Bike buying advice, please!

For the price you quote, you can either get a Sel Atalia saddle and aero bars OR you could get an entry level wheelset. You could quite possibly find a bike for $250 somewhere but I would not count on doing the Hawaii Ironman on it!

Well, I'm not the authority on bicycles, so don't get your hopes up. BUT, I think we are living parallel lives because I bought my first (and only) bike for about $200 and was in the same sort of bind. So, I'll tell ya what I got from the ebay Gods:

I got a steel Fuji road bike that had been sitting in a guy's garage since the 80s or something. It has the shifters on the downtube and 7 speeds on the rear wheel with two chainring dealies by the pedals. When I bought it the tires were sort of rotted, so I replaced them with equally cheapo tires from performancebike.com. It also came with those pedals with the straps so you can put your street shoes in them. I replaced those with clipless guys. Other than that, I've been riding on the original bike for about two years now, both training and running errands, and it has held up to all the abuse I could give it. It's heavy too (over 20 lbs), but you know the old saying about training heavy and racing light.

I hope that helps give you some idea of what a $250-dollar bike is composed of. I'm confident you can find something perfectly rideable for your budget, but be careful of all those extra expenses, like cycling clothes, gloves, shoes, tools, etc. that make a pretty big dent in the old bank account.

Some stuff to look for in a used bike

It is entirely possible to get a quality used bike for not too much money
If you are lucky and if
you pay attention

It's also possible to get ripped off on a used bike

You want to look for a bike that will fit you
then
at the brand of the bike (get name brand)
the components on the bike (again name brand)
the condition of the bike
remember that things like tires,
handlebar wrap, cables, and chains are
routine maintanence items anyway

Have you got somethng in mind already?

I got my first bike for about that price from Ebay. I've had it about 4 years now. My opinion, it's going to be hard to find a decent bike in that price range, from your LBS. I'd watch Ebay, cause sometimes you can get good deals from there, but it definitely is caveat emptor. Or, you could go and buy a basic bike from your local Wal-Mart, Target etc. I know these bikes aren't the best, but if you need to get into the market, that might be a place to start.

My bike (which is still my bike, as I haven't had the funds to buy a new one) is a no-name (the original owner repainted the frame at some point, so I have no idea of the maker), old (I think about 20 years), shifters on the down-tube, basic bike. I actually lucked out because I've been told by "those who know" that the frame looks really good, and high-quality.

The original wheelset had a couple of issues so I ended up having to replace that right out of the box. I took it to my LBS guy, who always works with me even though I haven't had a lot of money to spend. It came fully equipped, and slowly over the past few years I've updated some of the features on the bike. I've upgraded the bike seat, pedals, and changed out the rear cog set. I've learned a lot about bikes from having this bike and fiddling around with it, so it was definitely money well spent.

Shellee in CA

Thanks for the encouragement guys! I was a little worried about how good of a bike I could actually get.

Dave, I *did* have a bike in mind, but I missed the end of the auction on www.stealitback.com (thanks to whoever posted that site the other day). It was a Trek 1000 that looked to be in pretty good shape. It sold for $150. It'd be a stretch for me to afford that right now, but I probably should have done it. Oh well....

So, when you say "name brand", what are the name brands? I know nothing about bikes. I know Trek and Shimano and that's about it. Thanks!!!

When you find a bike, Google the brand name
This will not always work
as some perfectly fine old euro bikes
may be web impared

Avoid, as a general rule, bikes that were originally
sold in dept. stores or
mega-mart type dealies

for starters
Trek
Specialized
Giant
Bianchi
LeMond
Klein
GT (road bikes0
Motobecane
Raleigh
Paramount
Caloi
Cannondale

There are a whole lot more than this
what you want to avoid are the
Roadmaster
Huffy
Free Spirit
Western Auto
no names

Here's a good rule of thumb

if the bike has shifters mounted next to the stem, keep looking

FWIW, that police auction site looked like a fair source
as long as the emptor is truly caveat'ed

peas

I'm guessing from your username that you are a woman. My apologies if this is not true.

If you go to the Terry Bicycle site http://www.terrybicycles.com/Trade/sell.lassoyou'll find a section where Terry owners can buy/sell/trade Terry Bicycles. There are a few items there that might fit into your budget.

Terry makes very nice road bikes with dimensions for women. Most bikes are manufactured for men, and are poorly fitted to women, particularly short women like me.