FREE MOTORCYCLES!
Well, I’ve always sorta looked at it that way, but now more than ever I can prove that buying a nice, small commuter bike is like getting it for free. Now, I admit, I’m using my own numbers here to prove the point. You can substitute your own and you may find you could get a bike for free even faster than me.
First, how far do I drive and how many days do I work a year. My round-trip to work is 34 miles and I work about 240 days per year. That comes to 8,160 miles per year. I have a Chevy Avalanche, not exactly on the dean’s list of fuel economy. I get about 16 MPG. That means in 1 year just going to work it takes about 510 gallons of gas. Now, we’re not quite there yet but at $4.50 per gallon that costs me $2,295 to go to work in gas money.
Now, I just checked Ebay and it seems you can get a Kawasaki Ninja 250 or a Honda Rebel 250 for about $2,000, plus or minus $500. You see where this is going already, don’t you. Yeah, these bikes get 65 to 75 MPG CITY!!!! Now, you still have to buy gas so at 65 MPG this will cost you less than $600 for the entire year. That’s a savings of about $1,700 per year. By 18 months your little commuter bike is like riding for free.
Now, not everyone can do this to the extent we have available in South Florida where riding is almost year-round. But every little bit helps and a little bike like this could save you enough money to fuel that Harley-Davidson Ultra, Honda Gold Wing or VTX, or countless other bikes that struggle to stay in the 30 to 40 MPG range. Either way, the numbers above save me $7.21 every day I ride a little commuter bike over the Avalanche. If I ride just 100 days a year that means I save over $700 in gas. I can live with it. Even at that rate, the bike is free in just 3 years.