Aspects of the present disclosure relate to techniques for activating opportunistic relays. A combination of uplink and downlink pilots may be used to switch on user equipment relays (UeNBs) in an effort to make more accurate measurements in an effort to enable handovers. According to aspects of the present disclosure, a relay may evaluate one or more channel conditions, determine whether or not to transmit downlink reference signals to a UE based on the evaluation, and transmit downlink reference signals to the UE based on the determination. According to aspects, a relay may determine a set of resources reserved for transmission of uplink pilots by UEs, monitor the set of resources to detect transmission of uplink pilots, and report, to an eNB, a power at which the uplink pilots were received.