Just got back to the US through DTW after a trip to India and wanted to share how customs actually went, since I stressed about this way too much beforehand.
We had about $8,800 in purchases total, around $7k of that was new jewelry bought in India. We had everything itemized and receipts ready. We did get sent to secondary, but it was very straightforward.
The officer mainly cared about the jewelry receipt. Didn’t ask much about electronics or smaller items. Asked how long we were gone and why we traveled. Each adult got the $800 exemption plus a family allowance, which brought the duty free amount to roughly $2,600. The rest was charged normal duty around 5.5%.
He did mention that high value jewelry from India can sometimes be treated as a formal import with much higher tariffs, but because we declared everything properly and had documentation, that didn’t apply to us.
Big takeaway for me: declare everything, bring receipts, and don’t try to get cute. Being upfront made the whole thing calm and professional.
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