I haven't owned a motorbike since moving to Da Nang a few years ago. I rent one every now and then but then got tired of going over to the shop and doing the paperwork every time I wanted to head out of town a bit. When it go to the point that I was spending more on daily rentals in a month than it would just cost me to rent a bike by the month and keep it in my own garage when it is not being used, I decided to rent by the month. These days, I am starting to think that paying the 1.5 million VND a month might not be worth it either, especially when there are bikes for sale for 10 million or less. If you are going to stay here for more than 6-8 months and you drive a bike, it doesn't really make much sense to rent the bike either.
I suppose the only upside with renting would be that you are not financially responsible for maintenance and repairs but honestly, most of this costs very little here anyway.
Recently a bike came up for sale for around $300 and I am seriously tempted to buy it.
Now this bike is nothing special, it certainly isn't super fast with its 125CC engine. It is fast enough though and i do like the beefy tires that are on it should I ever feel like going semi-offroad. The bike is a bit old though and that concerns me.
I tooled around on it a bit and it runs well and is not ostentatiously loud either, which is something I would never purchase because everyone hates those guys.
One downside is that it is a proper motorcycle in that it has a clutch and manual gears. I don't have a problem with semi-automatic bikes that I call "step throughs" but sometimes a big with proper gears can be a bit annoying especially if you live in an urban area like I do. It seems to me as though you spend an awful lot of time mucking about with gears and this can actually be a bit dangerous since the roads here are so crazy that you need to have your full attention on the roads around you, not messing about with gears that refuse to get into neutral. This is something that has happened to me in the past and there was likely an easy fix but I just didn't take it to the mechanic.
I may still end up buying this bike because is it unusual and it has a very comfortable seat on it. I need to try to look past the unique sexiness of it though and instead focus on whether or not it is practical. I don't make enough money to be buying road toys.
So what do you think" Should I pick up this bad boy or leave it alone?