Hi Forest and Cindy. Its a funny story about this coach and how it was sold. The owner is famous nascar driver Dick Brooks and owned about 16 car dealerships like honda, acura, ect...in the southeast along with 8 hilton garden inns. He was very wealthy, had a private plane and the coach was serviced at Newell annually along with DD and other places. I believe he passed away about 5 years ago and his daughter and son in law kept the coach to use with their kids. They used it three or four times a year and kept it in the hangar. Last year, they decided to sell the hangar and stored it as his honda dealership. The son in law was really pushing the daughter to sell it and she finally said yes. They listed it for $149k on manheim OVE for car and rv dealers and one other website. No ebay, no rv trader, just trying to sell it like dealers wholesale their cars.
The phone didnt ring much so they lowered it under 100k. The phone rang off the hook but they really couldnt answer many technical questions and no one walked in the door. Then they kept using it in between with the kids. Before I called him, he said a few people were "serious buyers" but never showed up. They were at the point to just run it through the manheim rv auction in south carolina and as they told me on the phone, no tirekickers, only check writers. We agreed to be there at 8am with our checkbook and if it was as described make an offer. I ended up offering 30% less than asking price as we wanted to update it, and fix fridge and aquahot and some other little things. I felt comfortable as I was on the phone with Newell going through it and they basically said I could part it out and make a profit. It was also contingent on the fluids being tested. Since I am in the RV business, I know what to look for and am very familiar with Newells front to back.
Its funny how things work out, I could have flipped it two weeks later for $40k+ profit, but decided against as when I went through the coach front to back realizing what I had and besides, when will another one of these come across for me in this condition and floorplan. If they would have just marketed like a RV and not a car, they would have made $50k more and I would have never had a chance to have this wonderful coach.
RVs are depreciating assets, this was my lucky chance to buy what I wanted, fully update it, and hopefully in a few years if we decide to quit rving, sell it for what we have into it. Thats a rare thing in this market for sure. Guess it was just meant to be LOL.
Thanks,
Dave
Quote:
Originally Posted by folivier
Just goes to show you that advertising works. Or rather NOT advertising doesn't work!
I saw this one a while back, emailed a few times, tried calling. Finally after a few months got an email and was able to talk to someone who was helping the owner sell it. It belonged to a Honda dealership owner if I remember correctly.
Glad it worked out for you. We hadn't sold the house yet so I wasn't quite ready to buy. Worked out ok for us though, we really love the '98.
But why the heck doesn't a car dealer know how to market a coach? If it was in the condition you say it was, for a 1 owner, it probably could have sold for more.
Your coach looks great with the updates. Hope we can cross paths somewhere.
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