How to take delivery of new Diplomat

[Kevin2008]

Hi All - Our order for a 2009 Diplomat 38 PDQ is coming from DeMartini in Grass Valley in about two weeks. We live in Southern California and we have two options for delivery. Go to DeMartini and pick it up or have DeMartini deliver the coach and save the time, cost and hassel of travel.

I imagine some of you have had the same issue. Could you share with me the negatives/positives of this issue?

Suggestions?

Thanks,

Kevin

[Kevin2008]

Hi All - Our order for a 2009 Diplomat 38 PDQ is coming from DeMartini in Grass Valley in about two weeks. We live in Southern California and we have two options for delivery. Go to DeMartini and pick it up or have DeMartini deliver the coach and save the time, cost and hassel of travel.

I imagine some of you have had the same issue. Could you share with me the negatives/positives of this issue?

Suggestions?

Thanks,

Kevin

[TW]

HI Kevin, I hope you can sleep until you have it at YOUR place.... Sofar I was lucky, just stopped at a Dealer and bought of the lot.
After on our 4th RV, if we would order a new one, we would pick it up at the factory.
If you got the time, pick it up yourself. Somebody else drove it already to the Dealer!?
If you have to pay in full, b4 it leaves the lot, drive it yourself.
I read and heard, that DeMartini is a very good Dealer. Just met an RVer hear in BC last week, that was very happy with the Dealer.
Enjoy
TW

[RVRon]

TW,
First of all, Congratulations on your purchase. You will surely get a ton of enjoyment from it.

If it were me, I would travel to the dealer, do a complete PDI with the dealer delivery guy then test drive it, then pay. I would then camp there for at least an overnight while you check things out for yourself and get whatever issues you may come up with (none we hope)fixed the next day while you are still there.

Besides, this is a great adventure so why not go and enjoy??
Ron

[bkphotog]

Hi Kevin,

Congrat's on your new MH.

I will try to give you some comments on your question.

My wife and I bought our current MH from DeMartini in Grass Valley last year. We decided to have it delivered down here in Santa Ynez (Santa Barbara County). This was after I had flowen to Sacramento and rented a car to drive to Grass Valley to review and test drive the specific unit that we wanted to purchase. DeMartini put me up in a very nice hotel locally for one night. No cost to me! This was really nice. So I arrived the night before and then the next day I reviewed the unit and test drove it. This was ofcourse all scheduled ahead of time with our sales person (NATE) That day I made the deal and arranged to have it delivered. The whole process was simple and straight forward.

Now to tell you some additional particulars.

1. We had a trade-in MH that had to get back up to them. The man that delivered our new unit drove our trade-in back to them.

2. There was a small delivery cost involved that I believe was based on the milage from DeMartini. Your situation may be different.

3. Make sure the unit and the person driving the unit is covered insurance wize until it is driven to your home. Our person was covered and everything was just fine. It took him two days to get down to our home.

4. The person delivered the unit in perfect shape and even filled the gas tank to full.

Now a negative:
When you have it delivered the person delivering the unit might not know everything about the unit and its systems. So he may not be able to do a give you a "Walk Through" on all of the functions of the systems. This was not really important to us because this was our third MH and our second Class A. So I had a pretty good understanding of the systems on the new unit. If this is your first MH, I might not consider taking delivery at your home.

Another negative is to make sure all the systems are working properly. This is called, i belive, the "PDI" process or the "Pre Delivery Inspection". Do this if you can prior to taking delivery. I did this when I went up to see the unit. The delivery person will not be doing this with you, or at least he did not do this with us.

Arrange to have DeMartini to agree to any corrections to the systems that might be evident after you take delivery. Just about everthing will be on Warrenty. But I will tell you from experience that there will be things that will not be correct when you get your unit out for the first time camping. This is a "givin" within the MH industry. So I would recommend that you take it out for a maiden camping session for at least a weekend, as soon as you take delivery. Make note of all things that seem to be wrong and get back with DeMartini ASAP. I had a couple of things that needed to be addressed and working with DeMartini and Monaco these items were corrected with the help of a local Monaco dealer down here in Southern CAL.

Sorry that this is so long winded but I might say that the experience of having it delivered was OK for me. It did save me alot of time and expenses of getting up to DeMartini and then back. As stated I had a "trade-in" MH that would of taken several days to get up there and then driving the new one back. I just did not have that time available to me and the wife.

Good luck with you decision.

Bill & Arlene

[NW Knight]

I've been to Demartini's and to the factory. If I could choose delivery options I would choose the factory. However that's not what I did when we picked up our Knight since the factory was (then) in Indiana. Demartini performed an awesome job for PDI and addressing the "few" issues we discovered immediatley. Unfortunately we didn't plan for enough shake down time and had to circle back to Grass Valley from Tahoe after a couple of days. My recommendation Factory or Dealer is to plan on camping/diving/using the rig for 3-5 days and then circiling back to fix anything you couldn't discover during PDI. I would also as others have encouraged stay overnight at the delivery location, you might be suprised at what you will find.

good luck

[HPH]

If it's an option for you I would take factory delivery. My 2nd choice dealer del. I'd stay the night and crawl under it and on top of it. Paint issues especially need to be noted now. I'd also get everything fixed the dealer is capable of fixing before you sign. They won't be in as much of a hurry to fix your issues once you head down the highway. I speak from experience. Jon and Tim are stand up guys, but they are busy,busy. They sell one then on to the next one and on and on. I did my time in Grass Valley. Make the most of your moment in the sun. I thought about having them deliver to me. Glad I went up to get it and did the factory tour. Most important: This is supposed to be FUN. Enjoy it and Congrats on your new coach!

[Lukeaa]

Plan on staying around Grass Valley for 2-4 days. Problems WILL turn up. Monaco makes a well designed product, but has terrible quality control.

[Kevin2008]

Thanks for the great help. For those of you who have bought and taken delivery at DeMartini, do they actually let you go through it all day, spend the night in it, drive it and then pay once you are satisified?

Kevin

[JFC]

We've bought two coaches from DeMartini in the last four years. IN 2004 we bought a 2002 Ambassador and in 2007 we bought a 2007 Scepter. Wire transferred payment for the Ambassador a week before we took delivery. Looked at the Scepter to check options and colors, then bought a week later. Wrote a check, connected the toad and then drove home, the first test drive for the coach. As with anything this complicate, there were hitches, but nothig that wasn't taken care of. A lot depends on the trust you have in the dealer. With DeMartini, we haven't been disappointed and the timing of the payment had nothing to do with the post delivery service. Tell them how you want to check it out before making the final payment and I'm sure they'll work with you if you just let thme know what you want. I don't think they have anything to hide and I'm sure they want you on the list of repeat customers.