In this episode, Senior Staff Writer Tanner Bowden, who covers outdoors and fitness, explains what's so difficult about buying used bikes online–and offers tips on making it much easier. Like so many other industries and hobbies, cycling has seen a pretty significant resurgence in the wake of our Coronavirus-related lifestyle changes, and perhaps you're newly in the market; maybe you're a cyclist of many years and looking for an upgrade. Regardless, you'd be forgiven for finding the used bike-buying process somewhat opaque, but with a few specific strategies in mind–steps you may not have thought to take, helpful websites to utilize–Tanner says it's actually quite easy to find that bike of your dreams. So whether you're a casual or new rider looking for a commuter, or a dedicated enthusiast in search of an extremely high-end machine, Tanner's tips will arm you well to tackle the used bike marketplace.
Senior Staff Writer Tanner Bowden explains what's so difficult about buying used bikes online–and offers tips on making it much easier.
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Nick Caruso:
This is the Gear Patrol podcast. In this episode, senior staff writer, Tanner Bowden, who covers outdoors and fitness joins me from Vermont to explain what's so difficult about buying used bikes online and to offer tips to make it much easier. Like so many other industries and hobbies, cycling has seen a pretty significant resurgence in the wake of our Coronavirus related lifestyle changes. As a result, demand for used bikes has skyrocketed, but with a few specific strategies in mind, Tanner says it's actually quite easy to find that bike of your dreams online. Regardless of whether you're a casual or new rider looking for a commuter or a dedicated enthusiast in search of an extremely high end machine, his primer will arm you well to tackle the used bike marketplace.
Nick Caruso:
If you find this advice helpful and the episode interesting, I hope you'll subscribe to the podcast and take a second to give us a solid rating. We'd appreciate five stars, if only because it gets the podcast in front of more listeners, but now we have lots of ground to cover with Tanner. I'm Nick Caruso and I'm glad you're here. Let's get started.
Nick Caruso:
So, Tanner, tell me what's so hard about buying a used bike online?
Tanner Bowden:
Okay, first to answer the question I'll tell you what's hard about buying a bike online period and it's mainly that there is this symbiotic relationship between bike brands and brick and mortar bike shops that has made online bike selling much more uncommon than pretty much any other thing. You can pretty much buy anything on the internet right now, but essentially bike makers have maintained this structure of not selling their bikes directly to people on the internet because they need shops. They need shops to create an infrastructure of essentially service.
Tanner Bowden:
So, bike maintenance and even just simply putting together the bike out of the box is not an easy thing for the average person to do. If you've ever had trouble with putting together IKEA furniture, then good luck trying to put together a bike the way it comes shipped to you.
Nick Caruso:
Right, because there's actual mechanical things to worry about with a bike. You're not just putting screws into strange umlaut holes, you're actually tuning stuff.
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah, exactly and there's a set of specific tools that you have to have too. So, that is also just a very fundamental issue. There are some brands that sell direct to consumer, like Canyon bikes is a big notable one. Then, when you're shopping around you might find some brands where it seems like you're buying it directly from them, but really they're still sending the bike to your local bike shop, your local Trek, or Giant dealer, or whatever and they're putting it together for you. Then, getting it to you or you're going and picking it up from them. So, even there's these situations where it seems like you're getting it online, but you're really still going through this same bike maker, bike shop relationship.
Nick Caruso:
So, it's not so much ... It doesn't sound like it's so much about control as it is quality control. Not control over the consumer experience, it's quality control, making sure the bike is okay to use.
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah, yeah, totally. There's a lot of knowledge that goes into bicycles that the average person doesn't have. They're fricking complicated machines frankly.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, for sure. I know we will talk about the similarities between buying bikes and cars online, but this is a really similar thing to the car buying process. I mean, it's another vehicle for one, but in very rare instances can you actually purchase a car not through a dealership, a new car not through a dealership. The biggest exception being Tesla, who doesn't have dealerships, you literally buy them online. So, it is a complicated process for vehicles, particularly with bikes. You don't have to put cars together yourself though.
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah, yeah, right. To answer your original question about what makes it hard to buy a used bike online, mainly it's just that there aren't a lot of places to buy used bikes online. That's kind of it. The places that you do buy them online, you're really ... It's an Ebay situation where you're interfacing with just another human being and then how do you tell if the bike you're buying even works. It's just sort of a complex transaction that the internet doesn't really facilitate all that well, but there are ways to do it, to get around that difficulty.
Nick Caruso:
Sure and we're going to talk about a few of them, but this ... I'm going to jump way ahead into something really specific. The first thing that comes to mind when I'm buying something online, as I'm sure a lot of people, for better or worse, is Amazon and you can buy bikes on Amazon, right?
Tanner Bowden:
You can, yeah, you can. You won't find a lot of the core bike brands on Amazon. Actually, I don't know of any examples on Amazon, but you can buy cheap, budget friendly bikes on Amazon. I don't know that I would recommend it.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, no, I'm not asking you to. I'm just ... So, it sounds like ... So, for the purposes of this conversation, we're talking about ... Is it fair to say we're talking about nicer bikes?
Tanner Bowden:
I would say we're talking $400 and up bicycle. A reliable, every day bike up to a nice high-end road or mountain bike.
Nick Caruso:
Got it, got it, that's great context. So, it's tough ... You say it's tough because there aren't a lot of places to do it. I do this all the time where I'm teasing things we're going to talk ... I know we'll talk about, but there is a reason recently, before we get to that, there's a recent reason that it's tougher to buy bikes, that I've gleaned from some of your posts and that is the ... Not many people know about this maybe, this pandemic that's been going on.
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah, yeah, there is a massive bike shortage due to this pandemic that we've been going through. It's been happening since last year. It's kind of like this perfect storm of things that have contributed to this bike shortage. Before the pandemic, there were these ... The tariffs that Trump put on Chinese made goods. A lot of bikes and bike parts are made in China, so that caused a lot of bike makers to be more conservative in their manufacturing, not just produce a ton of bikes. Then right after that happened, you get the pandemic, which messes up manufacturing in China first, but then everywhere and it messes up shipping.
Tanner Bowden:
Then, it also increases demand because people want to do stuff outside more. There's actually some survey data from, that Trek put out recently. They said that 37% of US residents say that they've been riding bikes more, specifically because of the pandemic, as a result of the pandemic. So, increase demand and then you get weird stuff like the Suez Canal thing that also adds to it.
Nick Caruso:
Gosh, we've had a perfect storm of issues for consumers lately. People are riding bikes, you say, partially to get outside more, but I imagine it's also for ... Somewhat for maybe commuting and just generally getting around too. Maybe not wanting to get on buses and ride share stuff.
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah.
Nick Caruso:
I think there's also a stat that you quote in one of those posts about the percent or the number of people who say that they plan to continue biking after the pandemic, right? I didn't make that up did I?
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah. No, no, no, that's true. That was from another Trek survey. That was a little earlier than the one I just cited, but it was like 50% of bike owners say that they're going to continue to ride bikes more after the pandemic. That's been true for a lot of things, like running and stuff too. People have rediscovered these activities and bikes is certainly one of them.
Nick Caruso:
Right. Oh my gosh, my body can move on its own power, this is great. Okay, so for these people, this huge increase, this surge in demand, people are looking for bikes and you can't always buy a new bike. Sometimes you need a used bike. You can't go to stores lately, so everybody's turned to the internet. I imagine that's where the bottleneck happens. So, what is the ... What are the issues we're looking at here, in terms of finding a used bike?
Tanner Bowden:
The first issue is that, again, similar to cars, that finding a good used bike, even on the internet, is just tricky because everyone wants to be getting one of these things. It's also just a quality thing, right, which is sort of what I was talking about earlier. It's hard to know that what you're getting is going to work, is going to fit you even, when you're just looking at a Craigslist ad or a couple photos on Ebay. Frankly, it's hard to trust people when you're buying something like this on Ebay, or Craigslist, or wherever. Theft is a problem, people steal bikes and sell them online. You really shouldn't be buying a stolen bike if you can identify that and avoid it.
Nick Caruso:
Right, and you have a tip for that, not to give it away. I know that because I wrote it down, but I want you to say it.
Tanner Bowden:
Okay. Also, there aren't a lot of places to buy bikes online. There are some more dedicated sites, I mentioned a couple in the article that we're talking a lot about here. Pink Bike, is a bike enthusiast forum site and they have a specific forum dedicated to buying and selling. There's Gear Trade, is another one, which is like an Ebay, but specifically for outdoor gear. That one's kind of nice because Gear Trade itself actually acts an intermediary. Another one, which we'll dig into, is the Pro's Closet, which is a dedicated used, high-end, used bike store that's all online.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, which is really cool. The more I've read about it, mostly from what you've written, it's really quite the service. Before someone even starts to ... Before someone even opens their web browser, what do they need to know about shopping for a bike? Let's say a person is a noob, they're a person who doesn't want to take the bus anymore, who wants to get out, get active, but they don't know where to start. So, what are the basics we need to know before we're looking and discovering that it's difficult to do this at all?
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah, so you need to ... You kind of need to know what you're looking for because that's part of the difference between shopping in a store and shopping online. In a store, you can just walk in and talk to someone, and express exactly what you just said, and they'll guide you to the right bike. But what are you going to type into Ebay, bike for someone who doesn't own a bike, I don't know. You want to know what size bike. You want to know what type of bike. Are you going mountain biking, or are you riding to work, or are you road biking, or are you doing something else entirely? Do you want an electric bike? All these different things are what you want to think about.
Tanner Bowden:
It's hard and it does take some research, looking at Gear Patrol articles or some other endemic bike publications. You can learn about the differences between different types of bikes and things. Then, you'll have more of a specific thing to type into Ebay, or Craigslist, or whatever.
Nick Caruso:
Right because when you're searching ... This is like any other shopping experience in a lot of ways in that there are filters. So, knowing your size, which is very similar to your inseam. You say, the type, maybe you have a brand in mind. Certainly, you want to know your budget. So, let's talk about the problems then. Once we get to a site, which a few of which will actually give specific tips for, but there's this really ... The reason this entire topic was really appealing to me personally is one sentence, I don't have a quote, but I can paraphrase. You talk about how a used bike, there's no odometer on a regular bicycle.
Nick Caruso:
So, if I'm shopping for a car, I know that it has 100,000 miles on it or 50,000 miles on it. A bike, you don't. There's no record of how it was used. So, that seems like the biggest barrier, the initial barrier that you're talking about, whether it was stolen, or ridden really hard, or modified, or something like that. Are there other specific difficulties that come with buying a bike outside those elements?
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah, totally, you kind of nailed it. There's so many different components on a bike that maybe you're looking at a bike that was owned by a dedicated mountain biker or rode cyclist and they've recently replaced the brakes, or the drive train, or something. If that's the case, that kind of person will probably note that in an online listing, but if you're looking at a lower end bike, maybe just a get around town kind of bike or a commuter bike, again, this goes back to the thing that most people don't maintain a high level of knowledge about their bikes. You take them ... When it is making a weird sound, you take it into the shop for maintenance.
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah, that's the thing. If something's wrong with the brakes, or the cables, or the derailleur, or any number of small parts, the difficulty is how are you going to know that from an online listing, unless you have a very good seller who's going to note these things. Again, most people might not be that.
Nick Caruso:
Right, so that bring us to the tips that you actually have and you've broken down ... There's a post that we'll link in the show notes or on the site, wherever anybody has found the podcast, this episode, that basically breaks down how to shop for a used bike online and you sort of separate the advice into different outlets. I think that's a really great way to talk about just generally buying a bike, is to walk through these. So, may I escort you through the post?
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah, let's do it.
Nick Caruso:
Okay, so you start with ... You give the advice that you've already talked through and these reasons, but you start with things like Craigslist and Ebay. These are perhaps to me ... This is where I would have started as I am the noob. I've never purchased a bike that's cost more than $500 or $600. I admittedly don't bike all that much, but if I were to look to purchase a bike online this is where I would go. So, what does an idiot like me need to know before I start plopping down money on some hot goods?
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah, so maybe we'll start with Craigslist because that, to me too, that's the first place I'm going to go if I'm trying to buy a used bike via the internet. The nice thing about Craigslist is that you're probably shopping local if you're using Craigslist, so there's always the opportunity to check the bike out in person, take it for a test ride, and then even if you don't know a ton of specific bike maintenance knowledge, you can feel when things are wrong and you can also see when a bike is super beat up.
Tanner Bowden:
That said, you should still do as much online research as you can. If the post has the make and model of a bike, just Google that and see if you can find out how much it cost when it was new. See if the picture matches the bike that you're looking at in the ad because maybe it's a scammer. The stolen bike issue, Craigslist is rife with stolen bikes and it's hard to know if a bike is stolen or not. One thing that I would recommend is that if a price seems amazingly cheap, you've done some research. Maybe you found the exact bike and you know it costs $1200 brand new, but you're looking at it for $150, maybe that's a stolen bike.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, call the FBI immediately, don't even go. That's a good tip, or it's just super busted, or someone doesn't know what they have. Friends of mine just did buy a car actually and I helped them through the process. They found a cherry Subaru Forester for like half as much as it should have been and it was just because some old person wanted to get rid of it.
Tanner Bowden:
Amazing.
Nick Caruso:
Every now and then it works out, but old people can sell stolen stuff too, so be careful. The other thing ... When I advise people on how to buy a car, when I do, I always take it for a test drive and then get it inspected. Is that something a person can do with a bike? I assume maybe not since you usually just meet someone at their front door, but I don't know, what do you think?
Tanner Bowden:
It all depends on the interaction, right. Also, you have friends coming to you for car advice, if you know someone who's a total bike nerd, bring them with you to the exchange, the transaction, exchange, or whatever and have them look at it or figure out with the seller if you can ride it to the local bike shop and just have them give it a quick one over. They could look at it and tell you if there are glaring issues or not without you having to pay for them to dig into it.
Nick Caruso:
Right. Are you softly hinting that you're available? Should people start hitting you up on Instagram and stuff with pictures of bikes for your buying advice?
Tanner Bowden:
I think people should direct those to our colleague who works on Gear Patrol Studios, AJ Powell.
Nick Caruso:
That's a great idea actually. I'm happy to draw up ... I'll put AJ's phone number in the comments, how about that?
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah, and his home address.
Nick Caruso:
No, I won't AJ, I won't do that. Yeah, home address. Okay, so that's good. If we're on Craigslist ... In fact, one of my neighbors, a friend of mine here, fixes up bikes, and has a bike shop in the basement, and he flips them on Craigslist. He's the most reliable, greatest mechanic ever. So, I hear these transactions a lot and I sometimes walk myself through it, put myself in those people's shoes, I wouldn't know what to ask. So, if you can get ahold of Tanner, AJ, or another bike friend, it's worth it for sure. So, what about Ebay? Ebay's a little different because it's more removed.
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah, exactly. So, all the benefits of going via Craigslist ... There are trade offs. So, Craigslist is maybe potentially a little sketchier, but the benefit is that you have this in person interaction before any money changes hands. Ebay doesn't have that unless you're finding someone local on Ebay, which is totally possible. So, Ebay present these different difficulties and a different set of tactics that you should use.
Tanner Bowden:
The first one is that you can size up the seller, what's their Ebay rating? If they're below a 99, that's generally what I recommend to just avoid them. If it is, dig into their reviews and see why they're below a 99. Then, another thing with Ebay is that so much of it is about the photos that are there. If they're just posting a photo of a side view of the bike, you need a lot more than that. You want detailed photos of every little link between pieces, every little component, so you can really get a closeup view of the bike. You could almost think about what are you going to look at in and in-person Craigslist interaction and then you want a photo of each one of those little things you're looking at.
Tanner Bowden:
You can ask people for photos. If there aren't enough photos on their listing, you can send them a message and ask specifically, can you send me a photo of the front derailleur? Can you send me a photo of the water bottle cages? You don't have to feel weird about pushing people for more information because they want to get rid of the bike too. So, anything that they can do to do that is good. They're motivated to sell it, so you should be motivated to get as much from them as you can.
Nick Caruso:
Lessons in capitalism with Tanner Bowden. So, there are more specific tips too, that you go through. First of all, I love the 99% or higher thing. I've always considered myself an Ebay snob and been worried that people would judge me if they knew that I would not deal with someone who didn't have a near perfect rating, but you just told me that's okay, which is validating. You also said that to avoid stolen ... I should have mentioned this a few minutes ago, but to avoid purchasing a stolen product, particularly on Ebay or in a situation like that, you can ask for a serial number picture or a picture of a label, is that right?
Tanner Bowden:
Yep, yep. So, bike serial numbers are typically engraved on the bottom bracket. So, in Craigslist you can look for that in person. Ebay, ask for a photo. There are a couple registration databases, one is called Bike Index and another one is called Project 529. You can essentially punch in the serial number and if someone has registered the bike in one of these databases and it has been marked as stolen or something, then it lets you know that right off the bat.
Nick Caruso:
Cool. Then, you also have the most detectivey, sleuthy tip in here too about checking out the background of a photo.
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah, that's right. If the bike is ... If the photo is the bike in a garage and it's an immaculate garage, maybe there's a Porsche in there or something too, chances are that bike is probably in good shape. If it's ... If the bike is leaning up against a shed with a tarp and some bungee cords disheveled next to it, as if they were once wrapped around it to protect it from the rain, that's going to give you another hint on how it was stored and treated.
Nick Caruso:
That's right. Again, you can call the FBI. You should give these to the FBI anyway because maybe they can detect some sort of ... They can piece together some clues to a murder or something using clues in the background. No, that's a great tip for just context clues. I mean, you should do that when you're buying anything used really. Then, I keep prompting you because I really nerded out on this post. There are so many ... It's dense with tips. The other one, I discovered a website through you about ... I let you talk about it. It's about to avoid ... To find misspelled words on Ebay.
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah, yeah, right. I thought this was one was really cool too and I didn't know about this until I was actually putting together this article. It's a website called fatfingers.com and essentially you can type in what you want to search for on Ebay. Say you want a specific bike, you want a specialized whatever, specialized stunt jumper. Specialized is maybe a tricky word for some people to spell, so what the site does is it searches for all of the possible misspellings of whatever you're searching for and gives you those results. A lot of bike brands have Italian names, so it's easy to misspell some of these things.
Tanner Bowden:
This is nice because you can potentially find stuff that people who are looking for the same thing are not coming across because of a typo. So, you're finding these secret listings that other people aren't seeing and that might ... In a bike shortage, you need every advantage you can get.
Nick Caruso:
That's right, you heard it here first folks. Yeah, this is particularly helpful if someone puts a listing up that's like, I'm selling this ducking bike for $300 or something. You can really zero in. It called to mind, I'm at the age now where I'm just starting to get whispers of arthritis, so this felt like a targeted insulting website title, but it is what it is. So, that's good. That's actually ... For anything on Ebay, I assume, you can just go onto this FatFingers and maybe find some gems that people are frustrated that aren't selling.
Tanner Bowden:
Totally.
Nick Caruso:
You mentioned a couple other forums and stuff. I don't know if you want to go over those, but the last section in this post that we've been talking about so much is the site you talked about before, the Pro's Closet. So, I'd love to just geek out on that unless you want to cover any others specifically.
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah, so the other ones I mentioned, like the Pink Bike forums or Gear Trade, you can treat those very similarly to an Ebay essentially because you're not necessarily having that in-person moment. So, it's going to be all about communicating with the seller, getting lots of photos, trying to size up the seller, stuff like that, but the Pro's Closet is a totally different ball game, which is why I wrote a dedicated portion about this site.
Tanner Bowden:
Essentially what the Pro's Closet is, it's like an online used car dealership in a way, but for bikes. Actually, they've taken a lot of their business model from the car industry. So, essentially what they do is they buy high-end bikes only. So, they're not going to buy a bike from someone unless it was $1500 or more when it was new. So, that means ... That doesn't necessarily mean their prices when they're selling bikes start at $1500 because used bikes, they decrease in value just like a car or anything, but that sort of tells you the quality, the bottom level quality of the bikes that they're selling starts at $1500. That's the best way to understand that.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, so let's talk about the structure and the process here because you also ... You published a separate article dedicated entirely to the Pro's Closet because it is such an intensive, exact process.
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah, so when the Pro's Closet buys a bike they have this ... Like a certified, pre-owned process, which is similar to an Apple having a certified refurbished product line. Essentially what it is it's a quality standard that they're setting. So, a used bike comes in that they've just purchased from whoever and it goes through an assembly line of knowledgeable bike mechanics who are checking every single part of the bike to see what state it's in. They're also looking at what modifications, maybe, the previous owner has made to the bike because at this high-end level you're getting into things where people are putting their own pedals on the bike, they're putting a different set of handlebars, or a new stem, maybe even an entirely new drivetrain.
Tanner Bowden:
So, they're taking all that information in so that they can give, not only a fair price to resell the bike, but also when you're looking at a Pro's Closet listing they have all of these elements of the bike and they'll give them a numerical rating. So, they'll say like, the frame, it's got a couple dings on it, it's like a 7 out of 10, in terms of quality, but it's got brand new tires on it, so the tires are a 10 out of 10. They'll give you just such clear picture of what you're getting into.
Tanner Bowden:
Then, if there are any defects, they're going to photograph it and the picture is going to be right on the listing. You're going to look at the scratch on the frame, or the little dents in the rim of one of the wheels, or whatever it is. So, this is kind of the benefit of the Pro's Closet, which maybe is going to be more expensive than an Ebay or a Craigslist, but you're going in confidently into the purchase.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, I started poking around as you were talking. I have this nice little split screen setup and it should also be said that not only ... It's not just someone snapping photos with their phone, this is ... it's in a light box. This is a studio quality photos too, which is really cool. Yeah, I really like that, it's a good tip. So, this is a good example of ... To me, this is a different balance ... You, of course, go in with the same information, but you already trust the people. These are not stolen bikes. This is ... But you also are looking at a certain quality level at the base level too.
Tanner Bowden:
Right, yeah, exactly. Then, the other part that's really cool about the Pro's Closet is that when ... Say you do by a bike from them and when they ship it to you, it's pretty much all put together already. You might have to attach the handlebars. They even send you a torque wrench with a bunch of little bit heads, so that you don't have to go out and buy the tool to then put together the last little piece. It's all very easy and you don't have to have that special bike knowledge that we talked about a lot more at the beginning in order to be able to shop confidently from them.
Nick Caruso:
So, through the Pro's Closet, obviously you're getting a premium experience. Do you have an idea of what kind of price premium an equivalent bike through a different retailer or outlet would be? How much of a premium you're paying at the Pro's Closet versus somewhere else.
Tanner Bowden:
It's hard to say because ... Let's say that the same bike for sale on the Pro's Closet versus that bike for sale on Ebay or Craigslist, there's a negotiation factor on those other sites. Even on some of the other forums, but that doesn't exist with the Pro's Closet. Also, the knowledge part of it too. They know so much about bikes and they're pricing these bikes so that they can make a profit for sure. Their business isn't to lose money repairing and reselling bikes. So, you are going to pay a little bit more probably, but you're paying for something. You're paying for the knowledge that what you're getting is actually reliable, quality product.
Nick Caruso:
Right on. We've expanded from capitalism into just economics broadly now, which I really like. These are all really great ... If you're looking for this stuff, the bottom line for me is that this is a different ... It's even different than a car. In a lot of ways it's harder than buying a car. It's definitely not like buying a used table on Facebook Marketplace or something, you really need to know more and need more ... You need more info upfront from your own needs and then you need to be sure that you're getting as much as possible from the source.
Nick Caruso:
So, that's really great. That's a good run through, solid advice. Tanner, I've been beginning to tie a bow on these conversations in the same way, so let me set up this hypothetical because you are now a podcast celebrity guest. So, people are going to be recognizing you, maybe they hear your voice or maybe they know your face somehow. Someone's going to recognize you on the street, you're on a bike, you're at a stoplight, you have 30 seconds and they up to you and they want some advice. They say, hey, I'm going to buy a used bike online, what I do I know? What do you tell them? What are your most important or top level advice for them?
Tanner Bowden:
That's a good question. I think the most important thing to know is just to ask questions. I'm personally so hesitant to interact ... I feel like I'm being nosy or obnoxious by ... Like with an Ebay seller or a Craigslist seller. Just ask as many questions as you want to and feel like doing it. If you want to buy a high-end bike, use ... I don't know. Unless you have a ton of bike knowledge and know how to hunt for something specific on Ebay, I would just use the Pro's Closet. It's just so easy. I think it's worth the premium you're going to pay. But general advice, I don't know, hit up AJ on Instagram and he'll let you know.
Nick Caruso:
Right. AJ's free, but if you want Tanner's advice you have to Venmo him. That's what I hear.
Tanner Bowden:
Yeah, that works.
Nick Caruso:
That's a good tip. The number of questions should rise in lock step with the amount of money you're going to pay for a thing. You want to make sure you're getting a good thing. Those friends of mine who just bought that Subaru, apparently a lot of people were inquiring about it because of the price, but the persisted because Matt, my friend, was willing to put up with this guys one word answers to all his many questions. He had the patience to do and it paid off in a big way. So, it pays to ask questions. Make sure you get what you want and know what you're getting.
Tanner Bowden:
Totally and don't feel obligated too.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, there you go. This is good, we could ... This could be a motivational series. We could have a spinoff. Don't be pressured. Well, cool, Tanner, taking up a lot of your time and you have stuffed it full of advice for anybody looking to by a used bike. Like we've alluded to, there are a lot of posts on Gear Patrol, which will be linked below wherever you're listening. So, you can do a lot of your own advice and we're joking around a little bit, but really do hit us up. You can find us on social media everywhere, our handle is gearpatrol, one word. You can email me directly at podcast, at gearpatrol.com, and you can comment on posts on the site too. So, if you have a question, or something to say about something that Tanner wrote, or you're just looking for AJ, drop a comment in there and we'll point you in the right direction.
Nick Caruso:
Thank you, Tanner, for all your time. You're up there in Vermont just dishing out the knowledge. Everybody, thanks for tuning into the Gear Patrol podcast. If you like what you're listening to, I hope you subscribe and tell other people about it. The best way to that, give us a five star review. I'm not going to beg. Tanner might beg, may beg. AJ would definitely beg if he were here. It does help us get more listeners in on the conversation. So, Tanner, thanks very much and enjoy the warm weather up there
Tanner Bowden:
Thanks, Nick, you too.
Nick Caruso:
For everybody else, really appreciate you being here. I'm Nick Caruso and until next time, take care.