Bike Resale Value

[Ant]

I was taking a mate to the doctors today and while he was in being seen I went for a stroll into town to the local bike shop to have a mooch.
I'm not in the market for a new bike yet by any stretch of the imagination, there are plenty of legs left on my Bandit but I thought I'd ask out of curiosity what I'd get for the bike if I took it in 3 years from now with the mileage I've done already extrapolated to that length of time.

4 years and 60,000 miles was the result, I asked the guy there what I could expect to get for that (I was pretending that I had the bike there and then), he just looked at me as though I was mad. Apparently the average mileage for a bike that old is 13,000 miles, I've gone over the 15k mark now and I've only had it for a year and at that 13,000 mile mark it is worth £1900.
The guy said I shouldn't expect much more than £500 for it when it reaches that age.

Now I know that I'm not going to change my riding habits because of the resale value, I bought the bike to ride it so ride it I will!

I'm just wondering whether anyone here takes the resale of their bike into account when clocking up the miles sport touring? I'm inclined to believe that most of the people here don't care because of the nature of touring but I'm just curious!!

[gundog]

I never worry about resale value. I buy them to ride, and
expect them to be worth less than half of what I paid.
Any thing above that, is icing on the cake.

[stefrrr]

So what you do then, is go and buy four or five bikes and ride them all an equal amount of time. Then you don't have to worry about "going over the average miles."  

[chornbe]

I'm just wondering whether anyone here takes the resale of their bike into account when clocking up the miles sport touring? I'm inclined to believe that most of the people here don't care because of the nature of touring but I'm just curious!!

Nope. Not even a consideration at all.

[mike goodwin]

Generally resale on Japanese bikes totally sucks.
I have heard Triumphs are similiar at least stateside.
Hence a lot of people like to buy used.
Strangely enough my K75S is worth pretty close to what i paid for it four years ago.
Go figure.

[cultureslayer]

As the mileage increases, finding a buyer becomes harder as well, even with a lower price.  To add to the problem, you might have confidence in your bike maintenance abilities, but that doesn't mean that anyone else will, and proper maintenance is one of the most influential factors in engine life.  

I plan to keep the 250 until it dies.  Maybe swap in a new engine and wait until it dies again.

According to this site my 250 should have about 6800 miles on it.  I bought it a year and a half ago with 540, and it's now over 13k.  Oops.  

To make the financial hit not so bad, I buy used bikes, and sell my own bikes instead of trading or selling to a dealer.

[cultureslayer]

Generally resale on Japanese bikes totally sucks.
I have heard Triumphs are similiar at least stateside.
Hence a lot of people like to but used.
Strangely enough my K75S is worth pretty close to what i paid for it four years ago.
Go figure.

Yup, you can get a great deal on jap bike, especially if the plastics are a bit scuffed or cracked.  Cracked plastics can be fixed fairly easily with some metal mesh and extra ABS, and then you get to paint it the color you want.

[county]

Mileage is a consideration for people who like to polish motorcyles.

[Jake Harsha]

The trick is:

• Never buy new.
• Buy a bike that's a few years old that has been owned by some dilettante who only took it out a few times a year before realizing he didn't have the time and/or commitment to justify continued ownership of a motorcycle.
• Ride the stink out of the bike until you rack up the miles to about where they should be (and then some).
• ?
• Profit!

It's just a matter of not fightiing the system...  Thousands of guys buy bikes each year and then ride them next to not at all.  Take advantage of that fact.  As long as you're not all het up about riding the absolute newest thing out there, this method will serve you well.  I bought my bike when it was 4 years old and it only had around 1400 miles on it.    


HTH,
Jake

[jude]

Resale has never been a concern of mine.  I rack up lots of miles on all my bikes (65,000 miles on the '05 so far).  The other issue you may want to consider is whether or not to keep collision and comp on your policy for a high mileage bike.  Chances are that even a minor mishap will have the insurance co. totaling the bike.  Kinda makes the cost of the insurance pointless when that money can be used for damage repairs...

[MisterEd]

I never worry about the resale value of any vehicle.  I know going in that I'm buying a depreciating asset and that it'll be worth next to nothing on the market by the time I'm done with it.

[Doug Just Doug]

Never give it a thought.  I did make out well on one bike though.  I had a '90 Yamaha YX600 (Radian) that I kept long enough (10 years) that the resale value on the street (the books never reflected it) actually went up.  I sold it for $50 less than I paid for it.  10 years and about 78K miles for $50*...not bad.

*I'm conveniently forgetting about the thousands in mods and maintenance, but don't we all?

[chornbe]

*I'm conveniently forgetting about the thousands in mods and maintenance, but don't we all?

... and inflation.

[cultureslayer]

the worst depreciation is in the first several years, so I just get bikes that are past that.  Supersports are good for that too, once better tech comes out you can get a retired squid bike cheap because they all want the latest and greatest, assuming they didn't total it.

[STArnie13]

Resale shouldn't be a consideration if you use something.  My bikes will be with me until they are needing too much money to keep running.  One time I tried to sell some albums to a used record store.  The owner liked the albums but since they had been played he didn't want them.  Many people consider vehicles-especially bikes the same way.  If you are really into getting good resale just don't ride.  Sooner or later you could have a collectable and maybe even a profit!

[1moreroad]

1400GBP depreciation = $2800 / 45,000 miles = $0.06.  Every mile you ride in the next three years will cost you about six CENTS US.  Who cares about depreciation?  At 60 mph, you will spend less riding your bike for 2 hours than you would at a movie.

I paid about $5300 including taxes for an 18 month old bike with 3600 miles.  The owner's original sales receipt was in the tail storage -- he paid $8300.  That cost him $0.92/mile or 15x what you will pay to ride.

Best thing to do, as said above, is to buy a low mileage 1 - 2 year old bike.  I'm seeing 1 year old FJRs within a day's drive with 2000 - 6000 miles on them at $4000 - $5000 off MSRP.  No dealer prep.  Taxes will be lower because it's cheaper.  One even had a top box and two Powerlet plugs.

[Mike-H]

Ride what you like cause you want to.....worrying about resale is a waste of energy, the time is better spent riding it then worrying about reselling it.....mind you what I say & a buck & a quarter will buy you a cup of coffee ....

[Elseanno]

I'm just wondering whether anyone here takes the resale of their bike into account when clocking up the miles sport touring?

I do sort of... it's the reason I usually buy 3-5 year old bikes with 15-20K miles for less than 1/2 price.

Just sayin'.

Elseanno

[mike goodwin]

Sometimes even a high mileage Japanese bike can have a good resale,that is if you take very good care of it.
Point in case.
I kept my 1983 Kawasaki 750 L-3 (rare) for 16 years and put over 90,000 miles on it.
The bike was bought new in 1984 as a left over model for $2800.00.
It was so clean and well maintained(I'm poor so i keep them a long while) that the first guy who came to look at it didn't even hesitate to give me the $1650.00 i was asking for it.
However i had about a dozen callers that said they were not interested in it after telling them the mileage that was on it.