I'm kicking around the idea of buying a 250cc and then donating it to my girlfriend the summer after so she can start learning on it herself; she want to make sure I don't die within the first year before climbing on. I'd love to get a CBR250RR but it appears they're exclusively grey market imports. Any ideas on where to look into getting one and what kind of hassle it would be to register it? Also, everyone says a 250cc will get “buzzy” in the 70MPH range, what exactly does that mean?

 

Bah, it looks to be pretty much impossible but I'm still looking into contacting a foreign bike importer. The "buzzy" question still stands.

 

Grey market imports? Where are you located?

 

NY, everything I'm reading about the 1990-1999 CBR250RR series states that they were mostly sold in Japan and other international markets where the demand for a lower cc bike is still prevalent but were never officially marketed in the US. They still showed up on our shores but not in large numbers and not officially being sold by Honda. Looking around it appears decent models in the states are going for $3,000-$5,000+, there's a showroom ready one on eBay that's over $7,000 right now.

 

2013 cbr250r are going for $4699 msrp. A member here was trying to sell his 2012 for $4000 iirc. These aren't grey market imports. Honda started selling 250s here in the US a couple years ago.

 

The 250R is available stateside, and in large qunatities, however I was looking to get a '90-'99 2500RR MC22. They had more power, torque, a higher top speed and looked pretty bad ***. Apologies for the confusion.

I'm looking at possibly importing one from Canada however I'm unsure if it will pass emissions and safety standards. Is there some kind of grandfather clause for bikes older than 15 years that might alleviate this problem?

 

those kinds of issues are very state specific. i know from living in NY for a few years that they are very strict on emissions and safety checks on cars. i can only imagine they are on motorcycles too. when i moved down here to SC, they didnt require any kind of emissions/inspection at all, unlike NY. so you may need to figure out a way to register the bike in another state("slightly" illegal, so do so at your own risk)