Opinion: There’s Never Been a Better Time to Buy an RV
EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is an excerpt of a column by
Dear readers, even though it may appear so, this is not a puff piece for people to buy an RV. We’re living in a unique time where specific factors are contributing to the downtrend of RV sales nationwide. In a nutshell, this could be great news for those looking to buy their first RV.
For the past 20 years, the RV industry has been busy selling record units, year after year. This has been great for everyone; from the RV dealers to RV manufacturers. Even the consumers were getting a fair deal.
Then along came COVID-19.
This gave the RV industry an unexpected, yet welcome, extended sales run. People still wanted to travel. But with strict COVID-19 restrictions on airplanes and hotels and mandates like mandatory mask wearing and social distancing, options were limited keeping most of us indoors and going stir crazy.
RVs became the perfect solution for people to travel whenever and wherever they wanted without impunity. As someone once said, traveling in an RV during COVID-19 is like having my own jet. Unlike someone flying commercial, I don’t have to wait in lines or go through security. I just jump in my ride and go.
COVID-19 also brought challenges to the RV industry. Despite huge orders for RVs from dealerships trying to meet the demand for units due to COVID-19, RV manufacturers were also faced with labor challenges and a scarcity of parts to assemble trailers.
This resulted in most RV dealerships having limited inventory and forcing them to devise an aggressive plea to buy RVs from customers so they could have inventory to resell. Or, attempt to sell RVs to customers from a catalog.
Fast forward to the RV industry climate today. Units have been delivered to RV dealers and lots are back to being full. However, new challenges have been introduced. Now the problem isn’t inventory but higher interest rates and gas prices. This has resulted in a decline in RV traffic to RV dealerships.
“We’re in a unique window,” says Cody Freamon from Kamper Korner RV. “It will probably last as long as interest rates and gas prices are high. The RV buyer’s window will start to close upon the election of a new president. But until then, Biden is an RV buyer’s best friend.”
Source: https://rvbusiness.com/opinion-theres-never-been-a-better-time-to-buy-an-rv/
