How to Fill Out Arizona Form 5011: Nonresident Motor Vehicle Exemption

Arizona Form 5011 is the certificate an out-of-state buyer fills out at an Arizona dealership to establish residency in another U.S. state and claim a reduced or waived transaction privilege tax on a vehicle purchase.¹ Its full title is “Certificate to Establish Residency in Another U.S. State Pursuant to A.R.S. § 42-5009.” The dealer hands it to you with the rest of the sales paperwork, you complete the buyer’s section and sign it, and both parties keep a copy. Nothing gets mailed to the state.²

How Much Tax You Actually Pay

Arizona’s state transaction privilege tax (TPT) on vehicle sales is 5.6 percent, with county excise taxes and city privilege taxes added on top.¹ What the form does for you depends entirely on your home state, which falls into one of three groups.

States With a Full Exemption

If you live in Arkansas, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Georgia, Maryland, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Virginia, or West Virginia, you owe no Arizona state TPT and no county excise tax on the purchase. These are the states that do not credit TPT paid in Arizona against their own taxes.³ The exemption sits in A.R.S. § 42-5061(A)(28)(a), and the dealer must issue you a 90-day nonresident registration permit as part of the deal.⁴

States With a Reduced Rate

If your home state does credit Arizona tax but charges a lower vehicle excise rate (or none at all), the dealer calculates Arizona TPT at your home state’s rate instead of 5.6 percent. In practice you end up paying what you would have paid at home.⁴

States That Pay Full Arizona Tax

Buyers from California, Connecticut, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, and Washington get no rate break: their home states credit Arizona tax and charge above 5.6 percent, so Arizona collects its full tax plus any local tax when you take possession here.³ You still fill out Form 5011 so the dealer can document who you are and what you bought.

Who Counts as a Nonresident

Section 2 of the form includes screening questions designed to catch people who live in Arizona but claim otherwise. An Arizona address, or a “true” answer to any of those questions, disqualifies you.⁵

Three groups skip the screening questions and qualify under separate rules:

Nonresident U.S. military members and their spouses stationed at an Arizona military facility (bring a copy of military orders).
Nonresident students enrolled at an Arizona school and paying out-of-state tuition (bring a current student ID).
Nonresidents who work in Arizona but live within 25 miles of the border on the other side.

Filling Out the Form

Form 5011 has two main parts. The dealer handles the first; you handle the second and sign the certification on page two.

Section 1: Seller

The dealer enters the dealership name, address, and TPT license number, and runs the tax calculations on the worksheet, including the sales price and the applicable home-state and Arizona county tax rates.¹

Section 2: Purchaser

You provide your name (or your business’s name if the vehicle is being titled to an entity), federal employer identification number where that applies, full out-of-state address, telephone number, auto insurance carrier, and policy number.⁵ If you are signing on behalf of a nonresident business, your driver’s license has to be issued by the same state or country where the business is located.⁶ Then you answer the residency screening questions.

On page two, you sign a certification promising to register the vehicle in your home state before the 90-day nonresident permit expires and to keep any Arizona use after that date purely temporary. The same page lays out the civil and criminal consequences of signing a false certificate.

What to Bring to the Dealership

The dealer has to keep a specific set of documents to claim the deduction, and most of them have to come from you. Before the dealer issues the 90-day nonresident permit, the file has to include:⁶

Your signed Form 5011.
A copy of the 90-day nonresident registration permit issued under A.R.S. § 28-2154.
A legible copy of your current, valid out-of-state driver’s license showing an address outside Arizona.
If the sale is claimed under the out-of-state delivery rule in § 42-5061(A)(14)(a), a delivery certificate showing the vehicle was delivered outside Arizona.

When the dealer keeps all of this on file, the dealer is protected if your eligibility later falls apart. In that case, the Department of Revenue collects the tax, penalties, and interest directly from you.⁶

City Tax Still Applies If You Drive Off the Lot

The nonresident exemption covers state TPT and county excise tax. It does not cover city privilege tax. If you take possession of the vehicle inside an Arizona city, that city’s tax applies no matter where you live. The only way around it is for the dealer to deliver the vehicle to you at a location outside Arizona.¹ Some dealerships arrange out-of-state delivery as a standard option for nonresident buyers, so ask before signing.

Commercial Vehicles Have a Separate Path

A different exemption, under A.R.S. § 42-5061(A)(14)(b), covers commercial motor vehicles, trailers, and semitrailers sold to nonresidents when the vehicle has a gross vehicle weight rating over 10,000 pounds and will be used to transport property in interstate commerce.⁴ If you are claiming it, Form 5011 is where you certify that you are authorized to run the vehicle in interstate commerce as defined in 49 U.S.C. § 13501.⁵

Penalties for False Information or Early Arizona Registration

The certification on page two is enforceable. You become personally liable for the full state, county, and city tax that would have applied to a taxable sale, plus penalties and interest from the purchase date, in either of two situations: you register the vehicle in Arizona within 365 days of the sale, or you provided false information on the form.⁵

Criminal exposure sits on top of that. Knowingly preparing or presenting a fraudulent certificate is a Class 5 felony under A.R.S. § 42-1127(B)(2), and omitting required information or providing false information carries its own criminal penalty under § 42-1127(B)(4).

Where to Find the Form

The current PDF lives on the Arizona Department of Revenue’s TPT forms page.² You don’t need to print it; the dealer will have it. ADOR also publishes a companion sheet listing each state’s rate and exemption category, which is worth a quick look if you want to know what you’ll pay before you walk in.³ Bring your valid out-of-state driver’s license. Without a legible copy of it in the dealer’s file, none of the nonresident tax treatment applies.

1
Arizona Department of Revenue. Motor Vehicle Sales
2
Arizona Department of Revenue. Affidavit of Nonresidency by a Resident of Another U.S. State Purchase of Motor Vehicle in Arizona
3
Arizona Department of Revenue. Sales of Motor Vehicles to Nonresidents
4
Arizona Legislature. Arizona Revised Statutes 42-5061 – Retail Classification; Definitions
5
Arizona Department of Revenue. Arizona Form 5011
6
Arizona Legislature. Arizona Revised Statutes 42-5009 – Certificates Establishing Deductions; Liability for Making False Statements