Straw poll – Do you buy your bikes on credit?

clodhopper, do you have a mortgage, or did you save up and buy a house outright? Genuine question, and I’m fully expecting the answer to be the latter!

C2W is paid for via Salary Sacrifice which is basically reducing your salary in monetary terms for non-monetary items such as child care or in the case of C2W a bike. While it sounds attractive it does have long term implications as your NI and pension contributions are calculated on the “reduced salary” so you do eventually pay for the bike/service.

I think i’d always buy on finance. I don’t see the point in putting £50 away each month (for example) to then buy the bike outright when it’s all there (few years later) when you can just put that money to monthly payments and have the bike now at no extra cost?! Saving up seems a bit daft in this context to me.

But, what if you lose your job in the meantime?

Saver you has £50pm x 3 years = £1800 of spare cash

Credit you has a £50pm repayment to make ontop of all the bills and no spare cash.

Don’t say it’ll never happen, or you’re comfortable with your outgoings. I was at the start of the year, I’ve not worked now for 4 months and today’s job hunting threw up a grand total of zero jobs that I’m qualified for.

clodhopper – Member

Consumerism is fuelled by creating the illusion that people can have things they can’t afford, and selling them stuff they don’t need. Banks offering easy credit is just part of this. Many of the responses on this thread show just how deeply entrenched the consumerist ideal is, in our society. That someone would happily pay money to a bank, rather than help the needy, is indicative of just how rife this ideal is.

Can we assume you’ve never had a mortgage then after all that would be a loan for something you can’t afford or actually need?

“
Credit should not be an option for poor financial budgeting.

You can’t budget for the unknown only prepare for it, I’m not going to keep £200k in savings just in case my house gets hit by a tornado but I will keep £2k in savings for a boiler etc.

“clodhopper, do you have a mortgage, or did you save up and buy a house outright? Genuine question, and I’m fully expecting the answer to be the latter!”

Why would the answer be at all relevant in this discussion?

“Can we assume you’ve never had a mortgage then after all that would be a loan for something you can’t afford or actually need?”

We’re not discussing mortgages; we’re discussing using credit for unessential things.

clodhopper, do you have a mortgage, or did you save up and buy a house outright? Genuine question, and I’m fully expecting the answer to be the latter!

and while you are there what bike do you ride (better be a £100 bike assuming you have given the surplus for an unnecessarily better bike to charity)
oh, and what % of your salary do you give to charity?

clodhopper – Member
“clodhopper, do you have a mortgage, or did you save up and buy a house outright? Genuine question, and I’m fully expecting the answer to be the latter!”
Why would the answer be at all relevant in this discussion?

Because consumerism is fuelled by creating the illusion that people can have things they can’t afford, and selling them stuff they don’t need. Banks offering easy credit (for a house) is just part of this

See my reply above^.

But to reiterate:

If you don’t have the cash to pay for something, you can’t afford it, without someone lending you money. Which is fine, if you suddenly need a new boiler, or your bike gets nicked and you need it to get to work, but for things that aren’t essential? Just stupid, in my opinion.

i’ve owned over 20 bikes in the last 25 years and they’ve all been cash purchases…but only only 3 were full bikes…2 were bought with cash and the other one was through cyclescheme

i did buy a frame and a pair of forks on finance 12 years ago…it was 0% so it made sense

i’m looking to buy a new bike in the new year (40th present to myself) but i dont have a couple of grand lying about so its going to have to be on finance

clodhopper, do you have a mortgage, or did you save up and buy a house outright? Genuine question, and I’m fully expecting the answer to be the latter!

Why would the answer be at all relevant in this discussion?[/quote]
It isn’t in the slightest; but then neither is your rabid judgemental condescension of anyone who chooses to use credit to buy a bike. Buying a house is neither affordable nor necessary – a mortgage is simply credit to enable people to do just that. The sums in question may differ; the underlying principle does not.

I last bought a bike on credit in 2001 (Spec Enduro FSR).

I bought a Bianchi Via Nirone via R2W/C2W/Cyclescheme in 2007

I bought a YT Capra last year and I bought a Canyon Ultimate last month both for

I earn a lot more now than I did in 2001

“and while you are there what bike do you ride (better be a £100 bike assuming you have given the surplus for an unnecessarily better bike to charity)
oh, and what % of your salary do you give to charity?”

What kind of nonsense is this? Why are you imagining that I’m saying no-one can have anything beyond basic function? We’re not talking about that at all. We’re talking about using credit to buy toys, pretty much. Something I, and others, don’t do.

Why do you assume I have a ‘salary’? Why are you only considering things in monetary terms?

“It isn’t in the slightest; but then neither is your rabid judgemental condescension of anyone who chooses to use credit to buy a bike. Buying a house is neither affordable nor necessary – a mortgage is simply credit to enable people to do just that. The sums in question may differ; the underlying principle does not.”

‘Rabid condescension’? 😆 No, just being ideologically opposed to the idea of easy credit to buy unnecessary stuff, that’s all. Why not just save up for stuff? And use credit for what it really should be for; necessary stuff you don’t have the cash at the time for.

And again, we’re not talking about mortgages, for the umpteenth time! 🙄

@kerley. Re: consumerism. The comment isn’t too far from the truth. I’d posted this quote in a thread about getting a new version of an existing bike that’s still good enough for the job in hand.

“We must shift America from a needs, to a desires culture,” wrote Paul Mazur of Lehman Brothers. “People must be trained to desire, to want new things even before the old had been entirely consumed. We must shape a new mentality in America. Man’s desires must overshadow his needs.“

Yes, that Lehman Brothers, you know, the one that went belly up in 2008 and for which we, the consumers, are still paying.

Why do you assume I have a ‘salary’?

Well you’re ok to make assumptions about how I use credit, so why not.

@whitestone, that quote brings back memories of business classes at Uni 😮

People going “Nooooo! Credit is BAAAD. If you need credit you can’t afford it” are missing a few tricks!
It’s quite easy to play credit card companies at their own game these days.
I’ll quite happily pop one bike a year on an interst free deal, pay for it with not a penny interest then sell it on. (Because I’m in the trade I loose little if any money too)
Then, at the end of the year, we get quite a large lump back in Tesco Clubcard vouchers that pays for all our Christmas food, generally. One year we spent and repaid £12k on one card (Mrs PP bought herself a motorcycle, which was a lot of it) and we ate well that year!
I used to have a lot of debt and I was bad with money but not any more. I’m getting my own back! 🙂

“Well you’re ok to make assumptions about how I use credit, so why not.”

Where did I do that?

“I used to have a lot of debt and I was bad with money but not any more. I’m getting my own back!”

Right. Ok…

All you’re actually doing, is making some very rich people, even richer.

There must be a reason why you’d want to help fund some rich ****’s yacht purchase, rather than trying to help others in need?

I can’t accept either of these arguments – banks are usually public companies, with shares that form the basis of peoples pensions.

You’re actually taking money out of pensioners pockets by NOT taking credit. You evil bastard.

No, just being ideologically opposed to the idea of easy credit to buy unnecessary stuff, that’s all. Why not just save up for stuff?

I just don’t get this. If it’s unnecessary, i understand being idealogically opposed to buying it at all. But once you’ve decided to purchase anyway, what difference does it make whether you use credit or cash, as long as you have the means to support that purchase?

Are you also against the use of credit cards to buy stuff, if the buyer then pays it off at the end of the month? Same thing, just a different term?

Peter, it’s not about people managing it or playing them at their own game it’s about people mismanaging/misunderstanding/misusing debt. It’s not credit, it’s debt.

What kind of nonsense is this? Why are you imagining that I’m saying no-one can have anything beyond basic function? We’re not talking about that at all. We’re talking about using credit to buy toys, pretty much. Something I, and others, don’t do.

Why do you assume I have a ‘salary’? Why are you only considering things in monetary terms?

Okay, no-one can use credit to buy anything beyond basic function. You will have to provide a list of what items are on the basic function list so we know where we are.

I am considering things in monetary terms because we are discussing credit – you know, that monetary thing.

Out of interest what do you do with no salary and no credit on anything but a house and a boiler (with no salary?)

If you can afford to buy a new bike and someone is offering to lend you the money for free, why would you use your own money, on which you can be making a return in the interim in all manner of ways? That makes no sense to me, especially on the basis of vacuous notions of “if you have to borrower you can’t afford it”, blah blah blah.

I don’t think people are judging others, just stating their personal preference.

I like knowing that everything in my possession is 100% mine, apart from my house. Puts me in a good place

People using 0% credit are happy with that too, fair play, crack on!

Don’t really care. I just do whatever. Got no qualms any which way.

Riding is a major part of my life, my priority of paying for things –

Mortgage>bills>bikes>car

0% credit card, c2w or real money when built up from parts.

It all works.

“I can’t accept either of these arguments”

I’m not forcing you to..

“You’re actually taking money out of pensioners pockets by NOT taking credit. You evil bastard.”

And the money used to bail out the bad credit came from where, exactly?

“I just don’t get this. If it’s unnecessary, i understand being idealogically opposed to buying it at all. But once you’ve decided to purchase anyway, what difference does it make whether you use credit or cash,”

Because the entire credit system is based on either people paying back more than they borrowed (not necessarily ‘evil’, in many cases, very reasonable), or people defaulting and having to pay massive interest rates. As explained previously. I’m not opposed to buying unnecessary things at all; just the far too easily available credit so many people use to do so. It’s financially irresponsible to spend what you haven’t got, whilst merely assuming the future will be rosy. We’re still reeling from the effects of the last bout of madness, yet people are more than happy to continue, as long as they can have that shiny new thing. And that bad credit has a knock-on effect on the entire banking industry, as well as screwing over future generations. If we kept credit to manageable levels, then the future risk of crunching wouldn’t be nearly as bad.

But as Whitestone points out, people want things now, and that overrides any notion of caution or common sense.

“Yes, that Lehman Brothers, you know, the one that went belly up in 2008 and for which we, the consumers, are still paying.”

If we kept credit to manageable levels, then the future risk of crunching wouldn’t be nearly as bad.

I always do, thanks very much.

OT – Kerley – are you Cornish/live in Cornwall?

OT – Kerley – are you Cornish/live in Cornwall?

No, my family is from deepest Dorset (generation of farmers). They survived on what they could get from the land, none of this consumerism and buying things you can’t afford crap.

I am a disgrace to their name due to my la sai fair approach to credit and have been shunned for many years now.

whitestone – Member
Peter, it’s not about people managing it or playing them at their own game it’s about people mismanaging/misunderstanding/misusing debt. It’s not credit, it’s debt.

Oh yeah. I get that. Agreed.
If you can get 0% and afford the payments or have the money in the bank then it’s daft not to really. It’s certainly better to spend it on bikes than coke and hookers…! 🙂

clodhopper – Member

“I used to have a lot of debt and I was bad with money but not any more. I’m getting my own back!”
Right. Ok…

I see the sense of humour bypass is working well. Ain’t medical science brill these days!
I bet you’re a riot at parties…..

I thought Kerley was a Cornish name, there’s certainly a Kerley hill in Chacewater, where I grew up.

https://www.google.nl/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=kerley%20hill%20chacewater

Enjoy your credit, or not, as you choose 🙂