texasvwnut
Texas
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IAMICHABOD wrote:texasvwnut wrote:Update -
I picked up my CA 23A from the Denver (Federal Heights) office this afternoon. My wife and I spent three hours going through and detail cleaning the inside. We need about an hour more work inside and will be hitting the road heading back to the Dallas / Fort Worth metroplex.
WhooHoo texasvwnut,Thanks for the update,what a nice way to celebrate the 4th of July.
I will put you on the books as member # 118 of Forum members that are in the Former Rental Owners club. ![[image]](https://www.picgifs.com/emoticons/smileys-and-emoticons/thumbs/smileys-thumbs-217948.gif)
I hope the ride home was a good one and all went well.
Please come on back when you can and tell us about how it went and what you think of the experience.
Again Congratulations on the purchase and I hope you will enjoy many great camping trips.
Thank you. We made it back home this afternoon. A little more than 800 miles one way from Denver to the DFW area. I’ll give everyone a overview of my experience after I have a day or two to process everything.
2016 Thor Majestic 23A
Ex Cruise America RV Rental
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texasvwnut
Texas
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bcrunk wrote:Hello! I'm Bill, I just put down a deposit for a CA Majestic 19G. 2017 with 118k miles on the clock. Other than an 83.5 Vanagon to dry camp in years ago, this will be our first real RV. I too have read/skimmed all 115 pages of this thread - I'll have 4 to 5 weeks of wait time for the refurbish process to re-read them.
What I don't remember reading is what to expect when I pick it up? What was included? Drain hose? Water hose? Gas? Propane? Shore line? ??
Other words, what do I need to pick up for a 2 day road trip home? Thanks to all who have contributed to this and other threads, it really makes a difference!
I'm going to go out on a limb and guess your experience picking it up will be different depending on the office that you purchase your coach from. I can relate my experience from purchasing from the Denver office. I got a used sewer hose, a used water hose, shore line power cord (as they are hard wired into the CA coaches) two different 30 amp to 15 amp converters, 2/3 tank of LP gas and 1/2 tank of fuel. ![[emoticon]](http://www.coastresorts.com/sharedcontent/cfb/images/smile.gif "smile")
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MtnBikeMarty
phoenix, az
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nrbrooker wrote:Hello Everyone,
I am in the process of buying a Cruise America RV, 2015 28a, and was so excited when I stumbled on this forum!
I was planning on getting an extended warranty because me and my wife are new to rving and would like the piece of mind. From other Cruise America owners perspectives, do you think it is better to get the extended warranty through Cruise America or to use another company like Good Sam's? I would love some perspective on this. I believe my unit will qualify for Good Sam's as it only has 98,000 miles. Very lucky I think..
nrbrooker,
I would spend some time and look through this forum, focusing on the warranty posts and the link IAMICHABOD posted. I skipped the Cruise America warrently and put that money into savings, because eventually there will be repairs on a "house with wheels that goes 65 mph". I did not qualify for Good Sam's policy with the high mileage on mine, ~142K miles, I did invest in Good Sam's roadside assistance program, and cancelled my AAA roadside, cause GS's covers all your cars, which I've used several times with the cars (wife's flat tires, battery jump, etc), and most recently with the RV when a front shock blew out at 147K miles 100 miles from home. A great peace of mind with a high mileage vehicle.
It's a personal decision but weigh your projected use (miles/year, distances you'll be going like just the SW vs. cross country) against the coverage/cost of the extended policies. And if you have the change use a RV inspection by a independant to go over your unit before you take possession. See my post a few pages ago, I used a local mobile repair guy.
MtnBikeMarty
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IAMICHABOD
Sunny So Cal
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Hello Bill AKA bcrunk.
Welcome to the Forum,also a future member of the Former Rental Owners Club. You are one of the lucky ones to get one of those rare 19Gs,I know that they have had a waiting list for a while.
I Know that this thread is long but there is wealth of information contributed by our Forum members,hopefully it has been helpful to you,also maybe answered some of your questions.
When you pick your unit please come on back and share your experiences on the purchase and your comments on how it went and what you liked or didn't.
When I picked up my RV from EL Monte RV I was given a kit like THIS ONE it had all the basics to get started,the toilet paper was a nice touch.
Also a set of These Tri Levelers these are handy and needed to get level for proper operation of the refrigerator.
Again Welcome to the Forum and I can't wait to hear back form you after the purchase.
2006 TIOGA 26Q CHEVY 6.0 WORKHORSE VORTEC
Former El Monte RV Rental
Retired Teamster Local 692
Buying A Rental Class C
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MtnBikeMarty
phoenix, az
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bcrunk wrote:Hello! I'm Bill, I just put down a deposit for a CA Majestic 19G. 2017 with 118k miles on the clock. Other than an 83.5 Vanagon to dry camp in years ago, this will be our first real RV. I too have read/skimmed all 115 pages of this thread - I'll have 4 to 5 weeks of wait time for the refurbish process to re-read them.
What I don't remember reading is what to expect when I pick it up? What was included? Drain hose? Water hose? Gas? Propane? Shore line? ??
Other words, what do I need to pick up for a 2 day road trip home? Thanks to all who have contributed to this and other threads, it really makes a difference!
Hi Bill,
You'll definitely get everything a renter gets: drain hose, water hose, shore line and 15A adapter, vinyl covered mattress (maybe not with the 19G??), spare tire (besure to check it). I'd say gas and propane fills might be negotiable with CA. Initial must have's I say are: a mattress topper or pad, sheets n pillows, water regulator, disposable gloves, I really love the clear drain connector that lets you connect a (black) hose to so you can flush the tank and hose, normal camping stuff (flashlights, papertowels, trash bags, first aid kit, etc.), maybe a small tool kit, and tire gauge are things that come to mind.
MtBikeMarty
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cencerrita
Florida
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bcrunk wrote:Hello! I'm Bill, I just put down a deposit for a CA Majestic 19G. 2017 with 118k miles on the clock. Other than an 83.5 Vanagon to dry camp in years ago, this will be our first real RV. I too have read/skimmed all 115 pages of this thread - I'll have 4 to 5 weeks of wait time for the refurbish process to re-read them.
What I don't remember reading is what to expect when I pick it up? What was included? Drain hose? Water hose? Gas? Propane? Shore line? ??
Other words, what do I need to pick up for a 2 day road trip home? Thanks to all who have contributed to this and other threads, it really makes a difference!
Whilst hopefully you will not need immediatly get a bottle jack from Harbour Freight and 2 large flat screwdrivers! If you need to change a wheel the large flat screwdrivers will help you prise off the stainless steel wheel lug nut cover. Cruise America have not fitted covers that need a false lug nut cover to be undone, you work your way around the rim and prise the whole cover off. I carried a full set of bottle jacks for raising all the tires slightly off the ground when in storage for a long time and one time when i went to have a wheel changed and the tire shop big hydraulic jack broke ..... mine was used! Also some off the off road paces we went to in our 27G I was glad to have the gear in case of damage for peace of mind.
www.cencerrita.comNow living in Pembrokeshire, Wales, UK. See our web site for US travels and books www.cencerrita.com
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fadumpt
SC
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Spend as much time as you can looking over everything. Perhaps bring a mechanic(ally inclined) friend along. Check all through the house and chassis (cab, drive train, steering, etc). The CA warranty department is easy to work with (so far) but the more you find while there, the better. We just picked ours up the end of June. Needed an a/c vent in the truck cab replaced, a storage cavity on the left side was missing, Crack in the a/c cover and they fixed all of that while we were there. We have since discovered a broken sofa (they are shipping one to the local rv service company to install), a broken USB outlet in the bedroom (we picked up a replacement from home depot to install and emailed the receipt) and are working on figuring out a loose inner tie rod and alignment issue. We bought a 28a from Orlando and it's been great so far. I just would have liked to have spent more time checking it out.
We received a water hose, plug adapter, the sewer hose stores in a the sewer compartment, power cord is a semi-permanent fixture in the power compartment. Make sure to get a copy of the rental manual that they give renters. They should give you covers to go over the front seats. Ours had to be shipped because they were out. Ask for historical paperwork on work performed, they were able to dig up a few things for us. Propane was full (75% plus room to breathe) and gas was 75% full. If you can, try to spend a day or two in town to camp and try things out. We were given a 3 week unofficial warranty on the house part and a 3 month official warranty on the chassis.
Keep in mind that that the year they post is the build year and that the actual Ford chassis is a year older. (standard thing)
Ford has a lot of information out there so you can start downloading the manual, etc and also check out the Ford body builders site for lots of pdf documentation that may be very useful in the future.
bcrunk wrote:Hello! I'm Bill, I just put down a deposit for a CA Majestic 19G. 2017 with 118k miles on the clock. Other than an 83.5 Vanagon to dry camp in years ago, this will be our first real RV. I too have read/skimmed all 115 pages of this thread - I'll have 4 to 5 weeks of wait time for the refurbish process to re-read them.
What I don't remember reading is what to expect when I pick it up? What was included? Drain hose? Water hose? Gas? Propane? Shore line? ??
Other words, what do I need to pick up for a 2 day road trip home? Thanks to all who have contributed to this and other threads, it really makes a difference!
2015 Thor Majestic 28A
Ex Cruise America Rental
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626OhanaCA
L.A. Foothills
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Hello Everyone! My name is Brad. My wife and I are new owners of a former El Monte 2018 Coachman Leprechaun 32BH rental with a little over 52,000 miles on it. I have read through most of the 116 pages of posts and first wanted to say thank you everyone who posted their ideas and thoughts on buying a former rental.
So to tell the story we have been looking at Travel Trailers for a couple of years now (had a brand and model picked out) and that search change in the past few months due to a canceled family vacation that we planned. My wife really wanted to go camping and spend time with our family (our son, mother and father in law). So we knew a travel trailer(a small ultra light) was not going to be big enough for a two week vacation.
So we looked at renting from CA or El Monte. We actually had units on hold from both. I know that we could have applied the amount of the rental towards the purchase to make sure we wanted to buy one. But the wife and in-laws who also wanted access to a RV wanted to buy one. That led us to look at the used market.
We went to look at a unit that I found on-line at a dealer in Santa Fe Springs, CA. This was a low millage(36,000) former rental same model and year as we bought. When we called and set up a time and day they told us they would call us if it sold. They didn't call and we drove the 45 min drive out to discover it sold. The sales person sent out another sales person to tell us. But we were told they had another sold unit on the way in about one hour we could look at since they were expecting another unit the year and model in a week. So we waited over a hour to be told the driver was running another 15 to 30 mins. Over another hour later we finally left with no calls or no one coming to talk to us. This dealership was busy with several people buying new Class A's. So maybe we weren't worth their time.
My wife being very frustrated with the experience had me look for another Leprechaun 32bh. I remembered we were just down the street from El Monte RV. So i made a call and made a appointment to look at a unit we were interested in. As of now since the virus they ask to make a appointment to look at a RV. So the next day we looked at 2 different units and with no pressure were able to go though the units they had. Next thing we know we were working on the starting paper work. One thing to know they will not negotiate on price they are all set regardless of mileage.
So after the starting paper work was done with deposit down we left to pick up 4 days later. This was great for us to make sure everyone was on the same page.
We went down 4 days later i went thought my checklist I found on this thread before handing over the money. Only found the DVD player wasn't working. Our sales person was very patient with us as we check things out. Fill out the remaining paperwork and handed a cashier's check over and done.
One thing to know is that if you are paying cash you have to have a cashier's check. They will take a credit card for the deposit. Also they do offer a extended warranty on the box only and a separate one for the tires if that's your thing. But we still have some of Fords warranty left and the 12 month 12,000 mile warranty from El Monte.
They also gave us a starter kit containing one roll of TP, pressure regulator, two leveling ramps, 30 amp to 15 amp converter, 10 ft sewer hose and some toilet chemicals.
What really made me comfortable buying a formal rental is knowing that rental companies for the most part keep up on the required maintenance and up keep to stay in business at least the bigger ones. Now i realize there can be a few more scratches and small blemishes from a rental but they do seem to really try to make them look the best possible once the units are for sale.
Sorry for the long post but in buying a used unit we saw both sides of customer service. I would have no problem recommending El Monte on what we experienced so far. If there is any questions, I'm sure i missed some things, I'll be happy to answer. Thanks Again to those who posted in this tread the advise really did help a lot!
* This post was
edited 07/09/20 02:43pm by 626OhanaCA *
2018 Coachman Leprechaun 32ft Ford E450 V-10
Former El Monte Rental
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IAMICHABOD
Sunny So Cal
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Hello Brad AKA 626OhanaCA
Welcome to the Forum and to the Former Rental Owners Club! I will add you to the list of happy owners of a Former Rental, you will be #119
Thank you for the insightful post and your on your experience of purchasing from El Monte RV,the nice thing about this is that you got what you wanted with low mileage and some Ford warranty left.I hope that you got all the maintenance records too.
I hope that you and your Wife and family will enjoy this Camping Season,which here in Sunny So Cal is year round...
Again welcome and have fun." Goin Places With Smilin Faces"
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gotsmart
a bit too late though
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MtnBikeMarty wrote:
Hey "Gotsmart" I have a question for you. I have a CA too, but what do you mean by "hard wired shore power calbe"??? is that cause we have to plug into the inside recepticle when we disconnect from shore power?
I'm an RV novice since this is my first, so forgive my question.
Marty
hardwared - as in: it is part of the coach. As opposed to a cable that plugs into the coach using one of these:
![[image]](https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/71qG-i0pZ2S._AC_SL1500_.jpg)
that one finds on most trailers.
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