classic motorcycles and the internet

So, even  though I no longer own a motorcycle older than 2015, [full update on the three bikes currently residing in the shed coming soon, you might be surprised, you might not be.....] my obsession for the east german mz marques is almost palpable, the tough, teutonic, two-strokes just tick a box for me. I’m trying to broker a deal with a bloke who has an old ts250 rotting away in his shed, he isn’t budging on his price because he’s discovered, courtesy of the fucking internet, that he has a ‘classic’ motorcycle.

Now, I’m sorry, I grant that the mz is a ‘classic’ machine in the sense that it’s nearly forty years old but really? No, no, hear me out here, let’s say he paid £600 on the road for it, on the road, a new helmet, rack and top-box fitted included in the price, he rides it every day for fifteen years, backwards and forwards to work until it finally gives up the ghost through a complete lack of maintenance so he sticks it in a damp shed for the next twenty five years and all of a sudden, boosh! It’s now worth £1500! the old bastard isn’t budging on his price, I’m not trying to rip him off just offering a fair price for a bike that needs a lot of work, I’m never going to restore it but have the seeds of an idea for another ‘special’ [be quiet Julian!]

Once upon a time, before the interweb you could buy a local paper or ‘loot’ or the other one who’s name escapes me and pick up a bike like this for a reasonable price, unloved, unfashionable and utilitarian, the owner just pleased to pick up a few quid as a bonus to creating shed-space, you happy until you got home and realised you’d bought another fucking money-pit. surely it’s better that these bikes are back on the road in whatever guise they may take on, cafe racer, scrambler or immaculate, nut and bolt resto job rather than rusting away?