Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Why we...Scoot!

Our Vino
...with our old landlord's Land Rover in the background
We bought our scooter in San Diego when gas first shot over $4 a gallon back in 2008.  My wife found a little 125cc Yamaha Vino on Craigslist, advertising an amazing 80+ mpg.  It looked immaculate and seemed to be gently used.  So we met the seller in a drug store parking lot that weekend before realizing, hey, we don't actually know how to ride this thing.  Luckily, riding it around the parking lot was about as easy as riding a bike, and we realized immediately that riding on two wheels is a lot better than riding on four.  So we tried negotiating a lower price, but it turned out we were dealing with a savvy seller.  Given that gas prices were at historic highs, he was showing the scoot over the weekend before taking offers that Monday.  With the situation as it was, we ended up being in a multiple-offer scenario. Our full price offer was trumped by another, but the seller asked if we were willing to beat it. Thinking this might be a ploy, I said we'd match: and he could choose who he wanted to sell the Vino to.