[OpenRoad]

Lanesplitter published a good article about why you should never finance your first motorcycle. Granted the SCR950 isn't a new rider kind of bike, but the article is a good read nonetheless. I generally stick by the no finance rule anyways when it comes to my interests.

This applies even if it's not your first bike:

When you finance a bike, the lender gets the title; only after you pay off the loan does the lender sign off on it and send it to you. This complicates a private-party sale because the buyer has to trust that you’ll take his money, pay off the loan, and send him the title at some unspecified point in the future.

deadspin-quote-carrot-aligned-w-bgr-2

 

[Cruze]

That's the big thing and a lot of people are hesitant, for obvious reasons, to buy bikes that have a lean on them. The problem is, it sounds so enticing to new riders that they can finance it and not pay everything right up front and it gets them excited and buying

 

[eddie]

Years ago, when I was interested in getting my 1st bike, my oldest brother gave me this simple advice:
Never finance "fun".
It wasn't until my third bike, a then-new 1991 CB750 Nighthawk, that I put the title up against the loan.
That was the only lien on a motorcycle I've ever had. I took out a two year note and worked a ton of overtime to pay it off early.
Run, don't walk, away from a potential buyer of your bike for sale that asks if they can make payments to you.
It seems like every time I've put up a bike for sale, someone will ask this.
They get a polite, but firm No. I am not a bank.
I also do not take checks. It's spooked a couple of folks away, unfortunately.
I do try and make things as safe as possible for both parties, though.
There's a very friendly, centrally-located bank about 5 minutes from my house
where I've agreed to conduct sales in the past.
They have a little office area out in the lobby where the paperwork is done.
The man who bought my last bike had his police officer brother with him.
We did the sale, including whole transfer of payment (cash) in plain view of him and about a dozen cameras.
The brother was impressed. =)

 

[OpenRoad]

Didn't think people would even try to buy a used bike and ask to make payments to the original owner... I assume people who go the used route would just pay up front since they're looking for something cheap and within their budget.

Just blows my mind that these things happen. I'm going to borrow your Never finance "fun" motto. Sounds a lot better than mine.

 

[Cruze]

Didn't think people would even try to buy a used bike and ask to make payments to the original owner... I assume people who go the used route would just pay up front since they're looking for something cheap and within their budget.

Just blows my mind that these things happen. I'm going to borrow your Never finance "fun" motto. Sounds a lot better than mine.

What do you mean?

 

[OpenRoad]

I.e if they were looking to buy eddie's bike and asked to pay him in installments instead of giving him the full amount up front, financing it from him instead of the bank. That just baffles me.

 

[Cruze]

I.e if they were looking to buy eddie's bike and asked to pay him in installments instead of giving him the full amount up front, financing it from him instead of the bank. That just baffles me.

I don't think anyone does do that. I've never heard of that before.

 

[eddie]

I don't think anyone does do that. I've never heard of that before.

Oh, yea. I've had all kinds of goofy stuff happen when trying to sell a bike.
"Can I give you $2,500 now and bring you the rest later?" - Meaning to take the $7,000 bike with them immediately. Not no, but **** no.

Had another fellow agree to the exact terms of the transaction, including cash only, no checks - both via email and verbally over the phone. He drove nearly two hours to get here and then pulled out his checkbook. I looked at him dumfounded & said,
"We agreed to cash. No deal otherwise."
Him, "I wasn't comfortable with that much money on me and figured you'd take a check. " {To myself, I thought, "No, genius. That's why I had you meet me inside a BANK."}
He left and was gone about 35 minutes before showing back up with a Bank Of America envelope stuffed with $100s. I made the deposit, he loaded the bike and I walked the 2.5 miles home. =)

The funniest one was a man that went to take a test ride. With me, he left the cash, his car keys and a rather cute wife as collateral. I hated to think what'd happened if he didn't come back. Well, he was gone a long time and I could see the wife was getting worried. He finally rode back up, laughing. "I ran out of gas and couldn't find the reserve switch. " It was a VT700 Shadow and those had the fuel selector on the right side down under the side cover. He'd spent 10 minutes trying to find it and then get the bike restarted, nearly killing the battery in the process. They bought the bike and all was well that ended well.

 

[OpenRoad]

Well, he could have left worse things as collateral. :grin2:

Always great to hear stories like these from experienced owners who has probably gone though everything I can imagine, including keeping someone's wife as collateral.

 

[Cruze]

A wife as collateral LOL now that doesn't seem like such a bad idea. Would have been funny if they were having issues and he did indeed just leave her there lmao

 

[TheScrambled]

I remember taking a look at my first used bike, not knowing what to expect. Advertised as almost mint, turns out to have scratched up fairings and plenty of pink decals on one side, probably to cover up even more cosmetic damages. Baffles me why they decided to go with pink on a black bike. No wonder it was so cheap...

 

[Cruze]

You'll definitely find that a lot and it's quite sad. But that's why it's always a good thing to check anything out in the day time to ensure you can really inspect it in good light. Had a buddy that bought a black CBR (used) in the night time and when he seen it in the daytime the next day, he was mind blasted.

 

[eddie]

You'll definitely find that a lot and it's quite sad. But that's why it's always a good thing to check anything out in the day time to ensure you can really inspect it in good light. Had a buddy that bought a black CBR (used) in the night time and when he seen it in the daytime the next day, he was mind blasted.

I called out the seller of a used Honda PC800 once.
He left it in front of a business after hours and from the road, it looked okay. I stopped and got a closer look. The paint was very hazed & scratched all over - like someone had wiped it down with a used rag out of a Jr. high metalworking class. Yea. That bad.
It had a sign on it,
"1996 Honda Pacific Coast. Clean title $2500. Call 555-XXXX."
So, I did and played dumb.
"Saw your bike on the drive home. Tell me about it."
The guy went on about how it was in A1 shape, had only 20k miles on it, etc... I listened and then hit him with the details:
It was black, which was the correct color for a 1994 or 1995 PC800. (This one had 1995 on the VIN decal). All 1996s in the US were bright red. The paint looked horrible and the odometer said something like 27,000 miles.
He got mad, "If you know so much about it...blah, blah, blah..."
I stopped him and said, "You don't know the bike at all. Who does it belong to, really?"
He hung up. I felt sorry for whomever bought it if they didn't know something was probably up with it in a bad, bad way.

 

[Cruze]

That's disgusting, I hate when people do that crap. Brings down the trust within the community. Good on you for calling him out on it though. Someone that hasn't gotten a close up on it or even knew the history of the colors like that would easily get fooled into that.