I spent 4 weeks touring Australia back in 1996 with a rented BMW F650. I had a great time and it was probably the most enjoyable motorcycle tour I've ever had. I've been contemplating doing another Australian tour, but for an even longer span, say 6 to 8 weeks.

I've considered a buy-back type scheme, but I'm not very keen on those, as they ask for a big chunk of change up-front, and then you cross your fingers and hope you get some of your money back at the end.

When I look at rentals, I see companies wanting to rent fancy Harleys and BMWs for equally fancy prices. All I want is a mid-size Japanese street bike, say 350 to 650 ccs, that I can strap a sleeping bag and a tent to and go riding.

Does anyone know of a place that hires out the sort of basic non-fancy motorcycle that I'm looking for, at basic non-fancy prices..?

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Bruce Clarke - 2020 Yamaha XV250

Nah, no cheapie bike rentals in Oz I'm afraid, not even scooters.

Best bet for cheap is to rent a car, or even buy an older bike (10-15 years old seems to be the sweet spot) and see if you can sell it at the end of your journey (even if you can't sell it you are probably in front compared with 8 weeks rental charges).

Alternatively you may wish to find an owner who is prepared to loan out one of their bikes.

Good luck.

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Garry from Oz - powered by Burgman

For your time frame, you'll come out well ahead buying and selling, over renting, big time. The big exception is if you have a major repair. That can be a very big exception of you're unlucky.

Good to see you're heading back to this neck of the woods again, Bruce.

Regards

Nigel in NZ

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The mouth of a perfectly contented man is filled with . -- 2200 BC Egyptian inscription

Thanks for the replies. Any buy-back companies you've heard good things about, and can recommend?

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Bruce Clarke - 2020 Yamaha XV250

For 6-8 weeks bike rental can be quite hard on the wallet. I note you are not keen on buy back and I can understand as it may be a little difficult to organise from a distance. A bit of personal experience - I was motoring around New Zealand and decided to enquire about motorcycle rental. I went to one place that did servicing for a couple of bike rental firms (North Island). They were good people and their advice to me was "call me two or three weeks ahead of your trip and we can discuss the second hand bikes we have in stock. Tell me the distance you will travel and I will work out the cost of the bike and the repurchase price. On the figures he gave me the cost was about half the rentsl cost.

I recently shipped my bike to NZ to ride around for a while and met up with an English chap who bought a 700cc Kawasaki (fairly new) and had a contract with the dealer for repurchase (he organised this from the UK). The figure quoted worked out to be a little over half the rental rate. I contacted him after we both went back to out respective countries and he had no issues with the buy back. Dealer was keen to see he had not dropped the bike and so gave the agreed price no questions. (Keep in mind if you hire a bike and drop it the cost is also about $2500NZ).

Now for Aus. Phone calls are not expensive (certainly not with a Canadian VOX phone card from my experience) so it may be worthwhile just working out your entry city and looking for dealers of the brand you are interested in and cold calling.

I tried to get a bike in Vancouver to ride to the HU meeting in BC in August last year. Hire bikes were hard to get (all booked out) and the dealer suggested a buy/repurchase is worth looking at. The time I had was short and accommodation was almost all booked out at that time and so I did not go ahead.

My thoughts

All the best

Thanks for reply.... I'll check that out.

One place that has more affordable rentals is Garner's in Sydney. Garners Motorcycle Rental Melbourne and Sydney Australia They have a CB400 for about $2600 a month, but haven't responded to my emails.


Update: they did get back to me eventually, but their rates don't get any cheaper, even with several weeks of rental - they quoted me $3990 AUS for 6 weeks. I get that there's a lot more overhead in renting a motorcycle than a car, so it makes some sense to charge $100/day for a small bike... but after 30 or 40 days I think you should get more of a break on the total cost.

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Bruce Clarke - 2020 Yamaha XV250

Have a look at Rent That Bike in Brisbane. They were the cheapest in Australia last year when I did a two week ride there.

https://rent-this-bike.com
Hmmm... Lowest rate for long term is $75/day, which does seem to be the cheapest I've found.
I'll check into them.

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Bruce Clarke - 2020 Yamaha XV250

Hiring is one option,buying another one.

Up to you.

Everything here is expensive here.

Used Motorcycle For Sale - Buy and Sell Motorcycles Australia - bikesales.com.au

From the pricing I'm finding on the Internet, most of the costs for a road trip are about the same or less than where I live.

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Bruce Clarke - 2020 Yamaha XV250

I don't suppose you have contact details for either the dealer or the chap who bought the Kawasaki do you?

Hi Rachael,

Just on the HU site now (been as busy as a one-armed paper hanger since coming back from NZ).

I have the email address of the rider who undertook the buy back scheme on my contacts (Dave) so please give me a minute and I will PM it to you. If you do not get it send me a pm (with direct email) and I will send again.

Regards
Mal