What will happen to your bikes when you are gone?

[oldwheels]

My son does cycle but mostly in competition so my bikes not of too much interest to him since they are more based on utility and touring.
I also have 2 trikes and have several times referred to the value of all of my fleet.
Therefore they will almost certainly sell all of them and I hope they stick out for a reasonable price.

 

[wafter]

That's a depressing question since I'll never have kids..

I sometimes think about this in a more general sense tbh - put so much time, effort and money into aquiring nice things that mean so much to you; yet as you age they become of less and less value / use while that sense of attachment potentially remains.

 

[Ming the Merciless]

They will appear on the repair shop in 100 years, and be lovingly restored.

But assuming I’m not taken early, I have no idea which bikes I’ll still have as I head into my 120s. I can imagine the fleet will reduce down towards one bike as I age.

 

[numbnuts]

If I don't sell them before I die and out live my brother-in-law and sister, the housing association will just dump them along with my kayak all my fishing gear, tools ect

 

[roubaixtuesday]

According to my will, in a ceremony akin to a viking funeral, my corpse will be slung on a flaming bier between them as they descend a ramp into a blast furnace, there to be recycled to iron as my remains are become slag.

 

[vickster]

Left to friends various in my will, then they can do with them what they want!
I do need to update my will as I foolishly named the bikes, some I no longer have, some have been acquired since the will was written

 

[Slick]

Hopefully all my bikes will be very old by the time I die, but my brother would be welcome to my bikes as he's a tight git and would make sure they went gor their true value.

 

[HLaB]

I'll finally sell them! and live up to the 'over my dead body!' claim

 

[johnnyb47]

Mine will probably get thrown in the skip along with me 🤣🤣

 

[Ming the Merciless]

Mine will probably get thrown in the skip along with me 🤣🤣

Surely a bike would go in the recycling?

 

[nellietheelephant]

My concern is that when I die, my wife will sell them for what I told her they cost.

 

[Moon bunny]

Ours will clutter up the house for a while, then the twins will send them for scrap as the market for second-hand steel frames (aka classic) will have died as did those who remember them from their youth.

 

[fossyant]

If anyone has a nice Colnago with Super Record that they don't need, I'll take it off your hands now, and promise to look after it once you die (and before).

Nobody got one then ?

 

[Gillstay]

When I had a health scare earlier this year, I made sure my kids had the password for the Google spreadsheet entitled 'Family Bike Fleet' which has all the details of all of our bikes (checks notes.... 23 at the moment) including a table of the geometry and components that can be pasted straight into an eBay listing, along with a realistic idea of their value. They'll keep hold of what they want, including maybe a "Dad's Pride and Joy" or two, and move the rest on. The bikes themselves will probably outlast all of us.

But that's nothing compared to this guy... I sold a couple of Hetchins last year, to a very interesting chap who has stockpiled over 450 Hetchins, mainly curly, in 3 shipping containers. One for each of his sons when he dies and without troubling the will or the taxman. His view was that they'd have to work for the money tied up in them, as they couldn't just dump them onto the market but would have to drip feed them over time. Based on what he paid for my two at the time, that's getting on for half a million quid. The two sales were the least emotional transactions I've ever had over bikes - a quick once-over, hand over the cash and away. No stories, no reference to or interest in the Hetchins Register, no deep checking of the frame or test rides, nothing. Just cash and carry.

Chum did that with old motorbikes so his widow just put them all in an auction in one hit and paid the tax. Did not want the hassle. Oh and they had all badly degraded from sitting around and no one had had any fun on them including him. Never understood it myself. He could have just bought one expensive Bentley or similar, had fun in it and looked after it.

 

[Ian H]

When an old friend died I helped his widow bury his best bike in the garden. The others went to good homes.