Did you purchase brand new and WHY?

[Roadtrek Adventuous RS1]

We purchased our 2012 in 2017...saved almost 50 percent off a brand new RV......
Yeah, we did put $$$$ into the rig for upgrades, maintenance, etc. ... BUT, I think I'm still ahead a little.......

On the other hand.... we're flying without the 6 years warranty on a brand new Roadtrek....

I guess you pay one way or another........

What are your thoughts on this..... the extra $50,000 is really buying the insurance up front for a warranty you might not need???

Hey, these things depreciate approximately $12000 or more per year for the first couple of years...

Just my opinion...

[michaelingp]

We bought our first class B, a Roadtrek, used. It was a couple of years old, but only had a few thousand miles on it. A new one was about $60K then, and I think we paid $35K. We didn't care about any kind of warranty because I'm handy and we were hours from the nearest Roadtrek dealer anyway and it took weeks to get an appointment. We kept it 13 years or so. It was our first motorhome and $35K seemed a lot less risky than $60K if we decided it wasn't for us. It sold for almost $20K when we sold it.

However, our current class B, is a U.S. registered Safari Condo, an extremely rare beast, so we had to buy new. We knew what we wanted and our finances were better (we were older) so buying new didn't bother us.

But in most cases, you can save a ton of money buying used, as the example of our Roadtrek shows.

[Roadtrek Adventuous RS1]

Originally Posted by michaelingp

We bought our first class B, a Roadtrek, used. It was a couple of years old, but only had a few thousand miles on it. A new one was about $60K then, and I think we paid $35K. We didn't care about any kind of warranty because I'm handy and we were hours from the nearest Roadtrek dealer anyway and it took weeks to get an appointment. We kept it 13 years or so. It was our first motorhome and $35K seemed a lot less risky than $60K if we decided it wasn't for us. It sold for almost $20K when we sold it.

However, our current class B, is a U.S. registered Safari Condo, an extremely rare beast, so we had to buy new. We knew what we wanted and our finances were better (we were older) so buying new didn't bother us.

But in most cases, you can save a ton of money buying used, as the example of our Roadtrek shows.

I'm not familiar with the Safari Condo...why is it rare? Tell us more...

[michaelingp]

Safari Condo is a Canadian company (Quebec). To register one in the states you have to buy the base (empty) van yourself and deliver it to them to convert. That plus a one year backlog of orders constrains the number sold to U.S. buyers.

[Chief Holbert]

I believe buying a gently used RV no matter what class is a perfect, all the bugs are out and upgrades would be your taste. I bought a 1990 ford Sun Sport in great shape, spent a winter in it and drove out to California for a month, no problems.
RV community is bigger than I thought, the independence and the different places you could be at are beyond your wildest dreams. I'm hooked on this life. "A Sailor and his dog".

[<<B-Guy>>]

My last three RV's were bought used - but each just a few years old, and looked in good shape when we bought them.

I don't know if I just had bad luck, but I spent more time than I care to remember working on them!

They were all travel trailers and I had to keep them in storage rather than at our home so it wasn't easy to work on them - often I would backlog jobs to do, take a pile of tools with us, and work on them when we travelled south in the winters.

Initially I didn't mind, as I am reasonably handy and enjoy that sort of thing, but after a while it seemed I was spending half our "snowbird trips" working on the trailers, and that was getting to be a bit much! My wife wasn't thrilled about it either!

So when I decided it was time for our 2005 31 ft Airstream to go after last winter's trip, I debated whether it was time to call it quits with RVing after about 50 years of it.

We are seniors, and I now have few health issues - mainly osteoarthritis - and decided I had had enough of working on RV's - other than minor repair jobs.

So now we have a 2019 PW Plateau FL.

I'm not kidding myself that there won't be some teething troubles with it - and if so, at worst that will be mildly inconvenient and aggravating, but won't likely be me doing teh work!

I'm sure this decision makes no sense economically - especially as we will likely not use it for more than five years or so, perhaps less depending on how life treats us! But it was a toss up between giving up the RV lifestyle now, or going about it a little differently and that, rather than just economics, drove the decision!

We have only used it so far on two short trips as we only got in in late September - but I am enthusiastic about it, and have already made a few mods to it - adding storage shelves, TPMS, bike/cargo racks, and now looking forward to heading south early next year.

It will be a lot less stressful for this old guy to deal with, especially compared to struggling to get our previous larger RV's shoe-horned into difficult back-in sites in state/provincial parks, and also I can park it in our driveway so apart from saving on storage fees, I can look after it better and it will be ready to go any time so I think we will use it a lot more than out trailers.

We'll miss the greater living space we had - but many years ago we owned a VW Westfalia, so we should manage!

We'll see how it goes!

Brian.

[booster]

I think it is very important to point out that all used/new are not created equal. A very large part of the benefit of one over the other is dependent on how much the new vehicle is discounted from MSRP, if it is a current model year, and how long you are going to keep it.


If you are trying to buy a new model that is popular and not largely discounted off retail, your benefit is larger. In many discussions of the comparison, full retail is very, very, often used in the analysis, and in many cases this will quite radically distort the picture. If the model you are looking at is selling at steep discounts for new ones, used and new costs get much closer together for initial purchase, and early years depreciation can also be much less.


Last year, the local Roadtrek dealer had a couple of full size Roadtrek Spinters that were new and listed at under $100K, IIRC, which was less than many similar used one in the market that were used and older.



For reference, we bought new, but were looking at both new and used. It just happened that a very highly discounted new unit became available that was very close to the same price as a couple of year old units (if they were the very nice ones that had been inside stored, as we live in Minnesota where outside storage can be an issue). For us, at that point, going new was a no brainer.

[avanti]

Another consideration involves the fact the the whole automotive industry is presently undergoing extremely rapid technological (r)evolution. Back when vehicles were more or less the same for decades, buying quality used vehicles made huge sense. Today, though, doing so generally requires one to forgo the latest safety and convenience features, which get dramatically better every model year. I realize that it is fashionable to pooh-pooh this stuff as needless complexity, but IMO this is just bonkers. The current generation of semi-autonomous vehicles are SO much safer (especially for older drivers) that I believe it to be irrational to purchase anything less. You don't have to use the autonomy features if you don't like them--the many important safety systems sit politely in the background waiting to save your bacon.

All my life I have believed in buying the best vehicle that I could afford and keeping it until it falls apart. No longer. Having experienced the value of these new systems, I now plan to trade in every few years just to keep up.

[magicbus]

My previous coaches were both used and I swore I would never buy new. I never cared about warranties because having to travel to get warranty service would make me nuts. I also liked having someone else deal with the shakedown issues.

This time we bought new because a) we liked the new features; b) the discounted price was in the range of used with 20k miles; c) we liked the chassis and floor plan. We did have a water line issue that caused our pump to burn out. Drove 2 hours to a dealer figuring it would be covered but they insisted the pump was not covered, only the issue that caused the water shortage (a kinked water line) was covered. Like I said, this stuff drives me nuts.

When I reached out to the dealership where I bought our coach they contacted Winnebago who agreed the pump should be covered and they reimbursed me.

[Phoebe3]

We purchased new, primarily because we couldn't find what we wanted on the used market and used coaches were, in our opinion, overpriced.

For example, given the level of quality we wanted and a requirement of less than 50K miles, a ten-year old van was $45-$50K and a five-year-old van was $65-$70K. Now, this was partially because these models were built on the (expensive) Sprinter chassis and partially because, as a result of the recession, there weren't many used models out there. But it was still hard to justify the potential headaches of buying used when we could buy exactly what we wanted new for just $10-$15K more.

Now I don't know whether it might have been better to buy a couple of years old. I have a list of 22 tweaks/mods that I might not have done if someone else had owned the van first, but it's kind of been my hobby so I can't say that I have minded doing them.

[BillsPaseo]

Our experience was similar to Phoebe3's. All of the used models we were looking at were in the 65-70K range, and were generally 3-5 years old with around 45-50K miles on them. By bumping up an additional 20K, we were able to get brand new with a full warranty, and some nice features the older rigs were lacking (like the Truma Combi furnace/hot water heater, the NovaKool fridge, and the factory installed solar system).

[ponti33602]

We bought new. Primarily due to my wife wanting some of the newer tech. If tech isn't high on your priority list you should never buy a new, depreciating asset.

[Rockwood27]

Of the 7 RV's that we've owned only 2 were new. The new ones were a park trailer and the other a park model. We bought the park model in 1996 and still have it. It is probably "worth" more now than new, but that's because of the campground it's been at. The most recent and currently owned RV's are a 5th wheel and our Roadtrek 190P. We bought both used last winter. Our plans were to buy a new 5th wheel and new Class B. However, the used units came along, so we bought them. That process saved us about $50K off of the 30% discounted price.

[richpress]

In 35 years my wife and I have had six RV's, as well as two kids. The first RV was a 5 year old used VW pop-top camper in which the engine caught fire while in the parking lot of a local Sears about a year after we got it and about two months before our first baby was born. That was traumatic. The second was a 12 year old dodge van conversion which lasted us about 10 years and about 80k miles before we sold it. The third was a 5 year old fifth-wheel which we kept for 5 or so years and gave to my sister in law. The fourth was a 3 year old toy hauler which we kept for 6 or 8 years. The fifth is a 1978 Harvest class C which we though we would restore. We still have that and need to sell it. Our last and most recent is a 2002 Roadtrek 190 V which we got for 22k with only 60k milers on it. Of all the units, this Roadtrek is by far the best. We looked at new Roadtreks in 2002 but they were way to costly for us at the time. I also believe in buying 5 or 15 years old and keeping until it falls apart or it makes sense to get a different one. The new electronics and gadgets are things you can install by yourself, or have installed, and do not make the price of a new or even 2 year old unit worth the high price. As an aside, with the exception of the VW ( which were all prone to engine fires caused by gas leaks at the carburetor) we have had very good luck and spent almost nothing on repairs and just the routine maintenance such as one would on a car.
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[dhectorg]

Originally Posted by Roadtrek Adventuous RS1

We purchased our 2012 in 2017...saved almost 50 percent off a brand new RV......
Yeah, we did put $$$$ into the rig for upgrades, maintenance, etc. ... BUT, I think I'm still ahead a little.......

On the other hand.... we're flying without the 6 years warranty on a brand new Roadtrek....

I guess you pay one way or another........

What are your thoughts on this..... the extra $50,000 is really buying the insurance up front for a warranty you might not need???

Hey, these things depreciate approximately $12000 or more per year for the first couple of years...

Just my opinion...

You will definitely use your warranty if you have one. Personally, I've never owned a brand new unit because I can't yet afford one at these ever increasing prices, but I know quite a few people that have bought new and every single one of them had A LOT of warranty claims early on. The RV industry is known to have some of the worst manufacturing quality of any industry, so the first year of owning a new unit will almost certainly require warranty repairs. The upside is, at least you have that warranty covering it.

Buying used has its advantages also. If it's less than a few years old, the original owner should have already taken care of all of the initial issues, so there shouldn't be much left to deal with when you buy it, unless they just didn't take care of it. I probably wouldn't touch anything older than 4-5 years old, for that reason, but that's a personal choice.

I currently have an old beat up Dodge Xplorer class B that has served me well, despite its age, usage and mileage, but I'm saving up to purchase my first new RV when I retire and it will likely be a custom build. It will cost a bit more than OEM, but I expect to avoid many of the quality issues that mass production units tend to be plagued with.