Owners advice to potential new buyer - Montana Owners Club

candler · 08-26-2007, 06:31 AM

We, are seriously thinking of buying a new Montanta 5th wheel, we would be interested in any advice or comments that any of you have. Also, if you were looking today, would you buy another Montana? I have noticed that some of you have bad comments regarding dealer service department which we know would be unique to the dealer.
Thank you very much in advance for any advice you care to give us.

richfaa · 08-26-2007, 06:54 AM

That is a tough question and this response is from a person who has always been critical of both Keystone/ Montana and the Rv industry in general.My observations only...Quality workmanship and quality control in the Rv industery is poor..any brand any price range.The probelm is not(in general) with the vendor provided items but the manner in which they are assembled by the the manufacturers.Remember the only thing Keystone does is put together a camper from vendor provided parts. The dealer is the MOST important factor in a RV purchase. I would rather buy a comparable brand Rv from a "good" dealer rather than a Montana from a "bad" dealer. IMO the Montana is no better no worse than any other brand in its price range. Having said all that.. IMO the Montana is a very good "bang for the buck" and yes I would buy another one.. 2 reasons..good dealer and excellent Keystone customer support. We are , as critical as we are,satisfied with our 3400.

lawrenceb42106 · 08-26-2007, 06:59 AM

When you make the deal make sure that everything the salesman and dealership tells you they are going to give you is in writing. I Would start out taking at least 26% off the suggested price. Let them know you are going for the best deal you can get from several dealers. Yes we would buy another Montana. We are on our second one. Check out how good of service department they have. If on the road some dealers won't help you out. We have had a few problems with ours. Keystone stands behind their products.

bsmeaton · 08-26-2007, 07:13 AM

I agree with most of what Rich says - the level of quality and service is no where near what you will find in the auto industry, but at least it's a universal problem accross all companies.

Find a Dealer you like, but excellent service would the be exception rather than the rule.

With that, pick the brand, style and color you like, grab some bailing wire and duct tape, and go have fun! Montana and Keystone have been good to us, but so have others throughout history.

ols1932 · 08-26-2007, 08:01 AM

Buy from a "reputable" dealer, someone you know. Don't go shopping 100 miles away from home just to save $500. All this will do is cause "your dealer" to not want to service your rig--and that won't make you happy. In our case, we have purchased from the same dealer for over 30 years and never, repeat, never had a problem getting service. I can call for an appointment and even though they are busy they will have me come right in. For that peace of mind and satisfaction alone, I'd purchase from your home town dealer. Sure, you can get "bargains" elsewhere, but peace of mind is worth a lot--at least to me.

Orv

bncinwv · 08-26-2007, 09:26 AM

Take Orv's advice to heart. I always put the dealership service record above the final price that I negotiate. The benefits of reliable service over the life of your purchase is immeasurable in my opinion. Things will go wrong (it is unavoidable), and if they are major in nature, your dealership is your salvation. Brad is also correct, being mechanically inclined is a definite benefit (don't know about the duct tape though!!!). I personally am very happy with our Montana and would not hesitate in doing it again.
Bingo

sreigle · 08-26-2007, 09:28 AM

There are a lot of good brands on the market. To answer your question, yes, we'd buy another Montana IF we found one with the floorplan and amenities we want. That said, a year ago we bought our third new Montana. The first we bought new in January 2001. The second in July 2003. And this one in August 2006. And we feel we made the right decision for us. You'll have to decide whether it's the right decision for you but if you do go with a Montana you're getting not only a good rig but a company that stands behind it's product. That has something to do with why Montana is the number one seller in North America for each of the last six years.

As others said, the dealer is a critical factor, as well.

boylanag · 08-26-2007, 10:09 AM

We bought our first Montana in 2002. Last year, because of how much we liked our first one and the good experience that we had with our dealer, we bought our second Montana. We believe that, if Montana has your floor plan, you can't go wrong. Dealer service is so very important.

gjetzen · 08-26-2007, 10:18 AM

Let me answer your question first. YES I would buy another Montana. I am on my second, first one was 2001 purchased in April 2001 and the second is a 2005 purchased in Sept 2004 and when my wife and I are ready for another if Montana has a floor plan we like we will find the best price we can and buy it. Now I some what disagree/agree with some of the statements made about finding a dealer with a good service reputation. I know that in my case nothing on my trailer ever goes wrong when the trailer is parked in my driveway, Its always when I'm 200,300,500 miles from home and that selling dealer with the good service reputation is not doing me any good. While not much has gone wrong with my trailers it's always been when I am on the road and I do agree that a dealer with an excellent service reputation is important so do some home work before you take a trip and try to find out were these dealers/service departments are located. I also believe that it is extremely important to do a very thorough pre delivery inspection on your new trailer and do not take delivery until everything (I mean everything) meets or exceeds your expectations and you are satisfied that there is nothing defective out of adjustment/alignment everything works as stated before you hook the trailer to your tow vehicle, because after that it's too late. Make yourself a personalized check list of all the components that you can think of and spend some time checking everything over. Get help from another trailer owner anything you can think of or do so that you do not get taken advantage of at the time of delivery. I think with a Montana while anything can and may happen your chance of purchasing a good trailer that will service you without too many problems is going to be in the 85+%. AS far as problems with my Montana's my first had a bad furnace after about 1 year and was replace under warranty and the second had a street side landing gear that sheared in the second year of ownership and not under warranty and both happened far away from my home/selling dealer.

richfaa · 08-26-2007, 10:49 AM

gjetzen has a point that many of us overlooked.The selling dealer Is very important and if you are a weekender or low use camper perhaps a determining factor. We are long timers and are on the road several months out of the year and we had serious breakdowns many hundreds of miles away from that selling dealer.. We found that calling keystone customer service and letting them find a dealer and arrange the service has worked very well for us.. another reasonf for going with keystone/Montana..the customer service is excellent. In fact in one case we called our excellent selling dealer and THEY found a dealer and made the repair arrangements for us..

Mudchief · 08-26-2007, 12:16 PM

gjetzen, I agree with you. I have not had any problems with my Montana but in the pass with other units each time I was far from home. Also In the world we live in a dealer that is good today maybe bad or not in business 6 months from now.

AZCampinfool · 08-26-2007, 12:34 PM

Looks like I am going to side with gjetzen also on this one. In my case I bought a Mountaineer because I needed bunk beds for my kids. A little over a year later, I am happy with the fiver and would buy another one if the deal was right. That being said, I could have cared less about the local dealer when I purchased my rig. Part of this reasoning was like others have said, I was nowhere near my hometown dealer when I was on the road having problems. I ended up fixing the issues myself. Some were minor, some not so minor but like richfaa has stated, these issues were/are not Keystone specific. My main reasoning for not caring about the hometown dealer was the fact that they were no where close to being competitive on the price. I saved over 6K by driving 400 miles to buy my fiver. For that kind of savings, I figured I could have taken my fiver to an independent repair facility and paid for the repairs out of pocket and still been way ahead financially. Now over one year later, my fiver is out of the warranty period so I have to pay not matter where I take it. Luckily for me, there are three independent repair places all within about 15 miles from me. So far I haven't had to use any of them.

MIMF · 08-26-2007, 12:49 PM

candler, in a heartbeat!! Hence, my name. Montana In My Future.

Sunshine · 08-26-2007, 02:03 PM

Yes, we would, and did, buy our second Montana. We decided on Montana because we felt the materials and finish appeared were better than some other brands we looked at. Our local dealer provides good service and we were happy with the deals we made. Keystone has treated us right. Those are some of our reasons for choosing Montanas.

Montana Sky · 08-26-2007, 03:08 PM

I suggest looking at each and every brand that you might be interested in. After looking through them all, pick the one that feels the best to YOU. I will say that I am on my 2nd Montana already and will consider them again the near future when the time comes to trade again. Keystone has been VERY, VERY, good to me which is the reason I would consider buying my 3rd Montana.

robb · 08-26-2007, 03:53 PM

We have a great dealer but would not buy a Montana again, ours is going on one year and every trip leads to a new list of failures.
we are bothered by what happens after the warrenty is over.
This unit has been back to the factory twice for a total of 6 weeks.
2007 3400RL
Robb & Carole Isaacs

1999 Volvo 610 Pickup

Dustytuu · 08-27-2007, 03:35 AM

We bought our Montana over 400 hundred miles from home and saved over $4,000 by doing this.

Great dealer too. We had a relation with a Montana dealer near home before we purchased the Montana out of state.
We would take out other 5th wheels for work there. So...don't know if this made a difference but they did warranty work on our Montana. Had very little go wrong with the unit. They adjusted screen door, fixed a drawer, (Installed our 2nd AC but we paid for that). Had Durtherm replace the main AC and later the fridge all under warranty. Used an authorized Durtherm repairman.

We have been very happy with our Montana and if they had a floor plan that would work for us we would purchase another Montana.

PowellsMonty · 08-27-2007, 06:24 AM

We love ours and would buy another one in a heartbeat. Never had any problems with it.

mgdg · 08-28-2007, 02:38 AM

We`ve had some problems mostly minor except the tire and axle issue we had in the first year that Keystone refused to fix to OUR satisfaction. Make sure when you make your best deal that it includes an alignment of both axles. Don`t let the dealer tell you they are already aligned because they are not!! This way you should have tires that will last a while and a 5ver that not only rides smoother but follows correctly. After my alignment and new tires in 2005, the Dunlop RV tires I had installed are just like new after 2 full seasons and about 15-20k miles on them. After that first year we have had virtally no problems with the RV.

crandallbradley · 08-28-2007, 08:19 AM

Be sure to tell your dealer that befor you take control of your unit that you want to check and recheck every THING on your unit. I payed cash so I told them that we would hook powre and water to the thing and I would play with it until I was satisfied,there was a lot that needed to be fixed,LOOK everywhere. There were some small things that I missed but I have not had to return to the dealer.
I love my home

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