Quoted: I was surprised to hear that I could ship directly to the class 3 dealer the buyer plans on using and that I would NOT have to go through my local class 3 dealer.

Title 2 firearms are governed by the very same laws as Title 1 firearms, which are designed to restrict who can receive a firearm, not who can sell one. It regulates the party who is coming into possession of a firearm.

A non-licensee can legally sell a regular Title 1 AR15 to an FFL anywhere in the country, and ship it directly to him interstate. But that's a one-way street: A non-licensee cannot purchase a firearm interstate, and receive the shipment; only FFLs may receive interstate shipments of firearms.

NFA firearms do not have their own interstate sales rules; instead, the same laws apply to NFA items. An FFL may buy an NFA item from anyone, anywhere in the country, and have it shipped to him directly. A non-licensee must instead have an NFA item shipped to an in-state FFL.

BTW, an FFL does not need to also hold an SOT to buy and sell NFA items interstate. The SOT only comes into play if the FFL wishes to avoid the $200 transfer tax when purchasing from other Special Occupational Taxpayers.

And as noted, only an SOT-to-SOT transfer is tax-exempt and uses a Form 3. All other transfers, even when either the buyer or seller is an SOT, must be done via $200-tax-due Form 4s.

So yes, Miami02TJ, you can sell NFA items directly to an out-of-state dealer. If you don't hold a valid SOT, it must be via a Form 4 and a $200 tax is due. The out-of-state dealer then transfers it to the buyer via a second $200-tax-due Form 4.

I still don't understand why so many arkommers keep bugging the BATFE field offices when they could instead just post here and ask me.