My ex has requested that I provide values for any bikes bought since the wedding in 2005 to be taken into account in the weighing up of “assets”. The only bike I have bought since then is:

2006 Marin Rocky Ridge – as stock.

Pretty tricky to work out what that is worth as it is almost 8 years old now! Cost new was £900 or thereabouts IIRC.

So, give me some suggestions! I found a frame on eBay for £75 so figured £150 or something wouldn’t be a million miles away for what I would actually get for it on the market. Does that sound reasonable?

I’d be asking for the value of shoes and handbags over the same period.

oh and £150 is fair I reckon

Sounds like you are getting off lightly. I had to account for the current market value of every unsold painting I had created within a ten year marriage.

Do what my dad did when going through the same – he sold his racing car and the team he set up to his mate 😉 and strangely enough bought it back soon after the divorce was finalised…

£150 sounds like you are being alot more reasonable than she is TBH!

Good luck, I went through divorce about 6 years ago. When it came to “the weighing up of assets” as you put it, things got pretty messy 😐

Yep, about £150.
I’m intrigued though, are all assets valued in this way? What about non-tangible expenditure like holidays and haircuts?

Fortunately the other things she wanted to have priced up aren’t working out too well:

Guitars – I think there is one worth £100 bought since then, most of them are knackered out to the point of being borderline scrap and were bought well before we got hitched! Got to spend some quality time with new pickups, pots and bits of wire to try and breath some life back into one of them!

Cameras – belong to my fathers company, so are irrelevant

Motorbike – had an interface with the tarmac and was sold for not a great deal as “spares or repairs” for cash. So no longer have that one either!

But £150 for the bike sounds okay, or a bit high? If the latter… where would you put it? Given a complete lack of TLC from new (the forks have never been serviced!) should I be putting it down at less than that? £125/£100????

I may get myself something new once everything has worked through (both guitar wise and mountain bike wise).

lol – yeah, should have haircuts in there 😉 Given that I look like a filthy hippy most the time, that would be a win for me!

Got to check with the solicitor about what value counts as an asset. I think I heard somewhere that it had to be over £500 which pretty much rules out ANYTHING I own these days!

You’ll certainly own nothing worth more than £500 after the divorce anyway.

Would a Bike To Work Scheme value it as less than £150 after all this time?

Just give her the bike…that way the line is well and truly drawn and you can get on with it all…let her sell it for whatever it is worth.

It is the only bike I currently have that is even slightly serviceable Richard, so not planning on giving it away! Although it is a tempting thought (although she would have to give me half it’s value surely… so £75 back!)

Let her have it! My ex thought bikes were worth a fortune but they don’t consider the depreciation. We tend to spend far less on riding than they do on beauty treatments and glad rags particularly shoes and bags. Get onto those costs straight away. Remember that when all the accounting is done and you go for your first free ride it’ll feel great whatever you’re on.

Is the 575 not rideable? What needs done to it? Can you move parts around to get another machine rideable?

Give her half the bike. 15min with the hacksaw should do it.

Don’t forget the cost of hairdo’s. Me 7quid for a kids cut, a no 4. My wife 50quid if she has a colour. I’m well in credit for bike stuff.

Aye what’s your counter claim to hers then?

jeepers! This divorce lark can be reet messy.*

*hopes never to go through one.

The 575 is needing new shock/forks at the moment. May pick something up on eBay to see me through 😉 Amazing how far technology has moved since 2004 though when I got that one so I am considering just getting a new off the peg machine instead and just sell the 575 frame on.

Not going to get that much riding in this year coming though by the looks of things, so I was planning on just getting by with the Marin for the time being (it is good for Grizedale and the like) and perhaps treat myself at the end of next year if the credit cards are looking a little more healthy!

HMRC say 2% for 5 years old and “negligible” beyond that:

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/manuals/eimanual/eim21667a.htm

Admittedly those are minimum values but probably a good starting point. 🙂

Good luck buddy.
I went through all this 3 years ago and it was really shit.
I’d suggest putting up min values rather than reasonable ones for all your assets.
You can bet shes doing the same. I bet she’s not even listing a whole lot.
Let her prove your bike is worth more.
In the end though when she argued about something I usually gave it to her as the legal costs of debating the point outweighed the value of the item.
She knew this and got a whole lot of shit that way, but I’ve got my sanity and a hot young girlfriend while she’s still single. Thats priceless.
The small shit that seems important now will not be so later.
I’ve got new views now on what is important in life and a shitty old bike frame is not one of them.
Good luck mate.