<prompt> Human: Hey guys, I have a pretty simple situation. Im 25 years old and I work part time 35 -4 hours a week and I make Alabamas minimum wage. 7.25hourI live with my dad and he doesnt make me pay rent. I think I can live here for the foreseeable future without any problems. Id rather not, but I dont have many options at this point with my current level of income. I am looking for better jobs and applying on the internet for anything that seems like an upgrade, but, having very few marketable skills, I rarely hear anything back from potential employers.I have no debt, I have a car and around 800 in the bank. I buy most of my own food and I am able to take care of what needs taking care of so far. I have: a car insurance payment of about 40 a month and a phone bill for 45 a month. Aside from that, its foodgasliving expenses.I want to buy a bicycle. I want to commute on it and ride it on the weekends. Im overweight and I think it will help me become more physically active as well. I want to get a decent bike. I was looking at a few different ones and the ones that I feel are the best value for me are around 1500. Yeah, I could get a really crappy one for a lot less but its just not feasible to ride long distances on a bike like that.Im thinking about taking out a loan on it because, while I could save up enough to buy it outright with cash, I dont know if I want to take that huge of a chunk out of my bank account since it would take me several months to be able to save that much money up.It looks like Id need to get a personal loan, and my local credit union offers them at a 10.90 rate. So Ill probably end up with around 100 in interest. That seems manageable to me.Additionally, I dont have any credit at the moment. Im wondering if this is a good idea to help build me some credit. Im not super familiar with credit anyway.Should I take out the loan or should I just scrape until I have 2 grand which might be several months to a year so I wont feel so bad about taking that huge of a chunk out of my total assets?Assistant: As a bike shop manager, I would revenues an honest talk with yourself. It seems as though you want a bike to get back in shape, clear your mind, commute to work a bit and just for the pure joy of riding a bike. If not racing, a decent performance hybrid is not a bad choice. Think trek 7.1 439or Carbondale quick 4 - 6 550. I describe those as the vehicles of the bike world. Obviously a touring bike is.nice but a bit more expensive. A road bike is not designed to have racks mounted nor are the smaller tires as comfortable.I would recommend purchasing from a local shop. Preferably one that offers at least 3 months of free maintenance. Every bike that is sold will need a few adjustments as the cables stretch...all of them. This expensive if multiple trips are required. Lifetime warrant on most frames and 1-2 year on most components is nice...internet wont warranty or maintain your bike for you.Buy one within your means.Ask me any questions you may have.Human: Im looking at a cannondale synapse 105 disc or possibly a fuji cross 1.3.Its hard to find a used bike in my size especially in my area, were not exactly the cycling capital of the world.I think I need a 52 or 54 cm bike, and you just cant find many of those on craigslist. Ive been looking and I will continue to, but I havent seen anything I thought was worth anywhere near what they were asking yet.Assistant: Both of those that your are looking at are road or cyclocross. Not the ideal commuter. Used might be a bucket of problems. A few customers have shown up with a used bile that they are in the market to purchase and had us evaluate it to see what repairs are needed. Then negotiate with bike owner. We charge them 20 to do that. It takes us time to do so. If they purchase the bike and bring it in for repairs that day, we credit that 20 towards the repair if the repair is 40. Human: Well I dont really have the money to buy 2 bikes, so I want to buy 1 bike that I can use for several purposes. I want to be able to ride 100 miles on it, or ride it across town. Thats why I settled on a roadcyclocross bike. I dont want something with a fixed gear, and I want the shifters and brakes to be quality that I can depend on.  <response>: Well I dont really have the money to buy 2 bikesFrankly, you dont have the money to buy the bike you want not need either. If you want to make a sound financial decision, then save up until you can afford it or look at a cheaper bike. If you want to finance it anyway, go ahead, but know that it will be a stupid financial decision. 