Cash for junk motorcycles

Motorcycles end up junked differently from cars. They rarely get towed off a highway after a crash and sold the same week. More often a bike gets parked in a garage “for the winter,” the battery dies, the carburetor gums up, and five years later it’s a dusty shape under a cover that someone finally wants gone.

We buy them in that state, and in worse ones.

Bikes we take

• Street motorcycles of any style: cruisers, sport bikes, standards, touring bikes and dual-sports.
• Scooters that are past saving.
• Crashed bikes: bent forks, broken frames, missing fairings, a tank that leaks.
• Bikes that sat: seized engines, rotten tires, no battery, rusted chains.
• Project bikes nobody finished, including ones partly taken apart, as long as you tell us what’s missing.

Running or not doesn’t change whether we buy it. It changes the offer, and that’s why we ask.

What to have ready

The title. Motorcycles are titled vehicles in Illinois, the same as cars. A title in your name, with no lien on it, makes the sale quick. If a loan is still open on the bike, our guide to selling with a lien in Illinois covers getting the release first.

Your ID. The driver checks that the name on your ID matches the title.

The keys, if you have them. Missing keys don’t stop the sale. A bike with a locked fork is harder to move, though, so say so on the call. Our guide to selling without keys explains what changes.

The plates. In Illinois the license plate belongs to you, not the bike, according to the Secretary of State. Take it off before pickup.

Where bikes sit, and what that means for pickup

On the West Side, junk motorcycles usually turn up in one of four places: a detached garage off the alley, a gangway between two buildings, a back yard behind a two-flat, or the corner of an apartment building’s parking lot.

A motorcycle doesn’t ride on a tow truck the way a car does. Tell us it’s a bike when you call and we plan the pickup for it. What helps us most:

• Where it is, exactly. “Garage off the alley, third door from the corner” saves time.
• Whether the wheels turn. A bike that rolls can be walked out to the alley. One with seized brakes or a flat, collapsed tire has to be carried or dragged, and that takes more planning.
• What’s in the way. Gangways are narrow, and gates often have padlocks. Clear a path before the pickup if you can.
• Ground level. We don’t carry bikes up basement stairs. If yours is below grade, it needs to come up first.

For a car or truck that’s parked in a tight garage, see our guide to a dead car in an alley garage. Most of the same access advice applies to a bike.

Before you call

Have the year, make, model and engine size ready if you know it, plus the title status and what doesn’t work. Then send the form on this page or call. If you also have a camper or trailer to clear out, see RVs and campers; we can often take more than one vehicle in a trip.