Rent vs Own

[Dr. Dolittle]

I've been lurking and just got around to joining recently. A quick search didn't turn up this topic, so here goes...

I've been reading many threads about maintenance and warranty nightmares. I'm kind of wondering what the advantage of buying a trailer is over renting. Has anyone run the realistic numbers out over several years and decided which requires less money out of pocket? By the time you add up monthly payments on the trailer, storage, insurance, and maintenance it seems like you'd have to really use your RV on a pretty consistent basis to come in cheaper than renting several times a year.

Here are some of the cons I can think of for renting:
1. Rental trailer must be available the dates you want to camp.
2. Many rentals don't include much beyond the actual RV, like kitchen stuff, towels and linens.
3. Pick up and drop off times rob you of some flexibility.
4. Lose out on any pride of ownership and ability to customize your RV.

I should have prefaced this by stating that we don't own anything yet but we are considering a purchase. We rented once and my wife enjoyed it but I still don't see us heading out more than 5 or 6 times a year. We have a pontoon boat that we love using in the summer and when Covid departs, we plan on doing a lot of traveling that requires flying.

Thanks for any and all input!

[mtofell]

The biggest thing to me is having my RV ready to go with all my things in it. Years ago when I was without an RV I rented a travel trailer and the time spent packing and unpacking was nearly as much time as I spent using it.... and as an added bonus I forgot a bunch of things.

Sure, if you did it all the time you could probably get a decent system down but it's still a big chunk of time.

IMO, the main reason to rent is to decide if a certain type or RV brand is something you would like to buy.

One thing we all have to admit is that RVing is an expensive hobby. There's just no way around it. Trying to apply any finanical reasoning usually just makes that more obvious.

[xc-mark]

Biggest reason to own in my eyes. shop for food and GO. little to no planning needed other then your destination booking. we leave clothes and non perishable food in the camper all summer. we clean out all the food in the fall after the october 15 final trip and winterize it for the cold weather. I dont take my clothes out if it for winter , I have everything in it for 25*F to 95*f. I have even done some dry camping up north (snowmobiling) over night was -18*F several nights . We used 4 electric cube heater and the furnace set at 70* so it turned on when needed .

[bneukam]

I would say renting is a great way to start. Many folks buy RV’s and then they sit in storage yards.
Loading and unloading wouldn’t be a big deal for us as we pack light. It’s just planning and using basic supplies. Personally, I would want to use my own stuff anyways.
RVing is expensive, tow vehicle requirements, storage if needed, insurance, and overall cost of ownership adds up quickly.
We also like to travel without the RV, and keeping a TT small, helps to fit our use.

[Isaac-1]

A lot depends on not only how much you use the RV, but also how you use it, if you tend to plan out trips well in advance, or if your lifestyle is conductive to spur of the moment travel. There are other factors that might be at play, for example we live in a somewhat hurricane prone part of the country and use our motorhome as a lifeboat in case of needing to evacuate or if our house might be uninhabitable after a major hurricane. This year it came in handy twice as we were hit with direct hit from Hurricane Laura with 130+ mph winds at our house than 6 weeks later a glancing blow with Delta and 90+ mph winds.

[tuffr2]

Renting is a great way to see if you and wife like it. That is step 1 IMHO. Also while renting you can see what you like and don't like.

I rented a small class 'C' from Cruise America with a small bathroom and corner bed. A few things those 5 days taught me. It was well worth the rental. After 3 nights in a corner bed I bought a travel trailer with a walk around short queen bed and a bigger bathroom.

Depreciation on an RV is a lot. Thousands of $$$ per year until a 6 or 7 year slow down. Just be aware of depreciation.

An RV you would buy is better than what you can rent. My rental Class 'C' was a bear bones unit.

You can rent from Cruise America and El Monte. Figure on spending about $1,500 for a one week rental. That would be less expensive than 1 year depreciation which will be at least $8,000 - $10,000 for year one. I bought a 5th wheel for 50k and sold it 7 years later for 20k. The person that bought it for 20k got a good deal and much slower depreciation.

[Tomahawk]

We rented a 20ft trailer in 2017 to see if it was for us.
The experience almost made me not get a Trailer. The trailer had one crappy battery and we were dry camping in Yosemite for a week. I ended buying a battery on the trip. The trailer was just like it came off the lot, no improvements but had been used hard. The shower door vibrated apart on the way home. I had to put it back together all the while wondering if the dealer ever heard of locktite. Some screws in the front rock shield vibrated loose. When I went to tighten them, they were all stripped. I inspected them closely and realized the dealer had glued them using a dab of silicone prior to me renting it. We pent the final night of the trip close to the dealer so we could clean the trailer before turning it in to avoid the cleaning fee ($300, I think). I spent an hour getting propane to avoid an additional charge for filling.
Going in I knew this was the type of trip I was interested in. We dry camp 90% of the time. I made a mental list of all the issues we had and what it would take to over come them. A year later we bought our TT. Our real battle is power. I researched Solar before we bought the trailer and I bought and installed the solar right after we got it home. I added a second battery. I added an inverter. Changed all the lights to LED. Got WDH and anti-sway. Bought a slightly smaller trailer to be more inside of the towing capability of my tow vehicle. I bought a generator, that I have never used, but will be happy I have the first time I camp somewhere I can't get sun for a day or two. We paid 12K (new 2 years on lot, a mistake in my opinion) for our TT and I made another 1.5 in upgrades (WAG). We have made about 10 trips in it would have made more if not for COVID and the forests being shutdown due to fire danger. The maintenance is a PIA, but when we have been out, we haven't had any issues. I think right now I can sell it for what I paid for it because COVID has the prices sky high. Next year when the COVID buyers start selling, I probably won't be able to give it away. Definitely a learning experience, still. I wish I had a walking roof, I wish I had a 3/4 ton truck, don't buy a trailer with a window on a surface that is not vertical. Given time I'd come up with more.

[UFO Pilot]

We live in earthquake country and now sadly in fire country also. The RV is our fully stocked, ready to go, escape pod. Now with rolling blackouts we use the onboard generator to power the house when necessary.

[Dr. Dolittle]

Thanks for all the great replies!

We rented a 26 foot, fully equipped TT and camped at a state park 20 minutes from our house in case my wife hated it. I grew up progressing from tents to a Starcraft pop up but my wife never even remotely roughed it. She found it fun and relaxing so she wants to go more!

That being said, and because we like to boat a lot during the summer months in our pontoon boat, I honestly don't see us going out more than 3 or 4 times a year. I could do some "guy trips" added to that with my mountain biking buddies but not a significant number more.

That 3 or 4 times a year to rent would rough out to around $4000-$5000, so way less than the depreciation on a new unit. But if we bought new and kept it for more than about four years the numbers start to even out.

I'm leaning towards getting a new one around $30,000 and just accepting the facts that it will depreciate like mad and require lots of maintenance and TLC. I'm retired so I have lots of free time but I've never been accused of being very handy so that has me worried some.

[keymastr]

Buy a quality unit rather than a budget model and you will have fewer maintenance issues and better resale.

[Dr. Dolittle]

Originally Posted by keymastr

Buy a quality unit rather than a budget model and you will have fewer maintenance issues and better resale.

This, of course, leads to the Million Dollar Question - "Which brands are the highest quality?" Followed closely by, "Who has the best warranty?"

I've done hours of internet research and come up with dozens of answers to those two questions so I know there's no black and white answer.

[tuffr2]

If you want to spend 30k you can look at travel trailers with a MSRP of 42k or even 45k.

I really like the Rockwood/Flagstaff products. Of the Winnebago towables.

[swavescatter]

If you search around the forum, you'll see that every manufacturer has build quality issues. Some have fancier crap inside (which I like), but it's all still Chinese crap in the end. Fit and finish is poor even with top end manufacturers like outdoors RV, Grand design etc.

I recommend buying a 1-2 year old unit that has had all of the poor manufacturing issues worked out under warranty by the previous owner.

I bought two new units and both spent more time at the dealer than camping the first summer while warranty issues were sorted out. Save money and time by buying used if you can.

[ArcticGabe]

Rent vs Buy... Man, we went round and round trying to answer this question...



We rented a TT last year for the first time. It was a very good experience. So much so, that we decided to try renting again this year, and it was even better. Naturally, this led us down the path to a few dealers and we eventually put a down payment on one this past fall.



For us, the decision to buy came about based on the cost to rent. The rentals we had were both newer units (1st one we rented was only a couple years old, the second we rented from a dealer and it was brand new). But nether was cheap to rent. We decided that we liked it enough to want to go at least 4 or 5 times per year. At around $800 for a 5 day rental (hitch rental, cleaning and service fees, even though we brought them back spotless), it adds up quick.



However, renting still has it's benefits. For example, both times, we rented a unit that was near to where we wanted to stay, so we only had to tow each one a few miles. Also, if we were to only go once or twice per year, it would make much better financial sense to rent.



Now that we're almost owners, we are stating to make plans and we're looking forward to several trips next summer since each trip now is practically free... lol, finance major I am not.