Big Bart
Tow&Slow
Well don’t assume you will do better buying old and used to pull a trailer half way across America. Yes you are correct full size SUV’s are not cheap to rent, figure $100-200 a day based on location but if they break down you go to the next office and they give you a new one. But that is the price of admission to travel these days.
We have a canoe trailer in Maine so I rent full size SUVs for a couple weeks each summer. I have penciled out the costs of keeping a SUV there Vs renting. It’s about the same cost renting vs keeping a SUV. Figure buying something decent is 10k, depreciation (10k will be 2k in 10 years.) maintaining it, insuring it for the year, registering it, paying my care taker to start and drive it every so often, hoping the mice don’t set up shop in it, and still paying get taxi’s to and from the airport which best case is an hour away. One big upside of renting is you can fly in and out of any airport in New England which at times saves us $200 a ticket or $800 for the family. A second upside is I don’t spend my time on vacation at the stealership or wrenching on it.
So let’s talk this through. Buying a used car for 2k could work out if you get lucky and it‘s a well maintained runner. But how do you ever know???? But maybe you just dropped $140 on a Motel 6 trying to find the right deal and another $200 on a taxi‘s to go across town too look at a few and back again pick one up. Now its $2,340. Need a couple of tires? Some belts and hoses? By the time you register it, perhaps pay for a inspection to register it, insure it, put a hitch on it, and then pray it makes it without breaking down how much will you really save? Then you get the pleasure of dealing with 20 Craigsflakes and 30 Offer Up lowballers when you sell it till one actually buys it. Now you probably lose $500 on the resale and $150 worth of your time dealing with those folks.(Because your time is worth money.) You could save as much as $800 if the plan goes off without a hitch but you could loose your $2,340 or more on the side of the road. Let’s say the car is tired and the extra trailer weight does the motor or tranny in. You just lost $1,500-2,000 and your stuck till you fix or find another car and go down the above path of pain again. So is the risk of best case saving $800 vs the risk loosing $2,340 actually doing better? That is not a good bet to me, but to each there own. If my RV died I would cut bait, liquidate, rent a SUV from National with a $300 drop fee, and high tail it home. Regroup and hit the road when ready again. The truck is pricey but now it was also 3-5 nights at a hotel, gas, and food. Break down in a old car that expense keeps adding up. Life is getting really expensive and sadly inflation is rising fast.
We have a canoe trailer in Maine so I rent full size SUVs for a couple weeks each summer. I have penciled out the costs of keeping a SUV there Vs renting. It’s about the same cost renting vs keeping a SUV. Figure buying something decent is 10k, depreciation (10k will be 2k in 10 years.) maintaining it, insuring it for the year, registering it, paying my care taker to start and drive it every so often, hoping the mice don’t set up shop in it, and still paying get taxi’s to and from the airport which best case is an hour away. One big upside of renting is you can fly in and out of any airport in New England which at times saves us $200 a ticket or $800 for the family. A second upside is I don’t spend my time on vacation at the stealership or wrenching on it.
So let’s talk this through. Buying a used car for 2k could work out if you get lucky and it‘s a well maintained runner. But how do you ever know???? But maybe you just dropped $140 on a Motel 6 trying to find the right deal and another $200 on a taxi‘s to go across town too look at a few and back again pick one up. Now its $2,340. Need a couple of tires? Some belts and hoses? By the time you register it, perhaps pay for a inspection to register it, insure it, put a hitch on it, and then pray it makes it without breaking down how much will you really save? Then you get the pleasure of dealing with 20 Craigsflakes and 30 Offer Up lowballers when you sell it till one actually buys it. Now you probably lose $500 on the resale and $150 worth of your time dealing with those folks.(Because your time is worth money.) You could save as much as $800 if the plan goes off without a hitch but you could loose your $2,340 or more on the side of the road. Let’s say the car is tired and the extra trailer weight does the motor or tranny in. You just lost $1,500-2,000 and your stuck till you fix or find another car and go down the above path of pain again. So is the risk of best case saving $800 vs the risk loosing $2,340 actually doing better? That is not a good bet to me, but to each there own. If my RV died I would cut bait, liquidate, rent a SUV from National with a $300 drop fee, and high tail it home. Regroup and hit the road when ready again. The truck is pricey but now it was also 3-5 nights at a hotel, gas, and food. Break down in a old car that expense keeps adding up. Life is getting really expensive and sadly inflation is rising fast.
