Depreciation-proof bike

A mate of mine is going to get a bike licence soon and wants a fairly classic bike that will be as depreciation proof as possible as he's not going to ride it very much, just for fun on weekends etc. I have no idea about budget but up to about £3k I imagine, probably less. Bear in mind that he will be a new rider so insurance should hopefully be low, plus it can't look too old-manish!

[SoulKiss]

Originally Posted by benp1

A mate of mine is going to get a bike licence soon and wants a fairly classic bike that will be as depreciation proof as possible as he's not going to ride it very much, just for fun on weekends etc. I have no idea about budget but up to about £3k I imagine, probably less. Bear in mind that he will be a new rider so insurance should hopefully be low, plus it can't look too old-manish!

A Curvy, or a Silver Framed Pointy will be sub £2k and not drop to much less than £1k ever (I would think).

Makes a good 1st bike too, and insurance is not too bad.

Well that will be a recommendation from me but I have a curvy S already so he may not want one of those. Are there any others?

id say soulkiss is on the right track, rule of thumb "the more you spend the more you loose" "the leest you spend the leest you loose"

so -
03 - 04 sv
03 - 05 bandit
any VFR as they hold prices well
2k on a gixer? its always going to be worth about that.

[Swin]

You could pick up a 03/04 cbr six for that price too.

I'm not sure I'd call an 03-05 bandit depreciation proof tho, but as with all bikes, where they're kept, maintenance routine etc will play a big part in that, if you don't keep on top of this routine Bandits look cruddy very very quickly

Old BMW R100 or R80.

Thanks for the advice so far, all look like good contenders, apart from the BMWs. If I didn't see a grey haired bloke driving one of those I'd be shocked!

Why 03-04 in particular for the SV? I would have thought any year/model, are the pointys better at holding their value?

[Dave20046]

My SV650 would be perfect
(as per my signature)

Rvf400

[SoulKiss]

Originally Posted by benp1

Thanks for the advice so far, all look like good contenders, apart from the BMWs. If I didn't see a grey haired bloke driving one of those I'd be shocked!

Why 03-04 in particular for the SV? I would have thought any year/model, are the pointys better at holding their value?

The black frame seems to be to more people's liking and the 03 is unique due to them having to re-engineer the rear subframe as people complained it was too high.

So a couple of little niggles that may affect pricing.

On the other hand, some people prefer the higher tail of the 03, only issue is with getting certain bits second hand as they are rarer than the 04-09 bits.