thesameguy
Well-known member
- Joined
- Jun 6, 2014
- Posts
- 623
I started shopping for my first RV in 2013 and finally bought in early 2014 after looking at a lot of them. What I learned came as a surprise even though it shouldn't have... just like with regular old cars as RVs devalue people take progressively worse care of them. There just isn't any such thing as an old, cheap RV that needs nothing. Compounding the issue is that RVs have a lot of expensive components, devalue like nobody's business, and their whole is absolutely not the sum of their parts. So if you buy that $4k RV that needs a few things, you're going to drop a fortune on those things when you could have just bought a newer rig that hadn't bottomed out, hadn't gone uncared for, and didn't need things in the first place.
I was originally shopping ~$4k trucks from the '80s, but they ALL needed something. Tallying up those needs made me realize I wasn't going to get what I wanted for anything approaching $4k and my real number was probably closer to $8k, all said and done. As a result, I instead started shopping trucks from the '90s - trucks made with newer materials, with (ostensibly) better construction, and more advanced parts. I won out with a 4-speed electronically controlled transmission and a fuel injected engine along with an interior and exterior with ten fewer years on it for the same price as an '80s truck with a handful of repairs. My nut was $7k with $1k worth of post-purchase repairs and $600 in updates... around $8k all said and done. I've been very happy with the purchase and while there are things I could do, there is nothing it needs and everything works great. I probably *should* have spent the $8k up front and gotten something just a tad nicer to start with, but no regrets!
(I will mention that I had fairly modest needs - sleeping room for four, a fridge, a toilet, and AC. Anything beyond that stuff was just complexity I didn't need or want. No fancy features like slideouts for me! I sought only a comfortable place to sleep and poop when I'm not outside doing vacation-y things )
If you *like* the idea of working on an RV and have some specific result you'd like to get, yeah, you might as well build - just be aware that when you put $4k into a $4k RV, you probably still have a $4k RV and you've done it for the love and the experience. But if you want to drive around and have a place for your food and your head, buy something in good shape from someone who still used it, kept it up, and didn't let it languish. I'm thankful every time I drive mine I bought someone else's love affair and not a project because it always just works. Tinkering on your vacation machine sounds like the worst of the worst.
I was originally shopping ~$4k trucks from the '80s, but they ALL needed something. Tallying up those needs made me realize I wasn't going to get what I wanted for anything approaching $4k and my real number was probably closer to $8k, all said and done. As a result, I instead started shopping trucks from the '90s - trucks made with newer materials, with (ostensibly) better construction, and more advanced parts. I won out with a 4-speed electronically controlled transmission and a fuel injected engine along with an interior and exterior with ten fewer years on it for the same price as an '80s truck with a handful of repairs. My nut was $7k with $1k worth of post-purchase repairs and $600 in updates... around $8k all said and done. I've been very happy with the purchase and while there are things I could do, there is nothing it needs and everything works great. I probably *should* have spent the $8k up front and gotten something just a tad nicer to start with, but no regrets!
(I will mention that I had fairly modest needs - sleeping room for four, a fridge, a toilet, and AC. Anything beyond that stuff was just complexity I didn't need or want. No fancy features like slideouts for me! I sought only a comfortable place to sleep and poop when I'm not outside doing vacation-y things )
If you *like* the idea of working on an RV and have some specific result you'd like to get, yeah, you might as well build - just be aware that when you put $4k into a $4k RV, you probably still have a $4k RV and you've done it for the love and the experience. But if you want to drive around and have a place for your food and your head, buy something in good shape from someone who still used it, kept it up, and didn't let it languish. I'm thankful every time I drive mine I bought someone else's love affair and not a project because it always just works. Tinkering on your vacation machine sounds like the worst of the worst.