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.