Ship or buy locally?

Hi,
i have a 2016 Adventure GS with 8K miles on. I am currently negotiating a job in NZ (north island ) and I am debating wether take the bike or seel it here and buy another there. Any input on moving there is appreciated!

Cheers,
Alberto

More than welcome...You and everyone else in the world are trying to get in here...Good Luck...bring ya bike, great roads to chew up.

My advice would be to do some maths. This question gets asked quite a lot and the answer depends on a range of factors.
If you’re coming for a short term contract, usually, not worth shipping here and back.
If you’re hoping to move permanently and money is a factor then you need to add up the cost of compliance when you get here to shipping cost, etc.
Have a look on www.trademe.co.nz for prices of equivalent bike here.
Decide whether it’s worth it. Don’t assume it will be easy to sell here if you do bring it.
All the info you need is either on NZ govt websites and quotes from shipping companies.

Happy googling.

Hi @Madeinitaly
Good luck on the job. I moved to NZ 3 years ago, and ended up bringing a few bikes with me from the UK. Bikes (and most other things) are often cheaper in Europe, and parts are certainly easier/quicker to get. As oldbeer says you just need to do the math. The certification process in NZ is easy and simple, and in my experience they didn't care about after market loud exhausts etc.. But I have heard it depends on the testing station - VTNZ in Mount Wellington were really great.
I ended up selling the big 1190R that I bought over, but as bikes are worth more in NZ I didn't lose that much on it, maybe $1k all up.
Depends what/how/when you ride here - for me a big 1190 made sense in Europe with big distances and big roads. And speeds are MUCH higher in Europe. But NZ is small distances and very small roads, so unless you ride two-up a smaller bike may be better, just IMHO... But even if a smaller bike, I'd personally likely buy something trick in Europe and then bring it with me. The shipping cost is not to bad - get a few quotes, and ideally include it with other household stuff.

+1 for shipping if you are moving here for the long term (2+ years).

We're looking to move permanently. Wife and I are both vets so we are considered both critical shortage skills and essential workers and potentially getting permanent visas off the bat. I am also retired military and that helps offsetting the paycut we'll get from the move. Wife doesn't ride so I liked the recomendation of possibly buing something smaller there. I just hate the idea of selling a dreambike bike with only 8k on. What about lights? Do I need to change the headlamp?
And totally unrelated in the rotorua, tauranga, bay of plenty how crazy are property prices?
Cheers!

If its your dreambike (and you can afford to do it) then bring it. Yes you will need to convert lights.
Trademe is good for property prices too. NZ is an expensive place to live well.

Not wanting to sound negative but if you haven't been here before i would strongly recommend an extended trip to get to know the place the people and the culture before you commit. I've never lived in the US but from what I understand (in part from previous thread like this one) it is very, very different here. If you move then decide you miss all sorts of things too much then its an expensive mistake especially later in life.

Mind you if there's not enough rain for you in the Bay of Plenty you could always move to the west coast of the South Island :)
Good luck!!

BoP property prices are insane, it’s God’s waiting room of NZ so lots of well heeled folk willing to pay whatever for their dream.
Rotorua not so bad....very blue collar town, lots of poverty, low life’s and crime. And it stinks, unless you lived here long enough to become immune to the Sulfur dioxide smell.

No idea about details, but there could be differences importing a bike from the US or the UK.
(US= drive/ ride on Right... maybe different exhaust/ air-intake systems like US = carbon canisters etc if it's a CA compliant bike... lights, maybe? Might not apply to modern bikes anymore, but headlights lenses/ reflectors were different for R/L traffic.)

Thumbs up to the "smaller bike = more suitable" comment...

With respect to the "small place" allusions in this thread... and not that we're sensitive about the size of our......peninsulas.....but riding NZ top to bottom is equivalent of riding from Seattle to San Diego. Or Copenhagen to Carcassonne, give or take a profiterole or two.

We may claim to be a small country at the bottom of the world, but we are a mid size country (76 of 202 by land area) midway between the equator and south pole (most of the country is closer to the equator than the south pole).

LOL what I live now we are on a well and if don't chlorinate it every other month the iron bacteria make the entire hous smell like rotten eggs when you open a hot water fawcet. I also have interviews in Hamilton, Wellington, and Hawke's bay. Any better than Rotorua? Mainily we would like a mid size town with good schools for the offsprings...

Yeah, we thought about it , but I am European, so never really fit well with the gun toting right wingers in the US. Wife is American but she liked living in Europe while I was stationed in Germany. The way I see it is it can't be any worse than here, and there are beaches. Worst comes to worse it is a nice experience to live abroad for my kids, and as veterinarians in the US we will never have to worry about getting jobs if we decide to move back.

Of those options Hamilton is pretty much commuter belt stuff of Auckland. Wellington has some of the highest property prices but hosts the ferry to the South Island (very important for us North Islander riders). Hawkes Bay attracts a lot of people with its climate and may be a good option for a mid size town experience.

Hawkes Bay would be my pick of those. Havelock North is a haven. Loads n loads of gravel, sandy beaches and close to Taupo if you want really gnarly riding. You'd have to pay me a large fortune and a bike of my choice (every year) to live in Wellington....Auckland is just plain out of the question. Hamilton.....meh

Hi, I think more important than location, property prices and motorcycles is that you can work as a vet here or not. Unfortunately the "I read it and should be OK" isn't enough, having a job offer isn't enough. If you need professional registration/membership, don't come here without getting it done from home. Have seen way too many lives ruined. Doctors working at petrol station, physio therapist with 10+ years EU practice have been told to go back to the university, senior teacher 15+ years practice with a masters from AUT to start as a teacher aid, etc. Be careful.

Yes, it is usually s[pelled out in the employment contract. The employers pay professional registrations, licences, relocation costs, and first couple of months rent. etc. Pretty standard. Plus AVMA graduates are recognized by the NZ Veterinary authority, and it's just a paperwork issue to get the licence once you have the work permit.

To go back on topic, I wonder if I should just sell my 1200GS here and get me a nice AT Sport doen there. I don't plan to go around jumping, but it would be nice to have a more offroad capable machine than the GS.

If you're thinking of changing bikes anyway it's one less thing to mess around with. To me both the GS & the AT are too big to be really useful as an ADV bike in NZ (unless you need to take a passenger) as they will restrict where you can go too much (unless you are Chris Birch). But that is mostly personal preference. You will actually have a lot of fun on anything, realistically it will take you several years of holiday travels before you run out of great NZ roads & tracks that can be easily done by GS.

I'd also put a vote in for Hawkes Bay as a great option, a slightly drier, warmer climate than most of the North Is, although we live near Rotorua which is pretty good too really.

Cheers
Clint

Fwiw/imho etc etc...

My impression of what is generally meant by "offroad" in other places/ride reports is off tarmac and on gravel or even actually dirt but still a formed, public road. There are many wonderful, glorious and remote kilometers of this in NZ. Almost any bike would be fine on this. People ride these on pushbikes.

Offroad over here generally means no road of any sort. Trail rides through peoples farms, forest whatever. That is always on private land, organised and or permitted by the owner. There are NO wide open Utah/Colorado open public spaces in NZ. You probably already know this but just in case... (We did have one of your countrymen a while ago who took a bit of convincing that he couldn't just ride a bike wherever he felt like it.)

On that type of terrain the offroad capabilities of the bike are not usually the limiting factor :). You dont see many people on 1200GS on these rides. However, I was once overtaken through Woodhill Forest by the aforementioned Mr Birch who was on a 1290 KTM. 2 up. Everybody else was overtaking me too including nippers on 50cc bikes. Humbling experience. But i digress.

Bottom line your GS would be great for 99% of what you would probably do here. But new bikes are always good and when you compare the fun of choosing a new one against the hassle of cleaning your bike to operating theatre spec, then crating it, paying for shipping, getting it approved registered etc. when you get here, for me I would buy a new one. Plenty of GS for sale anyway if you like them.

Good luck and let us know when you're coming, we'll put the jug on.

Nicely put @clintnz and @oldbeer
The current range of 700s are what I'd likely aim at - yammy T7 or something.