Written for Mexico. This analysis applies to Mexican federal tax law — ISR (income tax), IVA (VAT) and SAT rules — and cites Mexican statutes. Amounts are in Mexican pesos (MXN).
Article 93 of the LISR is the system's catalog of gifts: income an individual can receive at 0% ISR. One of the least used — and most useful for any family — is in fracción XIX, inciso b): the sale of used personal property. Your car, for starters.
The rule, precisely
When an individual sells personal property (other than shares, membership interests, securities and the taxpayer's investments), the gain — the difference between total sales for the year and the verified acquisition cost — is exempt from ISR as long as it does not exceed three times the annualized UMA (the daily reference unit). In 2026, that is roughly $128,450 (3 × $117.31 × 365). Only the excess, if any, is taxed.
Automotive translation: since cars are usually sold below what they cost, the typical gain is zero or negative — a full exemption without even approaching the cap. And if you did manage to sell at a profit (classics, special editions, the market's odd years), you have that ~$128k cushion of tax-free gain. The cap is annual and per taxpayer: it applies to the sum of your used-property sales for the year, not to each transaction.
The IVA bonus
The sale of used personal property by an individual who is not a business is exempt from IVA (art. 9, fracc. IV LIVA — the exception is when the seller is a business). Your sale of the family car, between private parties or even to a company, does not trigger IVA. Combined: a transaction completely clean of tax, with express grounding in two statutes.
Do you have personal vehicles that your business group uses in practice?
It's one of the most common arrangements in business families: assets held in a personal name that the operation uses daily. Regularizing ownership — a sale to the right entity, at a documented value, with the exemption properly applied — puts the deduction, the insurance, the risk and the estate in order in a single move. Strategium structures the full migration of personal assets into the group.
The fine play: selling to your own company
Here the reel is right — and it's missing the requirements. Selling your personal car to your company is legal and often convenient: the company acquires an asset it can deduct through depreciation (subject to the automobile investment cap in art. 36 LISR — $175,000, or more for electric and hybrid vehicles), takes on maintenance and insurance as its own expenses, and you collect free of ISR within the limit. But it's a related-party transaction, and that triggers the full standard:
- Documented market value: EBC/blue-book guide, appraisal, or real comparables for your unit. Selling "high" to your company to extract exempt cash is exactly the abuse the authority knows to look for — and it recharacterizes it as a deemed dividend.
- Contract and real cash flow: a signed purchase agreement, the original invoice endorsed/reissued as the case requires, a change of ownership, and a bank-traceable payment from the company to you. The "handshake" transaction is no use to anyone: not to your exemption, not to its deduction.
- Consistent use of the asset: if the car remains 100% personal but is now depreciated by the company, the problem simply moved from your ISR to the company's deduction and to deemed income for the use of assets. The right design assigns the vehicle to a real function.
Frequently asked questions
Does it apply to assets other than cars?
Yes: the clause speaks of used personal property in general — furniture, equipment, minor art, collections — expressly excluding shares, membership interests, securities and the taxpayer's investments. The ~3 UMA annual cap applies to the sum of all these sales in the year.
Do I have to report the sale even if it's exempt?
Exempt income of this kind generates no payment, but keep the file (contract, original invoice, proof of price) — it's your evidence of cost and of the exemption if the deposits draw attention in a discrepancy cross-check. On large sales, the informational return for certain exempt income may be required: check it against the actual amount.
My company wants to buy my car for more than it cost me — do I pay ISR?
Only on the gain that exceeds the annual cap (~$128k in 2026), and only if the price is at market. If the markup isn't supported by an appraisal, your ISR won't be the problem — the full recharacterization of the transaction will be.
Let's talk about your case
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