BUYING OUR NEW RV

For the first 3 years we owned our Pilgrim Travel Trailer, we had only gone out for long weekend trips. For 2 to 3 days at a time, our trailer with the small slide was great! During the summer of 2009, we took a week long vacation in San Marcos TX. After spending a full week in our travel trailer, we decided that if we planned to take longer vacations or live part time in a RV, we would really need more room. It was quite close quarters for the two of us and the two dogs.

During the summer of 2009, we attended our first RV show held in the parking lot of the Round Rock Express/Dell Diamond parking lot. At that time, we weren’t thinking of upgrading to a larger unit, but just enjoyed looking at all the options that are available. Having only the Chevy Tahoe as a tow vehicle, we realized we would be very limited to what we could pull.

Through the winter of 2009 we started talking more about upgrading. There are so many companies with many choices and options. It was easy for us to rule out buying a Class A motor home. First – they are huge, second – you have to pull another vehicle behind wherever you go. We looked at travel trailers that could still be pulled with an enclosed vehicle (Suburban). We liked that idea as Annie & Zoe would still have a place in the back to ride, and if the whole family wanted to take a trip there would be plenty of room for everyone as well as our stuff. Because of the towing limits of SUVs, the travel trailer would be limited in size due to weight – so would it really be worth buying a new trailer that wasn’t really much larger than our current one?

The third option – a 5th wheel – would fill all of items on our wish list, but would require that we buy a “real” truck. I was concerned about not having an enclosed vehicle to travel in and haul. I really liked our Tahoe. On the way down to a RV show in San Antonio in the winter of 2009/2010, we actually stopped at a truck dealer, just to talk to a salesman about full size diesel trucks, get answers to questions and even got to take a test drive. They are much larger than our Tahoe!

While at the show, we collected brochures and toured all the RVs. We sat in all the chairs and on all the couches, laid down on all the beds, stood in the showers and sat on the toilets. By the time we left the San Antonio show, we had pretty much picked our “dream RV,” the Montana 3400RL. We thought it was beautiful and the quality was very good. At this point in our lives we didn’t know if we were ready to move all the way up to an RV that we would be happy with for many, many years, or if we should look for something used or lower quality and then upgrade again in a few years.

Once home, we started making lists of options we liked or didn’t like. How many slides did we want, which floor plan for kitchen, bathroom layout, etc? We made a list of must haves vs. nice to haves vs. do not wants and rated them on a scale of 1 to 10. We realized that RVs can feel a lot different than they look in the brochure.

We looked at ads on Craig’s List and in the news paper. We even went to see one that we liked the floor plan of, but it was several years old and really looked like it had been “lived” in. So, we continued to look. I called another person who had an ad for a used 2010 Montana on Craig’s List. He had already sold his RV, but gave me the name of a Montana RV dealer & salesman in Indiana that I should call for a price. I told the salesman which Montana we were interested in, and he quoted me a price over the phone. We went to Camper Clinic II in Buda TX (a local Montana Dealer) hoping they would have a used RV that we liked. We liked one they had on consignment, but the price was too high. And, of course, we compared everyone with our dream Montana. We told the Camper Clinic Salesman, Mario, that we liked the Montana 3400 RL floor plan and told him the price we were quoted from the dealer in Indiana. Of course, we would prefer to buy from a local dealer. There was going to be an RV show in Austin that weekend that Camper Clinic would be attending. A representative from Montana was also going to be there, and often, if you buy on the first day of the show, you can get a very good deal. So, we headed to the RV show on Thursday (the first day of the show) They worked with us comparing their price with the price of the dealer in Indiana. In the end, Camper Clinic II matched the price in Indiana and we ended up buying our Montana 3400RL from them. And – we didn’t have to drive to Indiana to pick it up! We just love our RV!