You too, can buy a "scratch and dent" RV

A brand-new 2015 Heartland Sundance 5th wheel, retail price, $38,000 – sold, $20,000. The rig's front end was scraped in delivery, the dealer refused it, and Heartland didn't want it back. So Bob Ethan snapped the unit up for pennies on the dollar and turned it around at auction for the $20,000 price. Now that's one whale of a "scratch and dent" sale.

It's all in a day's work for a St. Joseph, Minnesota, auction house called Asset Management Inc. The company has been in business for a decade, largely selling repossessions. But a happy twist brought RVs into AMI's arena. They got a call from a trucking company that had a few damaged RVs that they wanted to get rid of. AMI looked into it, and in 2014 sold over 100 different RVs – not all of them "scratch and dent," but there are plenty of them. The outfit anticipates more and more of these rigs.

Not all the damaged RVs are sold at auction – the company website shows quite a list of both "for sale," and "sold" units sitting on the floor with a clear asking price. The prices can be eye-opening. Here's a typical listing:

NEW 2015 SUNDANCE TRAVEL TRAILER 25' CAMPER, MODEL 255MK, 1 SLIDE OUT, SLEEPS 7, FRIG/FREEZER, STOVE/OVEN, WATER HEATER, FURNACE, MICROWAVE, ROOF AIR, POWER AWNING, TOILET/SHOWER, BUNK OVER THE DINETTE, GENESIS STEREO SYSTEM, LED TV, POWER JACK, THIS UNIT HAS MINOR DAMAGE, GVW 8,900 ASKING $19,995 CALL BOB @ 320-267-3949

amiauction.com

Minor damage? AMI included several photos of the unit, both inside and out. We're including the photo of the damage. You'd have to be able to do the fix yourself, or count in the cost of repairs, but all in all it could be a deal. A Florida dealer is asking $29,000 for this model -- sans the damage.

Some units that the outfit gets its hands on are so badly damaged they're sold for parts; however, there's quite a selection of lesser damaged RVs. If nothing else, its an easy job to "kick a few tires" on the Internet by visiting their site.

RV buying: New or used?

David Prasad on flickr.co,

Thinking about buying a new RV? We don't mean, "new to you," but rather, brand-new, fresh from the factory new. There are advantages, sure enough, but there are also drawbacks.

A few years back, in the dark corners of the "Great Recession," buying a new RV was kind of a crapshoot. A lot of RV manufacturers went down the drain and shuttered their factories. This left folks with a seemingly-new RV, and an in-force warranty in a pickle. If nobody stepped up to the plate and assumed the warranty, well, they were just up the creek. Happily, it seems we're passed the days of "building today, bankrupt tomorrow," so the warranty is probably worth a bit more than the price of the paper it's printed on.

Still, even with a new rig and a warranty, life isn't always a bed of roses. Tap in on the conversations on RV forums and you'll find a common denominator among 'brand new' RV buyers: Repeated returns to the dealers to fix things that should never have had to be fixed in the first place. Sad to say, industry-wide, quality control is just NOT a big thing. Buy new, expect that your rig will spend time back at the dealer, getting things fixed. If you bought from a "local" dealer, then you'll likely find it a lot easier to live with this situation.

butterflysha on flickr.com

If you bought on price-point, and say, drove 1,000 miles or even more to buy from a dealer to save big bucks, you may find a problem. If you bought from Sam 1,000 miles away, don't bet that Fred the Dealer in your hometown is going to bend over backwards to get your rig into the shop to fix it – warranty or not. You may find you'll be standing in line a long time, waiting, while your precious vacation time fritters away.

Putting the warranty issue aside, then there's that little thing called "depreciation." Face it, when you buy an RV, you will NEVER get anything close to what you paid for the rig back when you sell it or trade it, even if it's just a few months down the road. It's like buying a car – drive it off the lot, drop the value in a hurry.

So what's the alternative? Buying a gently used, older RV may be the trick. Let the original owner waste his time waiting for his rig to come back from the dealer "getting the bugs worked out." Let some other poor schlep be the guy who paid dearly for the status of having a "brand new RV" watch his interest payments balloon, paying for depreciation.

Of course, you buy used, you've likely bought without warranty. That means, set a little money aside to have that "older but wiser" RV properly inspected. Top to bottom, side to side, and all appliances in safe, working condition. No water leakage. Good rubber on the road. Wheel bearings packed and brakes in good condition. No, it may not have that "factory fresh formaldehyde," essence, but hey, you may have saved yourself thousands of dollars, and months of frustration.