since I bought a lot of stuff, they charged me duty on the value of the laptop over $400 (since that is what you are allowed to bring in on trips over 48 hours)

I paid $71 CDN in duty, and realized when I got home that they had their own exchange rate of 93 cents USD to $1 CDN (worked in my favor, they taxed me on $540 worth of the laptop)

So that is roughly $335 saved... keep in mind that the CDN has more value than the USD at the moment.

Enough money for Apple care, or an xbox 360 like the microsoft back to school commercials lol.

If it's your first mac and you're on the fence, just get it. So much nicer than a PC, and I've been using PC's for the past 13 years.
 
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