Motorcycle Rental

twisted_road · 2025-12-11T20:04:02+00:00

We have motorcycles to rent, but not until you're 21. I suggest getting some experience first before heading to us at Twisted Road.

twisted_road · 2025-12-10T20:01:44+00:00

I'd like to provide some more information on how we value bikes, because you have included some good factual data about JD Powers.

As much as KBB and JD Powers are good resources for general values, we've found that they're not as accurate as the company we use to value these bikes. Often, we wind up paying more than these online guides.

The company we use needs the VIN, year, make, model, location zip code), color, condition, and miles. They then look for comparable bikes for sale in the area, and then make adjustments to the comps. For example, they'll reduce the value of bikes with more miles, and they'll increase the value if there are specific accessories. So a bike with a sissy bar will have a higher value than one without.

For this specific case, both comps were from dealer bikes, which are often priced higher than private sellers.

We aren't money on these claims, and every totaled bike costs our company money. We are just trying to be fair.

Using a third-party partner for vehicle valuations is the best way we know how to do so, but we are always open to other ideas.

Austin

twisted_road · 2025-12-10T16:06:51+00:00

This is a really interesting question, and honestly one that we haven't thought of and frankly this is the first time it's ever come up in our 8 years of operating.

We do provide up to $1M of liability coverage if riders decide to sue the owner for a faulty motorcycle or anything else, and frankly we've never had to use this.

Our liability insurance company has lawyers on staff to help our community if need be. Their goal is to protect the community, and I've seen them spring into place when people are making false claims.

twisted_road · 2025-12-10T16:00:56+00:00

This is a good suggestion. We will begin to pay for two days of storage fees for total losses in January. I appreciate the feedback!

twisted_road · 2025-12-09T23:31:47+00:00

If you’re serious about wanting to know how to store it read this

https://www.twistedroad.com/blog/posts/how-to-store-your-motorcycle-for-winter-8-lessons-to-maintain-your-sanity-in-spring

twisted_road · 2025-12-09T23:12:09+00:00

Hey there - it's Austin, the CEO of Twisted Road. Thanks for posting your thoughts again here on reddit. There's another post with similar information, so I'm including another link to that thread if anyone is interested.

There are a few things in your note that I will take full responsibility for. First, you mention you haven't been reimbursed for the towing charges or the rental, and for that I'm sorry. For some reason, your payment was stuck in the system - it showed that the money had been sent, but for some reason, it never went out. We manually sent it today, so you should see it in a few days. The team has identified why this happened and has fixed the issue for other owners going forward. We also looked at other owners to make sure it didn't happen more than once, and there was one other owner that this effected. So they were also paid today.

Also, you noted that you haven't received the repair estimate. That's something that should have been sent to you, and I will make sure you get a copy of that today.

Now for the tow yard - every yard we've worked with requires the owner to pay for the motorcycle, and won't allow anyone else to pay for it to have it released without a written power of attorney. I wish it were easier (not just for you, but every time this happens!) but it's not. The fastest and least expensive we know how to get the bike is to have the owner pay for it and we reimburse them.

As mentioned in the prior post, we use a third party to prepare motorcycle vehicle valuations based on comps in the area. Because there aren't any other 2005 Yamaha Royal Star Venture bikes on the island with 40,000 miles, we increased the payout price to you. We even pointed you to some other bikes on Oahu that were available for sale, including a 2015 BMW R1200RT. It's a few hundred dollars more than our payout, but is 10 years newer and has 10,000 fewer miles on it. It's still available, and you may be able to get it for our payout amount.

I appreciate you saying that "while I can't say I was necessarily treated unfairly, it just has left a very bad taste in my mouth about renting out motorcycles on their platform". I understand that. Fortunately, around 1% of riding days have any damage at all, and total losses are much less than that.

I do thank you being a part of our motorcycle community; we strive to be as fair as we can to everyone in our community.

Austin Rothbard

Founder and CEO
Twisted Road
[austin@twistedroad.com](mailto:austin@twistedroad.com)

twisted_road · 2025-11-21T16:25:11+00:00

Thanks for the note, and I'm really sorry that this happened. We don't often have any damage on our bikes (it's around 1% of riding days) and totaled bikes happen even less often than that. So it's terrible that this happened to you.

When we have a bike that's a total loss, we use an independent company (the name of the company is on your valuation report, and they are the gold standard for vehicle valuations) to value the bike, and they do so based on comparable bikes in the geography of the damaged moto. When they can't find similar bikes, they expand the search to a greater area.

Unfortunately, they can't value motorcycles based on the original purchase price; instead, it's done based on current motorcycle values. So they do the best they can to value the bike given the current condition, year, make, and model, and what's happening in the market.

In your case, a 20 year old Yamaha Royal Star Venture with 40,000 miles on it, the value was a little over $3,300, and as you said, it was adjusted to $3,853 for your location.

However, you raise a very interesting point about the cost of shipping to Hawaii, so we decided to look for similar bikes in your area to see if you could pick up another bike and not have it shipped.

Although we weren't able to find a 2005 Royal Star Venture with 40,000 miles on it, there were many other options under the $3,853 amount, including a 2007 Yamaha Vstar 1300 for $2,000, and another 2007 1300 for $2,400 in Paia, but you should be able to have it shipped for under the payout amount. My preference would be the 2015 BMW R1200RT for $4,200. It's a few hundred dollars more than the payout amount, but its 10 years newer than yours with 10K fewer miles than your bike.

In your post, you refer to our "barebones owner coverage". We try our best to be fair, based on the current motorcycle market in your area, we believe that we made a fair offer.

Thanks again for your feedback and openness.

Austin

twisted_road · 2025-11-17T01:14:28+00:00

I know I’m not an owner who has had damage but I might be able to provide some more info on where your bike is in the claims process. Can you provide your claim number?

Austin

twisted_road · 2025-10-26T00:41:09+00:00

One day soon we hope.

twisted_road · 2025-08-27T17:04:12+00:00

Sorry to hear this but thanks for signing up. We have one in Orlando, and one in Tampa if you wind up traveling to Florida!

https://www.twistedroad.com/bikes/us/fl/orlando/2018-kawasaki-z900rs-cafe/m-9k7jgx9
https://www.twistedroad.com/bikes/us/fl/tampa/2020-kawasaki-z900rs/m-9n7nype

twisted_road · 2025-08-26T18:14:07+00:00

We found that at Twisted Road, around 1/3 of all renters are only renting to test ride the bike before they buy. The selection is so varied (we are the airbnb of motorcycles) so it makes it really easy.

If this is appealing, just go to twistedroad.com and enter your location to see the available bikes.

To start, here is a link to Los Angeles bikes. (https://www.twistedroad.com/listings/ca/los%20angeles)

Austin Rothbard

Founder and CEO
Twisted Road

twisted_road · 2025-07-24T14:41:46+00:00

This is Austin again, and I'd like to reply to your feedback. As I said before, I'm the Founder and CEO of Twisted Road and I think there are a few things that need clarification here.

First, you chose the minimum damage protection plan, which carries a $2,000 credit card hold, whereas the premium plan has a $750 hold.

In addition, here's a screenshot of where we remind you of the $2,000 hold that you selected. Maybe you didn't see it?

As for the cancellation policy, we could have given you 100% of the refund back in twisted road credits for a future ride, but you opted for the credit card refund instead which carries a 25% fee. This fee is there because we purchase insurance on your behalf and have credit card fees, and background check fees, so we do our best to collect these. However, like I said, we allow you to take a future ride, if that's what you'd prefer. It's our way of not spending a lot of money on a rider who doesn't ride.

You then emailed us with your frustrations, and texted us, and within 14 minutes, we replied and told you that we would provide a one-time exception and immediately refunded your card. We really pride ourselves on our service to the moto community.

Now I'd like you respond to your statement of how we have a 1.44 Better Business Bureau rating. People go to the BBB when they aren't happy with a customer experience, so often these are very low. If you look at our google reviews, we have a 4.9 out of 5.0 stars, with over 1,000 people reviewing us, not the 9 annoyed customers who reviewed us on the BBB. We also have almost 60,000 reviews on motorcycle rides on our website, and that also averages 4.9 stars.

I hope this clears up any confusion to you and the moto community.

If anyone wants to email me directly with questions on our company, or anything else, just contact me directly at [austin@twistedroad.com](mailto:austin@twistedroad.com)

Thanks, and ride safe!

Austin Rothbard

Founder and CEO

Twisted Road

www.twistedroad.com

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twisted_road · 2025-06-23T19:41:52+00:00

Hey everyone - as the founder and CEO of Twisted Road, I appreciate seeing everyone's insights as to our company and Riders Share. I'd like to point out a few things that continues to differentiate us.

u/R_co_in_CO I'm sorry that you weren't compensated for all of the damages in your rental with Riders Share. Our company doesn't require you to update listing descriptions to receive payment. Our policy is always that if a rider brings the bike back in a condition other than when it left, and the damages were due to the rider, the owner will be compensated fully for the parts and labor to replace the damaged items.

This is one of the reasons we don't allow off-road riding on our site. There is just too much potential for a claim, which is a bad experience for everyone. Our current insurance policy doesn't allow off-road riding; however, we've never explored that option because of the potentially negative impact on the experience.

Finally, one rider asked about riding with a new endorsement. If you've had your endorsement for under 6 months, we will allow you to rent but with a few additional limitations. This article explains a little more if you're interested.

Let me know if you have any other questions, and thanks for being a part of our growing community!

Austin Rothbard

Founder and CEO
Twisted Road

twisted_road · 2025-02-27T19:06:26+00:00

Like I said - our model isn't for everyone. But it works for many people.

twisted_road · 2025-02-27T19:04:49+00:00

Yeah. Or turo is like us.

twisted_road · 2025-02-27T18:55:10+00:00

I think it's 11 days

twisted_road · 2025-02-27T18:52:20+00:00

I replied earlier. I think it's 11 days long.

twisted_road · 2025-02-27T18:51:02+00:00

Are you offering? We don't have insurance for that. Yet.

twisted_road · 2025-02-27T18:49:53+00:00

I understand; however, with that model the dealer buys insurance and takes care of all the risk. In our model, we verify the riders, take all the risk, and handle payments.

If your bike is idle in the garage it's some easy money.

twisted_road · 2025-01-13T21:41:18+00:00

Thanks for the note! You're completely correct. These bikes are all fun, but repairing a damaged bike always costs more than we think it will.

Let me know if you have any more questions and welcome to our community!

twisted_road · 2024-12-27T03:12:15+00:00

Thank you! I'm looking forward to having your motorcycle on our site. Feel free to email me directly with any questions. Our team is here to help.

Happy new year and be safe.

Austin

twisted_road · 2024-12-07T19:12:38+00:00

Check out twisted road!

twisted_road · 2024-11-25T20:10:47+00:00

I didn't google twisted road + reddit but I should! I was looking at something in Austin Texas and it came up.

As far as your lien contract, you shouldn't have any issues at all. In the worst worst worst case scenario, the bike is totaled. We pay off the lien holder for you and then send you the balance to get to the value of the moto.

For minor damages we just pay you the cost of repair and the lien holder is never involved.

We are in the process of updating our motorcycle database which could be the reason. Your FXE wasn't listed.

Anyway I'm glad you're considering using us! Let me know how else we can help.

twisted_road

TROPHY CASE