The Sweet Spot

[Jon Wehrenberg]

I have a friend who can afford a coach but chooses to not own one. But that does not stop us from discussing them and it does not stop me from teasing him from time to time with links to some of the coaches that are for sale.

Because he is not afflicted by MPD he looks at these from a unique perspective. He is not emotionally attached to buses so he can make objective comments. Today he nailed it in my opinion.

He is a technogeek and loves the latest and the greatest in all things so I sent him a link to a well equipped H3. I knew it would get his attention. I was right that it did, but not the way I expected. He flipped out when he saw a coach that cost a bunch of money had depreciated to less than half its purchase price in 4 years. So I sent him a link to a similar H3 only one that was 2 years older. It was down to about 40% of what it would cost to replace. It blew him away. So I sent him a link to another similar H3 that was 10 years old. While the 10 year old coach was not as well equipped with the latest in high tech gear, it had all the same appliances and devices, but now its price was on the order of 25% of replacement cost.

So we discussed this further and realized that getting any older the coaches had systems that were at least one or maybe two generations away from current systems and the coaches were expected to be needing repairs or upgrades, somewhat offsetting their cheaper price.

He defined the 8-10 year old coaches as being in the sweet spot with respect to value for the dollar. I have never looked at a coach in that respect. I know we take it in the shorts when we start getting closer to the build date, but never saw the curve as clearly as he saw it. The fact that he is a PHd and taught this type of analysis gives credibility to his comments.

Lest my remarks about him and his observations seem harsh to folks that have bought a coach outside of "the sweet spot" you have to consider this friend thinks anybody that buys a bus is brain dead and that instead of buses we should all have second homes attached to the ground. So now you know he is not to be taken seriously.

[Jerry Winchester]

So that means I have to wait until 2012 to buy the XL2 I have been coveting?

I think this is a reasonable analysis and well worth considering if your goal is to indeed buy in the "sweet spot". Of course if you think you are only going to live until 2010, then I would rush right out and get that H3 or XL2.

Is there also another "sweet spot" when you consider the last of the XL's and the first of the XL2's? Could you say that with the age and experience that Prevost had with the XL at the end of its run and all the bugs there had been worked out, that is is a much better value than a very early model XL2?

I wish someone had a kit to refit the front (winshields, cap, nose) of the XL to the XL2 style. At 6' 6", I sometimes feel like I am driving a tank because of the low overhead. Of course, the H3 Hummer gives the same sight lines, so nothing really changes for me until I get home.

And for Lew; Anyone have any good airplane experiences over the holiday? Post them anywhere.

And I really liked that work Dale did on his LED fab job.

And I had a nice dinner with Ben and Jeff last night at POG 2.2

Ben will post photos later. When he wakes up.

[Just Plain Jeff]

...what it is ain't exactly clear....

[truk4u]

Yippie...... This means my 10 year old SWEET SPOT Marathon is now for sale so I can buy a SWEET SPOT 8 year old "H".

[dalej]

Speaking of sweet spots, I don’t think I ever looked at it that way. I always looked at it by the
number of miles or use time. Kind of a lease. What will it cost for me to drive a bus around and
enjoy travel this way. When Jan and I started to thinking of a bus we came up with the amount of
time we could spend on the road a year. We then decided that with bus depreciation and the cost
of operation expenses, we wanted to spend $10,000 per year. We then thought 10 years for a bus
would be a fair time to have our first bus. So this led to our decision to spend up to $250,000 for a
bus. We ended up finding one with a trailer for $190,000 so we had it painted, spent some on the
inside and put up a building to house it.

Well after eight years I don’t think we are to far off track on the figures. We won’t know for sure
until we sell our coach. We figured $1.00 per mile back in 1998, but with fuel prices now its
going to go up a little. We have put on 87,000 thousand miles so far, so we are close. Next year
in Oct 2008 will be the time we need to start thinking of a different coach or what to do. But for
sure a bus.

I like the XLII's but the cost per mile seem a bit to much for us right now. Maybe by 2010 or 2012 Like Jerry said will be about the right time.

[Petervs]

It is very interesting to see all the various ways people have come at the issue of how to justify deciding how much to spend on a bus and it seems all us POGGERS ended up buying one .

In our case, we went down the whole RV trail since starting with a tent in 1977 ( minimalistic), then a Coleman tent trailer ( easy, fun,sensible, cheap), then a used mid 70's 26 foot class C ( roomy but Dodge really built junk back then), then a new mid 90's 27 foot trailer with pick-up ( worked real well but a little small with teenagers), and finally a bus. My logic was to buy something durable enough, tough enough, and comfortable enough that it would last us 20 years. Divide the purchase price plus operating expenses by 20 years and the experience is worth the cost even if the coach has no residual value. At 45 feet, we certainly do not have 2 foot-itis any more either!

We have enjoyed RV travel by all these methods since we before we were married, and will probably never stop until health issues force it, and we wanted to have a coach that would last us that long, assuming we took care of it along the way. Anything you buy will depreciate, but if you get enough use out of it then who cares, the experiences and fun you have and the people you meet along the way is what life is all about. Can not put a dollar value on that.

As for the newer coaches, and the newer systems, well, some features are nice, and in my opinion some I would just as soon not have. Example, our coach is a 94, and it has standard 20 inch Sony televisions which are perfectly adequate, but not up to the same standards as a newer 40 inch plasma tv. One day I may upgrade that; I do not think you need to buy a new coach for that alone. Another example is with Marathon, they developed the TechLink system, where the whole bus is computerized and you can plug it in to a telephone line so they can diagnose a problem and then they send you a replacement part. Personally, I do not want one of those, I like the regular hard wired analog style systems my bus has. I can work on it, troubleshoot it, and keep it going just fine. Go to a Marathon rally and sit in on the technical discussions, most of the problems are with limitations of the techlink system. Now the latest 07 coaches have the newer Diesels with lower emissions. I am all for clean air, but I do not need the maintenance and added expense of EGR and Particulate filters in the exhaust.

As for the Sweet Spot, I think there will always be a step price differential between similar Prevost coaches with the 8V92 or the Series 60 engines; and with similar coaches with and without a slide. Those two features do differentiate individual machines from each other.

What really amazes me is how the new plastic coach prices keep going higher, and with used Prevost continuing to depreciate, the difference makes the choice a real no brainer. Back in 2001 when we bought our bus, a used Prevost cost about the same as a high end Plastic; now a used Prevost can be much less than a top of the line plastic coach. It amazes me that Prevost's keep ging lower and people seem to keep buying the plastic ones in large numbers. Some people just want new I suppose.

Like we said at POG 2 , " A big thank you to all those who bought brand new Prevosts, so we could all get a great deal on a used one". As I remember, there was no one there who bought their bus brand new.

Happy New Year everyone!
Peter

[garyde]

I've looked at this nine ways to Sunday and there is no way to justify owning a Coach unless you live in it full time. Its an indulgence which I choose to have. The cost relates to what a person believes he can reasonably afford.
At the end of the day, its a $$ loser.
I get more pleasure and fun out of owning my Coach than just about any of my other interest. So thats the tradeoff.
None of my friends nor family get it. Its ok. I get it.

[Jon Wehrenberg]

I don't know about the rest of you, but I consider my purchase of the bus and the planes purely rational decisions and I can justify every dollar spent.

Excuse me....its time to take my meds.

[rmboies]

I don't know about the rest of you, but I consider my purchase of the bus and the planes purely rational decisions and I can justify every dollar spent.

Excuse me....its time to take my meds.

ha, this cracked me up Jon! I make the exact same comments to Bob-00 about my horses I gave up rationalizing a long time ago and just consider myself very fortunate to be able to have the extra things in life that I love. I think most of you would agree with that and also with the fact that they would mean little to us if not for family and friends to share them with.

Who needs meds, I like living in fantasy land

[truk4u]

Get a bus, have fun, enjoy the time with spouse, family, friends, etc. and don't try to rationalize any of it. Your time in this world is short and you never know what tomorrow will bring!