'Renting' out the bike to a friend

bboySushi

Well-known member
Hey guys,

Jut wanted your opinion on what is fair.

I’m moving to Singapore soon for a year or two. My friendjust told me he was looking to get a ’02 gsxr600 for $2200. I told him I wasmoving away for a while, and whether he’d be interested instead in ‘renting’my ’07 gsxr600.

To me I’d rather have a friend ride it, use it, take care ofit while I’m gone than just have it sitting and rusting away in storage. Theproblem is I have no idea what to charge him.

My initial thought is:


  1. I’ll still have the bike on my own fire andtheft policy to maintain continuous insurance – so that cost will be included –something like $150-200/year?
  2. Mileage – he’ll put around 5k a year, so I’dequate that maybe to $400-600 / year?
  3. All repairs and maintenance will be paid for byhim, and I know he will take care of it

So then roughly it would be $550-800/year. Is thatunreasonable? Considering he wanted to buy a bike for $2200? What do you guysthink.

Logistics wise I haven’t figured it out yet, I’ll have totalk to my SF broker.
 
If I were your friend, I'd buy the other bike for $2200. Solely on the principal of keeping 'friendship' and 'business' separate. The road to hell is paved with good intentions...
 
My guess is this is a total non-starter insurance wise. Your insurer is not going to let you rent out your bike. His insurer is not likely to write a policy for someone else's bike.
 
My guess is there will be some insurance red tape. You'll for sure pay more because you're technically using the bike for commercial purposes. Find out if he gets any tickets, accidents etc while riding your bike if it will effect your rates as the company renting out the bike. Honestly you'd be better off selling the bike and buying another one when you get back. Way less hassle in the short term and then when you get back you get a new bike rather than your bike which will be 10-11yrs old with an extra 10,000km on it.
 
"sell" him the bike for whatever your "rental" fee is. he can insure it himself. he breaks he buys.

when you get back buy it back for $1.

but yeah thisos a dumb idea. Just tell him to buy the other bike
 
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"Rent" meant selling it to him for free and getting him to pay me some sum of money.

I think he'd rather ride a newer bikeFor a few years, andI’d rather have someone looking after my bike for those years, it’s just amatter of how much.
This really isn’t a ‘business’ transaction so there’s mixingof friendship and business – I’m just looking to get compensated what’s fairfor use of the bike. However my insurance broker told me to just cancel mypolicy and sell him the bike – he said no continuous coverage wouldn’t reallymatter if I sold the bike and it wasn’t under my name. Not sure how reliablethat statement is.

Why do you guys think it’s such a bad idea though? You’drather have your bike sit for 2 years (2 years that you’re out of the country).I don’t even have time to sell the bike if I wanted to.

If I said I’m giving it to my friend while I’m away for 2years would that change your opinion at all? Is it just the fact that he’spaying me money?
 
nothing wrong with a bike sitting for two years....and i can't tell if you're leigitmately worried about it rusting.

disconnect battery and leave it be.

I wouldn't trust any of my friends to need to pay me for my bike if anything were to happen. regardless of how much you think it'll be good, the cons outweigh the pros. and for a G to let your friend up the mileage on your bike - what happens if there's isues with say, the tranny or the health of the bike in general? you going to ask him to repair? if he declines?

Too many negative outcomes for a G.
 
good point here not to do it or be prepared to write off that bike.
bad idea to rent it, you assume all the risk and issues related

store the bike as it was for winter, put a proper bike cover on it
have a buddy change the gas every year adding fuel stabilizer

If he crashes the bike then what?
This is not worth it. You will lose.
 
Sell the bike to your friend and buy it back at an agreed price and condition when you come back.
 
Sell the bike to your friend and buy it back at an agreed price and condition when you come back.

Win/win because Ontariario is in arrears.
 
I am not going to beat around the bush on this but this ... is a crappy idea ...

I won't even get into all the potential bad crap this could get into ... but suffice to say your bike will not melt into water if you walk away for 2 years. just do a proper storage on it for 2 years. I've stored a bike for 2 years without a problem.

one idea that you should consider if you MUST go thru with this hair brain scheme is ... have him buy the bike off you for a fair market value... when you come back you get to 'buy' it back from him for whatever the current market value is minus your 'rental' fee ... e.g. you sell it to him for 7 grands ... you come back the bike is worth 6g's (fair market value) ... you calculate it is 2k worth of 'rental' fee on it so you pay 4g's to him ...

my 2 cents ...
 
Let your friend get his own bike.
You sell yours.
Come back in 2 years, and buy yourself something newer better and shinier.
Who knows it you'll still be into that style of bike 2 years from now, or even want to ride?
What if you don't come back?
 
If you can afford it.... Do a rent to own scenario

He can pay you $2000 upfront and bike transferred to his name

He can pay you the remainder balance in installments

When you get back you can either buy it back or get a new one

No insurance headache

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
 
good point here not to do it or be prepared to write off that bike.bad idea to rent it, you assume all the risk and issues relatedstore the bike as it was for winter, put a proper bike cover on ithave a buddy change the gas every year adding fuel stabilizerIf he crashes the bike then what?This is not worth it. You will lose.
I agree with this first line. Only do this if youre alright with writing off the bike. In fact, you should probably just mentally write off the bike in your head as soon as you give it to him so you arent constantly worrying.Not saying anything will for sure go wrong. Thats just what I would do. And also discuss who will cover repairs and maintenance.

I would really only trust a family member or maybe a hot girlfriend with something like this.
 
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