How to Keep Your Motorcycle from Being Stolen

You love your bike, sadly some people love it almost as much as you do and try to find ways to make it their own. Every year around 45,000 Motorcycles are stolen. They have a 30% return rate, that’s half as much as an automobile. The math on that isn’t hard to understand. Motorcycles are smaller, easier to move and are harder to identify when on the road. You do your best to keep your bike from being stolen, but is it enough?

No one would steal my bike in public

You can’t rely on anyone but yourself. People ignore most of their surrounding. Sadly people are numb to car alarms going off in their neighborhood. When is the last time you heard a car chirping off in the middle of the day and you ran out to see if it was being stolen? We just assume someone bumped it and the owner now had to run outside with his keys to stop it. Though we shut out the sounds, alarms on cars have someone lost their effectiveness.

But, there are many things you can do to help prevent your motorcycle from being stolen. Here are a few. Most you’re probably already doing.

1. Lock your ignition. You’d be surprised how many people turn off their bike, but don’t actually lock it. Give it that extra turn.
2. Install a motorcycle alarm. They aren’t used often and like we said, people are a bit numb to them. But they will thwart someone who thinks they can slyly ride off with your motorcycle. And if you recognize your alarm sound, it will definitely alert you.
3. Lock your bike to a stationary object. We do it for our bicycles, you can do it for your motorcycle as well. Make sure you research your lock as some are far more impressive than others. A small investment like that can save you thousands.
4. Block it in. If you’re going to leave your bike in a storage or garage for an extended amount of time, block it off with a car or something large. Bikes are often stolen by the ease of stealing, so make it as hard as you can for them.
5. Use a “kill switch”. It’s a simple installation to make your bike a challenge to start for anyone but you.
6. Keep your eyes on your bike. When parking, park near where you’ll be at. Try to keep it in view. At home, check on it from time to time. If your bike had been stolen for a week and you didn’t catch it, you’ll probably never see it again.
7. Ride with friends, park with friends. Keep everything in a group when parking. There’s safety in numbers. No one wants to mess with a group of riders taking a break from the trip.

The last thing we’ll tell you is to prepare for the worst. Make sure your bike is properly insured. If you’re not sure what your coverage currently is, call or email your agent. You don’t want to be on a phone call after a theft and learn that you didn’t have the correct coverage.

Hundreds of bikes are stolen every day, minimize the chance of your bike being on that list. No one deserves your bike more than you.