early February '01...

Our bikes were bought from Inder Motors and they offer a buy back program when you are finished with the bike. They told us they would buy the bikes back from us for $200 - $300USD less than what we paid for them, not bad for 8 months use. They also supplied us with all the paperwork needed to sell the bikes to a private individual. How much time we have when we depart India will determine which route we will take for selling. I have seen people post bikes for sale on the Lonely Planet's site under the Thorn Tree in the Subcontinent/India section, they seem to get pretty good responses.

early September '01...

Damn, is it fun to finally have something to SELL back to the Indians or other tourists!! Selling the bike turned out to be quite easy for us, however we probably didn't get as much as we could have for the bikes considering we didn't do much (err, I mean any) advertising privately. Lazy bastards. We took our bikes down to Karol Bagh, went to the various shops, and asked if they were interested in buying them. All were interested......in getting a good deal!! Actually they all offered about Rps 30,000-33,000 (about $630-$700 USD). Also at this time in Karol Bagh, we asked various Westerners looking at bikes if they were interested. Jared got lucky and sold his bike to a handsome young Israeli named Norm for the going-out-of-business-sale price of Rps 34,000 ($715 USD). I ended up selling my bike to Guderial Motors for the blue-light-special price of RPS 33,000 ($ 695 USD). Considering we bought the bikes seven months ago for Rps 45,000 ($ 960 USD) we felt just fine about what we sold them for......at net cost of around $250 USD!!!!

When selling privately we suggest that you clean up the old beast, put it in a busy, visible but safe spot on the street with a "for sale" sign on it listing your guest house, room, and email address, etc. Also it couldn't hurt to print out an ad with all your info and tack it onto notice boards in guest houses, restaurants, and coffee shops. Keep in mind that you may have to wait around in the same place for a few days or weeks in order to sell your bike this way. As far as paperwork goes, make sure you sign over a reeceipt to the new owner stating that you sold the bike "as is" on said date for said price. And then wash your hands clean, brothas and sistahs.

Overall, selling was much easier than we thought it would be. It seems that the general rule of thumb is the more energy you put into selling your bike, the more money you will probably get out of it. Be aggressive, advertise everywhere, ask a reasonable price, and talk to as many people as you can. Or, be lazy like us and sell at the first chance you get--cash in hand in less than an hour. Hallelujah Praise the Lord AMEN!