(If you haven’t yet, check out part one of this story.)

The YZ450f arrived in San Jose last week in one piece. Considering we declined shipping insurance, this was extremely good news. Especially after a casual search online for Maersk – the shipping company that was responsible for transporting our motorcycle on a 10-day voyage over the Pacific – returned this result:

And this:

And these:

And all of these:

OK, I went a little overboard with those last ones (disclaimer: not all of these ships are Maersk’s), but still. Yikes.

Back to the good news: “our” ship completed its voyage, and the motorcycle was delivered without a scratch. It was now sitting in a customs yard in San Jose waiting for Natalia and David to pick it up.

But, we had yet to find out:

Will we make money or lose money? Two things still need to happen:

1. A customs official in Costa Rica needs to assess import taxes on the motorcycle.
2. Natalia and David need to sell the motorcycle on crmotos.com (Costa Rica’s “craigslist” for motor vehicles).

Let’s run through the numbers.

Our hope was a net profit of $1000-$2000. Natalia, David, Kirk and I all agreed at the start that we’d split the profit (or the loss) 50/50. That would mean $500-$1000 for each couple. Once we worked out a system, it wouldn’t be a bad return for a few days’ work.

So far, the motorcycle and expenses (gas for Kyle’s truck, tie-down straps and swapping out the paddle tire) totaled about $2000. In November, Miguel of North Atlantic shipping had quoted us $375 to ship the bike to Costa Rica.

$2375. Bam. OK, we still need to know the – DUN DUN DUN DUNNNN! – import tax. Somewhere along the line, we all got it in our heads that the import tax might be only a few hundred dollars. I don’t know where that came from, because 40% is the typical amount. (Again, 40% of what number? We had no idea.) Realistically, at the very least it would be $480 (that’s 40% of our $1200 declared US customs value). If this proved true, our net profit would turn out as predicted: $1000-$2000.

We were

SO WRONG.

On Friday, January 13th (go figure), Natalia told me via Skype that she had just talked with the customs office:

FUU…DGE.

Weeell, that’s awesome. Our expense sheet now tallied…

…nearly $3900. With a sale price of $4500, that leaves us with a teeny profit of…

$600.

Split 50/50.

Ugh.

It could be worse. We could have lost money. Either way, it looks like our motorcycle export endeavor has come to an end. What can we say? We tried. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Besides, in between all the uncertainty and the craziness, we learned a few things, and had fun doing it too.

Right now, Natalia and David have the bike listed on crmotos.com for $4700.

Let’s hope it sells. Fingers crossed. ☼

There’s a faint gleam in his eye. He looks wily.

It’s January. The post-holiday doldrums. Outside the restaurant, I’m standing next to the display menu trying with zero effort to entice people to have lunch. It’s 1 p.m. and the place is empty.

“I’m sorry, what was that?” I ask.

I can’t tell if this guy regularily sleeps on park benches or if he’s one of those rich dudes who dresses like a bum because he doesn’t have a single person left to impress on the planet.

“I said, are you looking for humans to eat?” He eyes me.

Uh…

nervous laugh…

“I suppose so… I’d say anyone who’s hungry.”

“Mhmm,” he responds, strolling away down the sidewalk. ☼

Kirk and I are in Costa Rica. It’s April 2011.

The four of us, having finished dinner, are sitting around the table brainstorming business ideas. With Kirk and I in the United States and Natalia and David in Costa Rica, we can use our respective locations to our advantage. Opportunities exist to make a profit on products shipped from the US to Costa Rica. Prices are often double or triple in Costa Rica than in the US. This goes for clothing, electronics and vehicles, for example. Vehicles, including motorcycles.

“I think motos are a good idea,” says Natalia. Kirk and I agree. Both Natalia and David are motorcycle savvy. They’ve owned a handful of bikes over the years and have knowledge of the current market. Kirk and I? We’re not motorcycle aficionados, but it’s not as if we’re opening a repair shop. We’re buying and selling. (Not to undercut Kirk’s motorcycle experience – he once owned a Honda CB250.)

Making money without a job has become our obsession. It’s the pursuit of freedom in its purest form. To be able to pick up and leave whenever we want, to move to Denver to ski over the winter, to surf in Hawaii when the swell picks up. To visit the relatives I just found out I have in Monaco, or my sister in NYC (before she decides to move herself!) Traveling is important. But more so, making money without a job sets your life free. It’s about enjoying your morning coffee – not in your car on a frustrating commute – but rather at the kitchen table while reading the paper. Or, at a coffee shop over conversation with a friend. Or, at the ocean while watching the waves! Making money without a job is about living the lifestyle you choose to live.

October 2011.

After months of talking about the idea we finally make the decision to pull the trigger and buy a motorcycle.

What type of bike to choose? Even with thousands of makes and models available, we needed to find one within our few-thousand dollar budget that would garner the highest profit margin between the two countries.

We decided on a dirt bike. Dirt bikes don’t require license plates in California (as long as you don’t ride them on the road), nor do they require registration or smog testing in Costa Rica. The amount of red tape we avoided by selecting a dirt bike saved us hundreds of dollars. To select the right make and model, I researched prices on craigslist here in San Diego and compared them with prices on crmotos.com, Costa Rica’s website for vehicle classified ads. Kirk created a Google spreadsheet that Natalia and David could review and give the thumbs up or thumbs down to various bikes.

On paper, the Yamaha YZ450f and the Honda CRF450 looked to have the highest profit margin. An ’04, ’05 or ’06 could still be found for around $2000 in California and were selling for up to ₡2,500,000 ($5000 US) in Costa Rica. Gross profit? $3000.

Cake, right? Why wasn’t anyone else doing this? But wait, we can’t forget the expenses:

• Shipping.  A Tico shipping company with an office in LA. offered us the cheapest quote: $350, Long Beach to San Jose. We were stoked! (Until this proved too good to be true.)
• Gas/truck rental. We could go looking for the bike just fine in the Passat, but once we found it, it wasn’t going to fit in the hatchback. It’s a motorcycle, right? Just ride it, you say. Ah, but it’s not street legal. Plus, the one we ended up purchasing was still sporting its paddle tire from recent romps in the desert. Those don’t roll on pavement. Moral of the story: we threw Kyle some gas money to borrow his GMC Sierra.
• Import taxes. This was the scariest of them all. Supposedly import taxes were 40%. But 40% of what? Forty percent of the what we declared to be the US customs value, $1200? Forty percent of what we actually paid for it, $2000? Forty percent of what it could sell for in Costa Rica, $5000?! Forty percent of some arbitrary number they pulled out of their own a**es?! Ohh, motocicleta bonita! You pay much money. No profit for you! There was no way to get our hands on solid number until the bike was under the scrutiny of a customs official in Costa Rica. From what we heard, this was like bringing a clown to a toddler’s birthday party: it could turn out fine, or, really, really bad. This number would make or break everything.

Every investment is a calculated gamble. So what did we do? Rolled the dice.

November 2011.

It was a rainy day in Escondido. With one last look over the chosen 2004 Yamaha YZ450f, Kirk shook hands with Marc, a new father with no time left in his schedule for riding. I tried to keep Marc’s anxious one-year old entertained with a horribly off-key rendition of Itsy Bitsy Spider while Kirk and Marc signed the papers.

Kirk handed over the 100 twenty-dollar bills. We had placed our bet.

By the end of the week the motorcycle was sitting in a warehouse in Long Beach, with many thanks to Kyle and Dana. Besides Kyle lending us his truck so we could transport the bike, the two of them let us store the bike in their garage for almost a week between picking it up from Marc on Sunday and making the day trip to Long Beach on Friday. Without our generous friends, details like this would have been this endeavor’s undoing. We don’t have a truck. We don’t have a garage. Where would we have kept the bike for five days? It’s not like we can park it on the street. This bike doesn’t need a key! Anyone could have kick-started that baby and within a couple of hours be whipping up sand at Ocotillo Wells. (Not that taking it for a joy ride is the first thing a motorcycle thief would do, but we didn’t park it on the street to find out.)

With the motorcycle now entrusted to one Miguel Larios of North Atlantic shipping company in Long Beach, all we had to do was wait. Or so we thought.

A week and half went by. I called Miguel. Did the bike ship yet? “No, no, I’m sorry, there were some problems in Costa Rica, and … ” blah, blah, blah … OK, fine, whatever.

Another week goes by. Did it ship yet? “No, no, but next Tuesday eet will ship.” What? Uh, now this is getting ridiculous.

It was about this time that I endured a sleepless night worrying about the motorcycle convinced that it had been stolen, wrecked or sold to drug runners. After weeks of near heart attacks over this stupid motorcycle – Why again did we do this in the first place, gah!? – I bring you to … drumroll, please …

My Facebook Wall, Friday January 6, 2012.

IT MADE IT! Over 3000 miles by container ship from California all the way to Caldera, Costa Rica and finally inland to the customs yard in San Jose. (Now you can breathe easy, Aunt Cindy!)

But, the reckoning hour has yet to come. Will all of our effort pay off? We won’t know until we can tally our expenses. To do this, we need the customs official in Costa Rica to hit us with our 40% import taxes.

Tax man, what’s your number? ☼

Now, I’m back in SD and things have quieted down. It’s time to say ‘adieu’ to 2011:

January. Awwh heck. We moved again! from snowy Michigan to sunny San Diego.

Our move doubled as cross-country road trip

with stops in Colorado to hit the slopes at Vail and A-Basin

road-side photo-ops,

and a night in Las Vegas to strike it rich.

February. We experienced plenty of gorgeous 70 degree days our first month in SoCal.

Between bike rides, surfing exploits and afternoons on the beach, we hatched a plan to start our own photography business. San Diego Home Photography was born.

By the end of the month we had landed our first shoot.

March. I made Kirk a double-layer cake from scratch for his 27th birthday.

We went hiking through Cleveland National Forest and I fell in love with my Vibram Fivefinger shoes. Thanks to them, now I run for fun. Seriously.

April/May. During the spring, a few more real estate shoots trickled in.

Kirk’s parents visited us from Michigan for a week. We took them to the San Diego Zoo.

At the end of April, Kirk and I made 10-day trip to Costa Rica to see Natalia and David,

to meet their daughter, Sofía,

and do a little surfing in Manuel Antonio.

June. Kirk’s younger sister Maureen flew out for a visit. We took her on a grand wildlife tour starting with the Point Loma tide pools,

Seal Beach,

and lastly the Safari Park.

Near the end of June, Kirk and I headed east for a few days of camping in the Anza-Borrego Desert.

July. We had two of our largest shoots this month. Incidentally, one of them proved the most dangerous as well. Thanks to a faulty outdoor propane fireplace, Kirk came milliseconds away from a human torching.

August/September. I made the big decision to write a book. To embark on this project, I took a hiatus from California and spent seven weeks back in Wisconsin.

I chatted away many afternoons with my Omi. We talked about her past, how she met my Opa, and their immigration to the United States.

In addition to writing, I squeezed in lots of activities with my family including Summerfest,

pool time,

and a night downtown Milwaukee.

October. My parents and I flew to Germany to celebrate the 50th anniversary of my great aunt and uncle.

The party served as an extended family reunion too. Here’s me and my second cousin Britta,

and my mom with her first cousins.

Besides the party, we sight-seed ourselves out. We toured Bremen,

gaped at the Cologne Cathedral,

cruised the Rhein,

explored Koblenz,

and drank lots of wine. (And my Mom and I went to Paris too! The posts are coming soon!)

November. Kirk and I tried our hands at the export business: shipping motorcycles to Costa Rica. Will it be profitable? We’re still waiting to find out…

December. The holidays. It’s a tradition in Kirk’s family to go out for dinner on Christmas Eve. We ate and enjoyed the sunset at Pacifica Del Mar, a seafood restaurant with an ocean view.

The Berrymans flew in to San Diego to spend the end of the holidays with us. Together we said goodbye to 2011 and welcomed in 2012. ☼

Lauren Schroeder, please wait while we locate your itinerary… read the screen.

Thirty seconds had gone by. Next to me, two people had already checked in, printed their boarding passes and left for their gates.

A service agent saw me floundering. ”Do you need help ma’am?”

“Yeah, the computer isn’t finding my ticket. Could you tell me flight number for the flight to Milwaukee?”

“We don’t fly to Milwaukee, ma’am.”

“What?”

“American Airlines doesn’t fly to Milwaukee. Are you sure you’re flying with American?”

Uhh…

“Are you sure your destination isn’t maybe Chicago? We fly there.”

Uhh…

Could I have booked my ticket to Chicago? It’s not out of the ordinary for me to fly to Chicago and then hop a bus to Milwaukee. Tickets are often cheaper and Kirk’s rental property is there, so we make stopovers in Chicago pretty regularily… But not this time… No. This time I was going to see my family – in Wisconsin - I know I booked my ticket to Milwaukee… Right??

“Here, let me see if I can look you up. We do have some limited acess to other airlines’ databases… What’s your last name?”

“Uh, okaay… Schroeder?”

CLACK CLACK CLICKITY-CLACK. “Is your first name L – A – U – ?”

“Yeah, that’s me…?”

“Okay, here we go. You’re booked on a US airways flight to Milwaukee. You need to go down the stairs and all the way to the other end of the terminal.”

You’ve got to be kidding me. I got the airline wrong?

I left the counter, mouth still agape at my own brainlessness.

Very suave. You really nailed that one, didn’t you.

All I could do was laugh at myself. ☼