If you paid $21K for a Road King I hope they kissed you cause you certainly got screwed. I paid less than that for a 09 Ultra Classic.

I am sure if you look at the bottom line...tax, tag, title, etc. you spent more than that. Plus the bikes in the last 2 years have taken a plunge. In case your not aware we are in a bit of a recession. So I guess everyone pre-recession got "screwed" huh?

Semantics, but that's cool. No one should pay sticker, even at the HD stealer. Recession or not.

Your missing the point of the topic here...try and sell that 09 Ultra right now and see what it brings. I bet you lose your butt.

I won't be screwed on mine, I bought a NEW 07 the end of 08, paid $9900, added tax, tag, title and a 3 year full maintenance contract with it. I also got special Yamaha financing of 3.5% for 5 years.

I will keep this bike to pass on to my son or maybe even my Grandson. Priceless!

My point exactly! The thing that I have a hard time convincing the "The only bike in the world is a Harley" crowd of is just because a 3 year old Harley has a higher resale value than just about any metric bike doesn't mean it holds its value better. If you lose 6K on a Harley and 4K on a metric bike than what was the better investment. The real answer is neither if your looking at it from an investment aspect, but the metric bike is the lesser of the two evils. Even though there seems to be a trend beginning here recently where the metric companies are producing more expensive bikes and the Harley's are getting a little cheaper. If you take a Stratoliner for example with a suggested price of 17K (I know you can get them alot cheaper) that would have blown alot of people's minds a few years back. I also think people are realizing there are alot of benefits to the metric bikes so they can swallow a little higher price. Anyway, who cares, ride what you want - pay what you want - as long as your on 2 wheels!!!!!!

Mr_Shamrock wrote:
I will NEVER buy a new bike ever again!
I have absolutely no regrets buying a brand new 2007 R*MS leftover for $9k. Like you said, it's impossible for me to lose $10k.

A couple of things here, and I know we are on the same page...

First, I LIVE in HD country! You can't swing a dead rat without hitting one!

The second point, Metrics are gaining notoriety and therefore are "Worth more" hence the dealers asking for more money, the other side of that is HD is struggling because of 2 things, the economy, and more people are buying metrics (because of price vs value and quality)

All I've seen from the rough times MC wise is fewer people in the showrooms, HD dealers offering MSRP instead of 10-15% above MSRP on new bikes. I still see bikes listed in the paper and on the Web for the prices I said before. Whether they're getting those prices or not is another story entirely.

I think if HD dealers were selling below MSRP, like metrics often do, it would piss off alot of their zombies (I mean faithful followers) who bought their bike a year or two ago for much more than what you can buy a new bike for now. Plus I think once you go down that route, you can't turn around when the economy turns around. I agree metric bikes MSRPs are approaching those of HDs and that's disturbing. If HDs and metrics were about the same price, I'd have a HD most likely.

Metrics don't have the loyal following HD does. How many of you will buy a yami next? You may wind up with one, but you will consider offerings from kawi, honda, suzuki, hd, etc. HD folks get excited if they change a knob on a bike from one year to another. For many HD owners, anything other than a HD is not a MC. HD does have the brand loyalty no other MC company has. Years of masterful marketing.