Servicing and Resale Value

[GSband]

...
Seriously interested buyers will be looking to buy a nice condition bike at that age, not a book of stamps. ...

Err... seriously interested buyers will be looking to buy a nice condition bike at that age WITH a book of stamps... IMHO. It seems to me that if a buyer has a choice between 2 identical bikes, the one with FSH will win hands down.

 

[RickG]

Err... seriously interested buyers will be looking to buy a nice condition bike at that age WITH a book of stamps... IMHO. It seems to me that if a buyer has a choice between 2 identical bikes, the one with FSH will win hands down.

This is true, assuming as you say the bikes AND the asking price are roughly equal. The point is that if you've clocked up a reasonable milage, say more than 30,000, you may have saved around a thousand quid is servicing costs by doing the servicing yourself and can afford to lower the sale price as necessay to reflect the casual punter's assumption that a FSH is some measure of the quality of the service history, which unfortunately it isn't always.

If, like me, you do more than 20,000 a year then the savings in doing the service youself become very significant with the impact on resale value being domimated by the high milage. Again though I could afford to ask perhaps a couple of grand less for the bike and still be in pocket compared to what I would have otherwise stumped up for the FSH.

 

[GSband]

You've got a point there.

 

[steveh]

my bikes 3.5 years old

I'm keeping it forever so will do the 24k service due very soon myself as its going to cost a bomb at the dealer and now its out of warranty why would I pay over odds for what is very simple work.

In your case I'd go independent and just keep all the receipts.