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I might be buying a bike real soon, so I was wondering what did you guys pay for in freight and assembly, as this is a charge they are going to make me pay?

there are 2 charges that i usually see when purchasing a new bike from a dealer

Destination and Prep


Destination- just like a car...its transporting the bike to the shop.
I have seend it from 250-400 here in Chicago


Prep- Seems that the bike isnt fully ready to go when it arrives inthe shop. Fluids and other adjustments needs to be made. Prices that i have seen range from 150-350



final additional cost that is a must is the tax.....check out your local taxes, but taxes for a new bike in Chicago metro is between 7-8.5% of the total bike


soo.....my $5000 V Star Classic that i truely want to buy ended up getting past 6K because of all these fees. ( about 750 for tax....250 for des and 150 for prep). I have not purchased my bike yet and plan to haggle on these fees. Ideally....everyone pays for tax....destination..hoping to get like 50-100 bucks off...and see if they can waive the Prep free. Thats what i would do...but in most cases, those are usually part of the cost- You may get breaks if you get last year models and if the shop is really trying hard to get rid of the bike...
good luck!
hope to get mine in April of 06!

Contrary to popular belief , bikes do not come totally assembled . Some are more together than others . Some are a real pain in the derriere .
Then there are some that it takes longer to disassemble the crate than it does to put the bike together , all in all , someone has to pay my wages..........
Regards, Wizzard
Oh and after we assemble them and make sure they are running right , they then go to the shop itself for further work . Fine tuning , cleaning , etc.
Our average prep charges are $188.00 USD .

Thanxs for the info. I'm actually buying the bike used. He said I had to pay for this at first, and that is when I posted this up. I started thinking about it, and I thought it made no sense having to pay for that if the bike is used, so I asked the guy about it, and he said no I don't have to pay for those charges. Glad I asked him lots of questions.

i would have paid around $3,000 USD for both freight and handling fee but they didn't charge me for it and they even sold it to for less than the MSRP.

i got such a good deal for a brand new '06 bike. i wouldn't have bought my gixxer if it wasn't for the big discount.

I've found that it depends on the bike, and the dealer. Some bikes are more labour intensive to put together than others. Some dealers try to cover more overhead in these costs as well.

Same bike, Same year, same everything:

Mcbride Cycle:

Frieght: 300$
PDI: 300$

St. Onge, Barrie:

Frieght: 150$
PDI: 150$

GT Powersports:
Frieght: 100$
PDI: 100$


Interesting, ain't it?

VermilionX wrote:i would have paid around $3,000 USD for both freight and handling fee but they didn't charge me for it and they even sold it to for less than the MSRP.

i got such a good deal for a brand new '06 bike. i wouldn't have bought my gixxer if it wasn't for the big discount.

LoL, I feel so bad about saying this, because it's going to totally burst your bubble. But the MSRP is inflated, the shipping and frieght are also something that most places are willing to let go. On any given bike that I've ever considered buying I should be able to walk out the door at least 10% under the MSP after taxes.

And if they quoted $3000 for freight I'd laugh, the frieght on mine at the "O Ring" stealership I didn't buy from was only $300 Canadian for a new Honda 599. I can't imagine paying $3000.

really? well, i never heard of that regarding dealers willing to discount the freight and handling fee all the time.

oh well, it doesn't matter to me though. at least i know i didn't pay too much for my bike.

other bikes i saw at the dealership have way less freight and handling fee. it all depends on the bike.

Yes, they will often discount the frieght fee, what I'm talking about is the line they fed you about $3000 in freight. My uncle just bought a Goldwing ($30000 bike) which set him back $1000 in freight and assembly. Why was yours so much?

Sevulturus wrote:Yes, they will often discount the frieght fee, what I'm talking about is the line they fed you about $3000 in freight. My uncle just bought a Goldwing ($30000 bike) which set him back $1000 in freight and assembly. Why was yours so much?

i dunno... that's just what was on the tag. i guess my bike takes more work to assemble or not, whatever. im just glad i didn't have to pay for it.

here's the exact value...

bike - $10,999
freight - $1,383
handling - $1,419
_______________

they sold it to me for $10,626. but of course i paid more since of the taxes, registration, delivery, warranty, GAP insurance, etc.