2005 Beaver Monterey Ventura IV Floorplan

[BT2019]

We are considering buying our first RV motorhome we are looking at a 2005 Beaver Monterey Ventura IV Floorplan,
Here are some specs 36’ long, 71,000 miles Roadmaster M Series chassis with cushion air glide suspension, caterpillar C-9 400 HP engine, air leveling system, aqua hot heat and hot water, dual AC/Heat pumps.
what should we be looking for? Any thoughts or comments are apricated. We are in Florida and will get a professional inspection on the Beaver. Does anyone know of a NRVA inspector in the Port St. Lucie area? Thank you,

[vito.a]

Beaver builds a great coach. Their wood work is the finest available at any price. Some folks think these older coaches are built much better than the new ones. However, it will need some TLC.
This is a link to the original brochure:
https://dreamfindersrv.com/Literatur...y-Brochure.pdf

Be careful with your inspector. Many of them are not familiar with large diesel coach systems.
Make sure you check the Norcold 1200 refrigerator. Some of them are causing fires, so check for any amonia smell.
Check the underside of the slide-out floors on the outside. Some have a tendency to collect water and the wood floor rots.
Watch out for pricing. Check NADA RV bluebook as well as the classifieds on RVT.com and RVTrader.com. Do nationwide searches plus or minus 1 year from 2005 and rank order by price, lowest first. I say this because I'm seeing huge differences in pricing.

Look at tire DATES, not tread remaining. RV tires rarely wear out, but age out around 7 years. New tires can be $5k.
Check battery dates as well. They can be over $1k to replace.
Check the Aqua Hot furnace in both electric and diesel modes. Raplacing an Aqua Hot boiler can be $8-10k.
Check the A/C systems as they are getting to the age where they will need replacing.
Check the air ride system. Most of the air valves/solenoids begin leaking at this age. They are rebuildable but it takes some effort.
Plan on updating TV's as well as other electronics.
Best of luck!

[Ivylog]

You are gaining on the length but still have 6' to go.

One of my "would like to have" when upgrading was no window over the head of the bed ...cold even in Fla during the winter. Also a good size shower which it has too. Good floor plan.
It also has a 23K rear axle...not legal in 2005 BUT it IS legal today so good CCC. Most 4 slide DPs of that vintage had very little CCC with only a 20K rear axle.

My 04 Dynasty still has the 3 original heat pumps as does my 08 Navigator and based on the poor quality of the new and improved units, I'll repair before replacing, even adding freon if necessary.

I made the mistake of starting at 36' 18 years ago because that was supposedly the max for public CGs. Until last month (in 15 years as half timers) I'd never had a problem finding a site in a public CG without reservations for a 42-45' rig. Instead of running the generator in Moab (95 degrees) we moved on to CO where we had frost on the car the next morning.

[LDM1]

We have a 2005 Beaver Monterey Laguna IV and really love the coach. Great construction quality, trim out and design. Beaver Motor Coach Sales in Bend OR just did some minor repairs and have always been helpful in finding parts for repairs. Some of their crew actually worked on the Beaver RV assembly.
C9 Cat 400 is a very strong engine.