Long distance purchase??

Howdy,

Who here has purchased a bike and then had it shipped to them? How did you handle the money? Did you just send it and hope for the best?

I have a buddy in the car business that buys his bikes out of Oklahoma, and then trailers them back. I hear they have smoking deals. I will look into it, and post up once I have more.

Well, I am thinking more in terms of a purchase where I won't be able to go get the bike and it will have to be crated and shipped to me. I guess somewhere along the line you just have to trust someone...

When I sold the CBR I found it was much easier to have the buyer shipped to me.

My experience was probably one of the best you'll ever hear about. I joined COG before I ever got my bike because I "knew" that is what I was going to wind up with. I had been watching prices for quite a while and then one Friday evening one of the COG members posted up that he saw a Connie for sale just outside the naval base he worked at. He gave the year, miles, price and general condition.

I PM'd him and asked him to verify the info because the price was really low. He assured me that it was valid so I asked if he would be willing to take a look at the bike for me and possibly ride it, and he agreed to this as well. I reached the seller and explained that I was in TX and that I wanted this other guy to inspect the bike for me and the seller agreed. They talked on Saturday and set up a meet for Sunday.

On Sunday the COGer did the inspection and contacted me with his thoughts and observations - sticky throttle, bent clutch lever, couple of scratches here and there from a drop. I reached the seller a little while later - haggled the price down another $100 (although it was already almost $2000 under NADA/KBB) and told him he had a deal.

On Monday I went to the bank and got a cashier check and overnighted it to my COG friend. He hooked up with the seller, gave him the money, obtained the bike and took it to his home. The extra $100 I whittled off the price was paid to the COGer for his time and to take his wife to a Valentine's Day dinner.

I arranged with Haul Bikes to pick up the bike and bring it to me for approx $450, but they weren't able to get to it for another three weeks due to all their trucks going to Daytona. The COGer held it in his garage for that entire time. Haul Bikes does not require the bike to be crated - you can see how they are loaded on the trailer by going to my web site (in my signature) and looking for the night I received my bike.

This was an ideal situation all the way around.

Could you use a bank recommended by yours as an escrow service?

Yeah, having a local that you trust is the best way to go. I just don't know anyone in the area where the bike is located, Columbus, Ohio. The bike is brand new though with only a few hundred miles on it. The owner has a garage full and this one just isn't getting ridden so he wants to clear it out.

Tourmeister said:

Yeah, having a local that you trust is the best way to go. I just don't know anyone in the area where the bike is located, Columbus, Ohio. The bike is brand new though with only a few hundred miles on it. The owner has a garage full and this one just isn't getting ridden so he wants to clear it out.

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Would he be willing to take it to a local shop that you have spoken to in order to have it inspected. Pay $50 to the shop to give you an unbiased opinion?

Good idea.

Or find someone that's unbiased on the vfr or advrider forums that lives near there?

Scott,

May be worth the bucks to follow Texas T's advice regarding the dealer if you can find one. That dealer may have a preferred shipper also. I bought my R1100S from San Jose BMW. Their shipper does not use crates. Bike arrived in perfect condition, fully serviced and full tank of fuel. Said they ship like that quite often.

Did I miss something, what kind of bike?

Yeah-What's the new bike, Scott? I get (as do others here, I'm sure) a discount on motorcycle shipping through HRCA for Federal Motorcycle Transport. If I can help, lemme know.

I just purchased a new bike from Abernathy's in TN. 600 miles one way. The dealer you are talking about in OK is probably Bartlesville Cylce Sports, good people, bought 2 dirt-bikes from them was painless.

I put my new bike in the back of my truck, and drove back.

Todd

Scott,

If you want to go get it, I've got a 6X12 tilt bed trailer and will "fly Co-Pilot" with you if you want company. Standard wiring, 2" ball and it's ready to go.

JR aka: grumpy
Lake Livingston Estates 4/5
8 mi west of Livingston, TX

936 433 0485

I know that many out of state buyers go to Modrell's Chickasha Honda Suzuki in Oklahoma.

The only shipper that I really knew of was Forward Air, they even have a motorcycle shipping page with a price calculator and have shipping containers available.

My friend bought a bike from a dealer through ebay. He couldn't be happier. Buying sight unseen from an individual is more risky, though.

I will be in Columbus, OH over the Thanksgiving holiday and will gladly look at the bike if you want me to. LMK

Scott

I bought my F4i from a dealer in Tennessee. The only problem I had was with shipping... the shipping company would only ship it to a business, they wouldn't send it to my house. Luckily for me, JR at Honda of Houston was kind enough to have the bike shipped to HoH where I picked it up.

I bought my Sprint ST off a guy in NY who wanted to trade me for my Trophy. Since both bikes didn't have clear titles, the 2 banks handled all the paperwork and no money exchange ever took place. I guess that won't work in your situation.
Guy shipped it via a 18 wheeler and it came in a week. ($450) I met him at a parking lot and he had about 5 others in the trailer, mostly antiques. I checked for damage, started it up and drove off. Guy flew in and we checked both bikes out at Triumph dealer. He rode north on the Trophy. Both of us were very happy.

Not ready to buy, just thinking out the issues ahead of time I have my eye on several different bikes. 04 KTM 625 SXC like the one Dyna Sport has. Then there is the Husky TE 610 Dualsport... a sweet machine! Still not sure what and when... just working on it so that when I can jump, I'll be ready

TM,

Steve O Chap's statement reminded me that shippers may jack up the price if you have it delivered to a residence. They know a business has regular hours, so will be there when they arrive with the bike.

kocook said:

TM,

Steve O Chap's statement reminded me that shippers may jack up the price if you have it delivered to a residence. They know a business has regular hours, so will be there when they arrive with the bike.

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They also require that you be able to turn an 18 wheeler around usually. So, the closest they can get to Scott is the main road leading to his culdesac.

I've bought four over the years through ebay. I went by the pics posted plus extras sent to me, sellers feedback, contacting previous buyers, and talking with them on the phone. One I hauled back, one I rode back, and two were shipped via forward air in the sellers own crates. They don't do home deliveries.

The associated costs of doing a long distance purchase was, of course, figured into the final price (re: cheap). I was satisfied will all of them.

I bought my CBR from a dealer in VT. I found the ad for it on Cycle Trader Online (http://www.cycletrader.com). The dealer aranged to have the bike shipped to me here in TX through Haul Bikes (http://www.haulbikes.com/haulbikes.html).

It cost $450, they ship via 18 wheeler with enclosed trailer and will deliver right to your doorstep provided that as somebody already mentioned, there is enough room for the semi to turn around. The bike arrived in great condition with no mishaps.

HOWEVER..... I am not sure what other people's experience is with Haul Bikes, but I will NEVER use them again. YES the bike did arrive unharmed. The problem though was that it arrived more than a entire MONTH later than Haul Bikes estimated delivery date. Then to top it all off, after the 3RD OR 4TH TIME that they called me (each time a delivery date coming and then going with no bike delivered yet AGAIN) the date again passed with NO contact from them about what was going on. So I called them wanting to know what the [expletive removed] the problem was THIS TIME.

They finally get in touch with the driver after almost 3 HOURS of trying. He calls me and says that he was in Brownsville at the moment (I live in Corpus Christi) and that it was a good thing that I called the company because he didn't even realize that he had my bike in the trailer. He said that after he left Brownsville he was going to make a drop off in Houston, then head to Colorado, then back to the East Coast so it would have taken another 3 - 4 WEEKS to get my bike delivered on top of the 6 weeks late that it already was.
So he came to drop off my bike after his Brownsville delivery and FINALLY I got my bike delivered, though 6 WEEKS late.


The problem with Haul Bikes IMO is that they WILL NOT ship until they have a enough bikes needing delivery in your Region, so say you buy your bike in Nov., if they don't fill the trailer up with enough bikes coming to your area to justify their cost until say the middle of Dec., then you are just SOL even though you already paid them in Nov.

I would go with a carrier such as Forward Air :

https://www.forwardair.com/prepaid/MCmainpage.jsp

I don't have any personal experience with them, but then again I have never heard of anyone saying that they delivered a bike 6 weeks late.

HTH


Phil

TX_F2 said:

It cost $450, they ship via 18 wheeler with enclosed trailer and will deliver right to your doorstep provided that as somebody already mentioned, there is enough room for the semi to turn around. The bike arrived in great condition with no mishaps.

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Yep. 7 pm and he had to back it 50 yards down my cul-de-sac to get to me.

HOWEVER..... I am not sure what other people's experience is with Haul Bikes, but I will NEVER use them again.

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I would agree IF my requirement was that I needed the bike right away. Otherwise I'd be happy to deal with them again. The driver called me once he was north of Dallas to let me know he'd be at my house the following morning, but then called me back about 3 pm to let me know he'd drop it that evening if it was okay with me. Of course I agreed and he was at the house a little before 7 pm.

Like your experience, it took about a month for them to get the bike to me, but it was at the height of the Daytona transport period and all the trailers were booked going down there. Not even owning a helmet at that point it was no big deal for me to wait it out.