I talked to a guy who just registered his Miata Exomotive Exocet kit car in MN. So he has first hand info on this process.
"It's surprisingly easy to register a kit car in Minnesota. Just gotta fork up some money. If you're persistent, you can do it without paying a shitload, but the value of my time versus what I might have saved kind of played a big part there.
It's registered as a twenty15 Exomotive Exocet, valued at $11,499 (so tabs are super cheap). You have to fill out a form to register a new car, which BARELY applies to kit cars but it's touted as a "generic purpose form" so whatever. There's another form you need to fill out that says where everything is from, which is for "reconstructed vehicles", which this technically falls under.
You go to the DMV, bring the two forms and all pieces of proof that you own all the bits just in case they ask (they don't need to know), and any receipts if you have them for proving the price/value of the vehicle and that you did indeed pay tax on them.
I ended up paying tax on the kit itself since I bought it out of state, but I didn't pay tax on the donor vehicle like they wanted me to. I had to explain to the guy that by holding the title to the donor car in my hand that I have already paid taxes on it.
When it came time to value the car he asked what it was worth, so I said "well you can get the kit for 7999 and a Miata like the one I used is on average $3500", so he wrote in 11499. Major win for me, there.
That's it though, you give them paperwork, you cut a check, they hand you a license plate. Boom, your car is legal.
6-8 weeks later supposedly the state will mail you asking you to go get an inspection. It's not for safety though, it's to make sure nothing is stolen.
This is where that second form and all the receipts are needed (keep the originals). The major parts are engine, transmission, "frame", body, roof, doors, and some other things. Most of that form was blank for me given what the car is.
I haven't received that letter yet, but I've only been registered for 6ish weeks. My check was cashed a week and a half ago, so I assume they accepted the paperwork.
Insurance is the next battle. I have it insured as a 7500 mile/year static value kit car for $30/mo.
Then to actually drive it on the roads you need a few things. Headlights, tail lights, stop lights, running lights front and rear, turn signals front and rear, a legal exhaust system (see the law about loud mufflers), and fenders.
Windshields are optional in MN. Supposedly if you have a windshield you HAVE to have a windshield wiper, but it can literally be a squeegee on a stick tied to your dash that you pick up and clean the windshield with.
Fenders are a big grey area, the law states a "best effort for installation of fenders" must be made. I read that and think that "I tried, I can't fit them!" is a legit enough response to it.
(get fenders though, sticky tires throw rocks straight up in the air at low speeds)
I don't have front turn signals yet, and hand signals are technically insufficient since I have a chassis and the chassis "can obstruct hand signals". That said, I've turned or otherwise have driven by dozens of police officers and only two or three of them actually spent any amount of time checking me out."
