Florida Residents – But Not Quite Done

Location: Jacksonville, FL (High 81, Low 63)

Our main purpose in coming to Jacksonville for this couple of days was to visit our new mail order facility to pick up our mail, get our licenses and register the truck and fiver, and register to vote. Well, we got 75% of the way there.

Florida requires a VIN verification before vehicles are registered. We had been told that we could just go in the truck and an official would walk outside to verify the VIN. (In the picture below, there is a motorhome parked in the street across from the county office waiting for a VIN verification.) We also understood that the VIN on the title could be used for verification purposes, but we do not have a paper copy of our title, as we still have a loan and SD is not a state where the owner holds the title, as we did in NY. So around 7:45 this morning I called the sheriff’s office, and the person who answered the phone stated that someone would come over. We didn’t know how long it would take, but were happy to have an officer arrive in only about thirty minutes.

After the officer left, we headed out to Green Cove Springs. We stopped at St. Brendan’s Isle and they brought our mail out, and gave us directions to the County Courthouse, which was our first stop. This is where we had to go to file our certificate of domicile. We had to have our ID so the clerk could notarize the paperwork, and we paid $30 for the filing.

Then we walked over to the County Office where the licensing department was located. We were given a number and barely had time to sit down before our number was called. We handed over our paperwork – social security cards, two pieces of mail, passport, old licenses and she filled out all the information for our licenses. We had an eye exam and our pictures taken, wrote out a check for $108.50 and voila! we were Florida residents. The clerk also filed the voter registration application as well, so we are now registered to vote.

The one delay came when it was time to do the vehicle and rig registration. We had the lienholder information, which we had been told would be required. What we didn’t know, and found out today, was that the Florida DMV would then request the title and call us when it came in, at which time we would have to go back in and complete the registration process. From requesting the title to its arrival in Florida would take two to three weeks. However, by then we will be down in Marathon and we will not be able to just pop back in to finish things up. So the clerk suggested, and it sounded like the best plan, that we wait and start the registration process when we arrive in Avon Park in the beginning of February since we will have two months there to get the process completed.

But, looking on the positive side…we have our Florida licenses! We are happy to have at least that much done.