Montana Owners Club - Keystone Montana 5th Wheel Forum - View Single Post

Rainer · 03-07-2014, 09:50 AM

A general rule of thumb is that your vehicles including RV's will lost about 15% of their value every year. Please note this is a rule of thumb and not a fast and hard rule.

But this rule has worked well for me, whether in trade-in, insurance value, or outright sale.

I purchased my Montana a year ago. The price was great, $10K less than my local dealer was willing to sell it to me for. Yes, I had to drive 1000 miles round trip to pick it up. But that comes to $10/mile! Definitely worth it to me.

I figured I'd sell my 2006 Outback trailer privately. But about a week before we headed out on our around the country RV trip for a couple of months, we decided to see if that local dealer could sell it for us while we were gone.

We got back, and discovered it hadn't been sold. I went to pick it up, and the manager said leave it here for three more months and I guarantee you I'll sell it myself because it's in such good shape and it has that 4300-watt Cummins-Onan generator as part of the package.

You guessed it, three months later it hadn't been sold. I tried to pick it up, but the keys to the locks were missing as well as all the manuals to every piece of equipment in/on the trailer. We were meticulous about keeping/saving them. I had put combination locks on the storage compartments, and the sales people said that they couldn't get into them because they didn't know the combination. I asked why they didn't call me? They just gave me their collective dumbfounded look.

I got a universal key to open the two doors into the trailer, then went out and purchased two new door locks at the Camping World next door.

I put the trailer on Craigslist and sold it in 48 hours for more money than the company that had it for six months was going to give me.

I'm now going after that company in small claims to collect the money for the door locks I had to replace as well as the lost manuals to all the stuff in/on the trailer.

The best deal about this ordeal were the things, 1) I got to store the trailer for six months for free, 2) I received the I wanted for the trailer, 3) overall I got a much better RV for a great price not only buying it but getting what I wanted on the sale of my old trailer.

I've discovered that if you're buying a vehicle and you're being given a phenomenal price, you'll find yourself getting much less for your trade-in, no matter what shape it's in. Dealers aren't going to lose money, they make it up either on the selling price or the trade-in.

When I traded my 2006 F-250 on a 2012 F-250, the dealer took $14K off the list price of the new truck. A great deal, but when I saw the trade-in paperwork, the trade-in value of my old truck was just $14K. A couple of days later I see my truck in a prominent place in front of the dealership with a $30K price tag on it. I called the dealer as a prospective customer to ask about the 2006 F-250, and the salesman told me it belonged to a "rich guy" who never towed anything and just wanted a new truck. Well, I'm not rich, the truck only towed a trailer that's why I had it, and the reason I bought a new truck is that I had just spent a fortune replacing the turbo system on the truck as it suffered from the 6.0 liter problem almost all of those engines got! Never trust a car dealer salesman - how do you know a car salesman is lying? His lips are moving!

That's my story, live and learn.

03-07-2014, 09:50 AM	#18
Rainer Montana Master Join Date: Apr 2013 Location: Oceanside Posts: 534 M.O.C. #13378	A general rule of thumb is that your vehicles including RV's will lost about 15% of their value every year. Please note this is a rule of thumb and not a fast and hard rule. But this rule has worked well for me, whether in trade-in, insurance value, or outright sale. I purchased my Montana a year ago. The price was great, $10K less than my local dealer was willing to sell it to me for. Yes, I had to drive 1000 miles round trip to pick it up. But that comes to $10/mile! Definitely worth it to me. I figured I'd sell my 2006 Outback trailer privately. But about a week before we headed out on our around the country RV trip for a couple of months, we decided to see if that local dealer could sell it for us while we were gone. We got back, and discovered it hadn't been sold. I went to pick it up, and the manager said leave it here for three more months and I guarantee you I'll sell it myself because it's in such good shape and it has that 4300-watt Cummins-Onan generator as part of the package. You guessed it, three months later it hadn't been sold. I tried to pick it up, but the keys to the locks were missing as well as all the manuals to every piece of equipment in/on the trailer. We were meticulous about keeping/saving them. I had put combination locks on the storage compartments, and the sales people said that they couldn't get into them because they didn't know the combination. I asked why they didn't call me? They just gave me their collective dumbfounded look. I got a universal key to open the two doors into the trailer, then went out and purchased two new door locks at the Camping World next door. I put the trailer on Craigslist and sold it in 48 hours for more money than the company that had it for six months was going to give me. I'm now going after that company in small claims to collect the money for the door locks I had to replace as well as the lost manuals to all the stuff in/on the trailer. The best deal about this ordeal were the things, 1) I got to store the trailer for six months for free, 2) I received the I wanted for the trailer, 3) overall I got a much better RV for a great price not only buying it but getting what I wanted on the sale of my old trailer. I've discovered that if you're buying a vehicle and you're being given a phenomenal price, you'll find yourself getting much less for your trade-in, no matter what shape it's in. Dealers aren't going to lose money, they make it up either on the selling price or the trade-in. When I traded my 2006 F-250 on a 2012 F-250, the dealer took $14K off the list price of the new truck. A great deal, but when I saw the trade-in paperwork, the trade-in value of my old truck was just $14K. A couple of days later I see my truck in a prominent place in front of the dealership with a $30K price tag on it. I called the dealer as a prospective customer to ask about the 2006 F-250, and the salesman told me it belonged to a "rich guy" who never towed anything and just wanted a new truck. Well, I'm not rich, the truck only towed a trailer that's why I had it, and the reason I bought a new truck is that I had just spent a fortune replacing the turbo system on the truck as it suffered from the 6.0 liter problem almost all of those engines got! Never trust a car dealer salesman - how do you know a car salesman is lying? His lips are moving! That's my story, live and learn.