How do you afford to ride?

[thehollowmen]

Some of you have families to look after, some of you are unemployed or students. How do you afford to ride?

I love to ride, but I'm about to join the ranks of the unemployed next week, and the car and bike services coming up are daunting.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not going to sell my baby or anything. First I'm going to give up eating or something. I'm curious as to how some of you scrape by with this expensive habit.

[MattRSK]

I have worked out what it generally costs every 6 months for me to be able to ride my bike and have a car. If I was not able to afford this I wouldn't ride, simple as that. I save that amount of money weekly before I piss all my money down the drain (which I am very good at).

[chanceyy]

if you really love to do something you sacrifice something else to do it .. also called living within your means . & being multi talented helps ..

being able to budget & as matt said putting a wee bit aside each week certainly helps

[onearmedbandit]

I just do. Well I do get paid well but I work long hours and have a young family. Money isn't the problem for me, it's time that is a more pressing concern.

[Steam]

I don't have a car, the cost of petrol for the car is the thing which made me try motorcycling in the first place, and now I'm hooked. I think having only one vehicle makes all the difference for poor people like me.

As for running costs, etc, it's not really that much. I do the work myself where I can, read the full workshop manual before I take apart anything too complex. Buy parts from wreckers or scrounge. It's easy if you've only got a crappy old GN.
But then I guess I am a bit of a feral. I don't need much to live on, and once to save money I lived for a few months on the lawn of a friend's house in a yurt I built myself.

[Goblin]

I hear ya! With 3 kids to feed etc. and now a race habit to support I'd like to know how others do it too. I have given up eating some weekends just to go on a road ride. Things like insurance and rego are just unnecessary expense so I just take the risk.

You could always sell your arse.:shit:

[Colapop]

It aint easy. I manage to just get by it seems. I've heard of people moving to Oz and earning half as much again for the same work that I do in Australian dollars...
Both my wife and I work (and have 2 teenagers). We don't earn exhorbitant salaries. I'm planning on needing a new back tyre, chain & sprockets, and suspension if I can figure out how to pay for it all. I work for a temp agency on the weekends (when they've got work for me) usually stevedoring which isn't too badly paid. Doing anything less than 12-16 hours @ $16/hr a weekend aint worth it - ya end up paing most of it in tax and the rest on commuting. That's how I do it but it's not easy...

[Hitcher]

I've sold both kidneys, two retinas and my soul. That should tide my riding addiction over until Christmas 2010, or until I win Lotto and can afford my own dialysis machine and seeing-eye dog.

[phoenixgtr]

Some of you have families to look after, some of you are unemployed or students. How do you afford to ride?

I love to ride, but I'm about to join the ranks of the unemployed next week, and the car and bike services coming up are daunting.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not going to sell my baby or anything. First I'm going to give up eating or something. I'm curious as to how some of you scrape by with this expensive habit.

It's not easy especially when shit happens' like my bike getting knocked over.the missus is putting the pressure on now. Still, I'll never give it up

[Brett]

Well, my fulltime job covers the day to day living, and due to some profitable past ventures, i have a bit of savings that the wife and I sometimes use to play with. My wife is a fulltime student, so once she is stuck into working, hopefully there will be a decent surplus of cash.

[Motoracer]

Student allowance and part time jobs. Technically I can't afford to but somehow I manage, with some help.

[adiddy]

:gob: try beign a student and playing sport 6 nights a week during winter

[Oakie]

I get paid reasonably well and Mrs Oakie works (well until her position becomes redundant in 5 more weeks).
I budget stuff and put money away for stuff like annual rego and insurance. (set it and forget it ... the money's there when needed)
I also weigh up the options as a comparison. For example ... $912 on bus fares if I was to bus to work for a year. That's enough for annual rego, insurance and about 200 litres of gas. Also factor in things with intangible value, like me being able to take the bike to cricket yesterday as Mrs Oakie needed the car for her own purposes. Oh, and there's a certain 'value' to the spiritual wellness you get after a ride.

[Colapop]

... try being a parent, paying for the sport, and the food, and the utilities, and carting the kids to their various extramural activities, and ensuring that the house is clean, there's clean clothes to put on and holding down a full time job...

[adiddy]

mmm but having little or nothign given to me by parent s(fair enuf) and then having to drive the cage to sport and skewl while paying insurance etc and trying to fit in 2 part time jobs

[Colapop]

...is a good way to learn about how hard it's going to be later on when you have your own kids.

S'ok bub I aint mad atcha... just trying to work out how to afford my 'habit'

[adiddy]

yeah its good budgeting...
i see where u r coming from colapop , plus u "older" people have mortgages etc ....

[Steam]

:gob: try beign a student and playing sport 6 nights a week during winter

Oh you poor poor baby, being forced to play all that sport, no time to make money, boohoo. :whocares:

[Swoop]

I have given up cigarettes, P and Cocaine...

Oh crap. I never started either of those addictions, so just divert the $$$'s that WOULD have been spent on those!:bye:

[Ixion]

My argument is that bike riding pays for itself.

If one is working , travel to work and back must be regarded as an inevitable expense, as is some other travel (doctors etc). And even if not working , some travel will be necessary.

I budget for all travel using the Pajero. Then almost always take the bike. This has a double benefit. (a) I get to ride to work etc. Riding's riding. I don't enjoy the trip to work as much as a spin in the countryside, but it's riding, and all riding is fun. And (b) it costs much less by bike, so the difference saved pays for the extra rego and WoF for the bike and still leaves a surplus that I can legitimately devote to riding at the weekend .

Only problem is that now I no longer have a 250, the surplus is not so great. I'm wondering whether I made a mistake there.

The actual cost of owning the bike is not much (not for mine, anyway). Rego is $5 a week, wof $2 a week. Depreciation on the sort of bikes I have is trivial in dollar terms (maybe a bit more significant in real terms).

Most other expenses are running expenses. So long as they are less than the Pajero, I'm ahead on the spreadsheet. Tyres are my biggest worry, don't get me started on that subject.

EDIT Actually, the real question should be , how do you justify having a cage as well as the bike. When I was young many families could not afford a car, and just had a bike. And others had a car, but very seldom used it, it was just for weekends and funerals. Everyday transport was by bike . That was quite common. It is really quite rare that one needs a car, just the occasional big thing that needs to be carried. I still don't accept the "but the children " thing. Bikes have pillion seats. And saddlebags.

[Racey Rider]

Having had a 7 year go at self employment (which paid less than minimum wage), and now being unemployed for 16 months, while feeding three kids and a wife, I have to wonder 'How I get to Race?'.

The main answer is Sponsorship, compromise and tight budgeting.

Sponsorship:
Without my Sponsorship, which this year paid about half my costs of Racing Street stocks in the winter series, I wouldn't be able to ride. The fact that I Really needed sponsorship meant that I Really put effort into getting it, and then more effort into Doing things for my sponsor to make it worth their while.

The rest of the money comes from the family budget, which is why I can only race one series a year.

Compromise:
I'd love to be riding a bigger bike, but if one can only afford a street stock,, then that is better than nothing. I paid $800 for a broken KR150 and slowing, working on it myself, learn't the hard way about what not to do to it.
Would like to get it Dyno-tuned one day, but at the moment it's just make little changes at the track each time and see what happens.
On dry days I use the old, old, front tyre that came with the bike. Was badly shaped, cracking and with out much tread,,, but it works ok in the dry. On wet days I now have a half used TT900 on another rim I can swap too.
Sleeping in the car is the go most times, to save money. Make sandwich's before I go, but don't eat much on a race day anyway.
When I came off and damaged my hand at the last track day, it was ether,, get it checked out at a doctors,,, or have petrol money to get home again :shutup: ,, not both.

Budgeting:
The household budget has to be looked at carefully.
Do I want to go out to the movies? or go racing?
Out for tea? or go racing?
do I really need new jeans/shoes/undees? or am I going racing?

Needless to say... I don't have much of a life, other than waiting for the next race day I can get too!
Mid life crisis's have to be appeased!

:done:

[t3mp0r4ry nzr]

I sell drugs on the side

[Disco Dan]

I sell drugs on the side

yeah helps.. :innocent:

i have a car and bike, mini uses flob all gas little more than bike.

fulltime student, so get student allowance but that barely pays for my social expenses ;)

..do pc repairs when i can which pays for reg, wof and speeding tickets :innocent:

very hard! ...may give up smoking soon! :bye:

[nighthawk]

Sure know the feeling C/P, its hard to keep ahead and do the things you enjoy,hence for us the bike only comes out in fine weather or on the odd weekend we don't have the kids.Mind you as you know fine days or reasonable weather has been a scarse commodity here of late

[thehollowmen]

...is a good way to learn about how hard it's going to be later on when you have your own kids.


Point. And that's one reason I've made sure I don't/won't have kids.

I've also given up drinking too...

[xwhatsit]

Hahahaha.

This question made me laugh.

I'm a student, and a poor one at that.

The question for me is... how can I NOT afford a bike? I used to catch the bus, to and from work, uni, yadayada. I live in Mangere Bridge, and everything is in the city and my work is in Remmers. My monthly bus pass (the cheapest option) was $160 a month.

$160 a month!

That's like more than a quarter of my wages; $40 a week.

On the bike I pay perhaps $20 a week at most in fuel, possibly only $10 if I'm careful. Rego, insurance, WOF of course... but it would still be well under $40. Plus, a bike is just better than a bus in any terms. I can leave half an hour to an hour later, depending on traffic and how many different buses I have to catch to get to where I want to go. In addition, where I live, often there is a bus only every hour, so I may get to where I want to go 45 minutes early. I value my time quite highly, I never seem to have enough hours to sleep, study, eat, work, and have some sort of social activity.

Of course there's the initial outlay, and extra costs like cracking cylinder heads as I've just done. However I would still wager I'm better off at the end of the day financially compared to a bus. Plus there's the intangibles... the grin on your face you get riding along the waterfront at St Heliers at 9PM with the streetlights shining on the rain-soaked road...

[Bonez]

Some of you have families to look after, some of you are unemployed or students. How do you afford to ride?

I love to ride, but I'm about to join the ranks of the unemployed next week, and the car and bike services coming up are daunting.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not going to sell my baby or anything. First I'm going to give up eating or something. I'm curious as to how some of you scrape by with this expensive habit. I just buy cheap ol shitters(20- 30 years old or thereabouts http://bonezs-blog.blogspot.com/ ) which are cheap on tires and ancillieries, minimal plastic work. Still plenty about. Hell some are even deemed "classics". If they crap out in a big way I haven't too much "invested", just scrap them and use what I can to keep the others going. Each time I arrive home without a major drama after a long ride , which is the majority of the time I might add, is always a bonus.

Have a reasonable job at the moment and can afford something more recent but old habits are hard to kill. :yes:

[yungatart]

Budget! Mstrs is of Scottish descent, so has a pretty good control of $$, far better than me, so I am happy to leave it up to him to be honest.
Hxc has some expensive pastimes, but now that I am not carting him around in the Commodore on a daily basis, the petrol in the car lasts a lot longer, which leaves more available for riding. He fillls his own bike but occasionally we top it up for him, he works only about 5 hrs per week so doesn't have lots of cash.
Kids, mortgages, tax bills, rates etc can certainly leave huge holes in bank a/cs, but we always get by, I guess

[Mr. Peanut]

Services? If it aint broke dont fix it :D

[RantyDave]

My argument is that bike riding pays for itself.
Quite. I need to get to work. The options are bus, scooter, bike, car. I could cycle in but I'm not hard enough (although this would probably be the ideal solution in a lot of ways). The scooter is by far the most practical and will be the fallback if money's tight. Bike and car cost, I guess, more or less the same ... but I get a much better bike than I could even think about affording as a car. And parking's free, of course.

From that point on the bike is a free weekend toy :)

EDIT Actually, the real question should be , how do you justify having a cage as well as the bike.
I have a family too - we couldn't really not have one. The luxury is having the bike over a scooter, a scooter over a pedal bike, and I'd rather crawl than catch the bus any more.

Dave

[thehollowmen]

EDIT Actually, the real question should be , how do you justify having a cage as well as the bike.

I can't. I'm planning to get rid of it.

[onearmedbandit]

You should try running my cage, 4.6l V8 fulltime 4x4 weighing in at about 2.5 ton. I leave that for the wife to drive, don't even notice the running costs of the bike compared to that! (Currently the cage is telling me it's using around 32.8 liters per 100km!)

[thehollowmen]

You should try running my cage, 4.6l V8 fulltime 4x4 weighing in at about 2.5 ton. I leave that for the wife to drive, don't even notice the running costs of the bike compared to that! (Currently the cage is telling me it's using around 32.8 liters per 100km!)

Have you seen what Scumdog drives?
7.0L turbo
I'd swear that beauty must get gallons to the mile.

[The Pastor]

I ride untill I have no money, and if im running tight (like the dagaville ride) i keep it in 6th on 100, I managed to get 13.666 kms/L! usally I get 9-10!! I was stoked, thats an extra 75km to my tank! WOAH.

If I get stuck somewhere, i just get a trailer and somone with a car + gas and they come and get me :D Doesnt leave me much money in the week though, but sif, you only need one meal a week, right?

[Squeak the Rat]

Owning and riding a bike is not a cost, it is an investment. For most of us it is a passion that balances out all the shit things that go on, plus it' a type of meditation that gets us back to a state of normality.

[-JC & Eleanor-]

"where theres a will theres a way!!!!"

try being a full time athlete training towards the olympics twice daily, & being @ Full time uni, .....

then trying to fit in work!!! although i must atmit the good old studylink helpes me out :rockon:

cheers.

[R6_kid]

I'm a student. For quite a while i found myself with shit all money left over at the end of the week, but thats mostly to me spending too much on food and other unneeded shit.

I work 20hrs a week which brings in about $340 a fortnight. If i save thats more than enough to keep me sweet for trackdays, tyres, services and all the rest. But i *hadnt* been saving, something that has now changed and i find things a lot less stressful. Also learning to do the small things like chain adjusting etc etc helps keep money spent on the bike to a minimum.

[andrea]

work hard and i try to get as much overtime as possible especially onsiters its hard work with heavy lifting but i dont care. im also a student too.and it helps when my parents are far away cause i just pop there for a feed:msn-wink: which im going to do right now hehe

[andrea]

oops im mean that my parents arent far away

[Grinner]

I don't think about it. If I want to go for a ride I go.
Go now pay later, that's me.