...If the factories hired several dedicated quality control inspectors with bonuses and\or walking papers tied directly to the faults found and corrected we'd be seeing a different industry....
This alone would shut down most if not all of FR and Thor in my opinion.
We have allowed for sometime folks (Amish or not) to slap trailers together and send them out the door. Quality and the time to produce it is again in my opinion almost nonexistent in this market today.
__________________
Former Owner of
2016 Cedar Creek 36 POS (My Last FR Product)
And this is supposedly an example of 'Amish Quality'? I call BS. If the factories hired several dedicated quality control inspectors with bonuses and\or walking papers tied directly to the faults found and corrected we'd be seeing a different industry. Just my .02
Quote:
Originally Posted by DKRITTER
This alone would shut down most if not all of FR and Thor in my opinion.
We have allowed for sometime folks (Amish or not) to slap trailers together and send them out the door. Quality and the time to produce it is again in my opinion almost nonexistent in this market today.
Well now I am shocked at those statements. Seeing that if you go over to Thor's Keystone divisions web page they have 230 user reviews and ratings from "certified owners" and every single one gets 5 stars along with Forest River touting this.
Hahahhaa. That's a great pic. Hey, it's capitalism at it's best. Either clean up your production lines or you are out of business. Only the strong, customer driven companies would survive.
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2010 Cedar Creek 5th Wheel 34SATS "The Beast"
2006 Ford F350 Lariat 6.0L Diesel
2003 Harley Heritage Softail "Hogzilla"
1986 Marriage to "Wifey" (patience of a saint)
I don't know what a "voluntary repossession" is, but wouldn't something like that have an impact on your credit rating?
Voluntary repo is exactly the same on your credit report as any other repo. It's not like you get bonus points for being nice and giving it back. The only thing it saves is you won't have to pay the costs incurred by the repo man. Yes, you gotta pay for repo too.
When your property gets repoed, it is sold for whatever value they can get. any costs incurred are deducted, the proceeds are applied to the loan, and if there is any left over (there never is) it gets returned to the consumer. If there isn't enough to cover the costs and loan, then you are STILL on the hook for the leftover amount. Just because you don't have the property anymore does not mean you are through paying. You will still owe, and the only way to clear that is pay it off, or bankruptcy.
My wife is a collector and loan officer for an auto finance co. She has to explain this to people on a daily basis.
Keystone has some problems. I've had my 5er for a year next week. It is in the shop now for a warranty item. It will be there about 2 weeks due to waiting on a part. I could have brought it home but not using it until we leave for FL. A fender that is being replaced is the only Keystone item. Atwood sent a mobile tech on the furnace and CW handles an AC problem. Surely there are thousands of FR owners with no more problems than I had with Keystone, many with less. My last was a Heartland product and had zero problems, before that FR and minor stuff. After 42 years and an unknown number of RVs they are bigger, lighter, more complex, and assembly is well done for the most part. Not sure why "Amish" is touted as anything special. Lived near 2 Amish communities ~~ the only difference is the labor rate.
A lot comes down to your dealer and service department I believe.
Voluntary repo is exactly the same on your credit report as any other repo. It's not like you get bonus points for being nice and giving it back. The only thing it saves is you won't have to pay the costs incurred by the repo man. Yes, you gotta pay for repo too.
When your property gets repoed, it is sold for whatever value they can get. any costs incurred are deducted, the proceeds are applied to the loan, and if there is any left over (there never is) it gets returned to the consumer. If there isn't enough to cover the costs and loan, then you are STILL on the hook for the leftover amount. Just because you don't have the property anymore does not mean you are through paying. You will still owe, and the only way to clear that is pay it off, or bankruptcy.
My wife is a collector and loan officer for an auto finance co. She has to explain this to people on a daily basis.
Tim
I would assume so also. Especially in today's financial world.
Back in 84 I bought a 79 used Toronado off a new dealers used lot on the Eastern shore of MD. They financed it for me through a bank right over the line in Delaware. Withing the first week the thing started smoking like a chimney and the valves were sticking. The dealer gave me the run around for a couple weeks. The typical dealer BS that was more prevalent back then. When I finally came to the conclusion I was royally screwed I drove on up to the banks corporate office in Georgetown DE, I believe it was Bank of Delaware. I ended up in an office with the president of the bank and the director of auto finance. I explained nicely the entire situation and that I highly doubted they were ever going to see my first payment. There Toronado is out in the parking lot.
They called the dealer and cancelled the loan right then and there.....and apologized. I do not think that ever affected my credit. About 2 weeks later the banks finance guy called me and asked if I would be interested in looking over a vehicle off their repo lot. I did so and drove home in a next to new 80 Chevy van for about half what it was worth.
Different times back then, where a lot of things were done on a handshake I guess.
Lots of unhappy folks!! We have had different brands of RVs over 30 years. I really don't see much of a difference in quality over that span. I know when I buy a new rig I will be working on it every time we go out for the first year. And what I can't fix, I have to go through the frustration of taking it somewhere. I will say the newer rigs have more fancy stuff that might have problems, and it appears there are a lot more rigs on the road now. Is quality control bad? Yep, but is it getting worse? Hard to say. We did have one rig that we finally sold as it was just never going to be right. But knowing all this, we still love RVing.
As far as not getting service if you don't buy local, we had never even heard of that until we read it on this forum. For us its either a myth or an East coast thing. We have had warranty work done all over the west and never had any problems at all. We haven't bought local in 15 years.
Is FR a bad company? Nope. But it is a huge company that can have problems. We have been lucky dealing with them, but some folks aren't. Some folks have serious problems, but then some folks expect too much also.
Every dealer we go to for service is overwhelmed and under staffed. So we use certified independents when we can. Much less frustrating.
Enjoy the adventure. As some other member said, Don't sweat the petty stuff and don't pet the sweaty stuff. Not sure what that means, but most of these type threads confuse me anyway
End of rant
__________________
Scott and Liz - Southern NM
2012 Wildcat Sterling 32RL - w/level up (best option ever)
2007 Chevy 2500HD Duramax
Reese Fifth Airborne Sidewinder
Just gotta say, I'm on my 2nd Forest River product and have been VERY satisfied with both!
__________________
Jay & Maria - Camp Dog Joplin
2018 Cedar Creek Champagne 38EL
Fulltimers since May 2018!
2017 Ford F350 Crewcab Dually Diesel
Officially homeless and loving it.
Ham Callsign K9NDY
So, since some of you asked questions and had comments about me mentioning the Voluntary Repossession I did with my $180K 2007 Monaco diesel motor coach.
First off, I'm the kind of guy that really ties to do the right thing.
For example, I enlisted for 4 years when I had a 352 draft in 1969 during the Vietnam War. If I say or promise somebody something I try my best to be there and to do what I promised. I have always saved and have paid cash for every car and motorcycle I bought since 1967 until we bought that 2007 Monaco motor coach.
We made every payment early, but after spending three years and thousands of dollars on an attorney, fuel and travel expenses traveling from the service center in Oregon to the one in Florida, twice to the factory in Indiana, trying to resolve the main issue with the motor coach and (many smaller issues).
It would bounce so hard going down the freeways at just 60-65 mph that it would knock the big one piece windshield out. Cracked the fiberglass front end cap. We weight the coach so many times, had the air ride adjusted so many times, had the windshield reinstalled and replaced six times. Finally, I was calling Monaco's corporate office multiple times try to resolve this. I even offered to trade it in on a more expensive $250K coach if they'd agree to at least give me the price I paid for it, or a reasonable trade in price. They offered me $90K trade in.
So, I ended calling Wells Fargo, I thought if Wells Fargo (since it was their coach) just called Monaco Corp we might be able to get this resolved. They could have easily said to Monaco, resolve this or we won't finance anymore customers financing to buy your coaches. Well after repeated calls and being transferred from one person to another, finally a manager told me that they have contracts with the manufactures and they can not intervene on behalf of their customer. My reply was, " Do you understand, It's your coach? Do you want to work with me, or not?" They didn't, so I called them and asked them where they wanted it.
Yea, my credit took a hit. A few months back Ford financed me on a 2017 Mustang at 0.9% (Less than 1%) Go figure?
Interesting discussion.
I have a 2015 Coachmen Prism that I am pretty happy with.
I have had warranty issues which are similar to those discussed here.
I am now out of warranty, and have some impressions that I think are true and useful to know, especially for new buyers.
1) Almost anything you buy these days can and do have problems. My impression (not based on science) is that there is more of this now than in the past. This is possibly a reason why long time owners have had a better experience than new ones.
2) RV's seem to have more problems than similar items, such as boats and cars. (Don't start, you defenders. I know cars and RV's are different, "not the same industries", but still)
3) I have no idea whether FR products are better, worse, or the same as other RV's, but if someone were interested, I bet he/she could find out.
4) Getting warranty work done on RV's is often a big problem (just read the hundreds of posts on this subject in this forum). It's not simply the imagination of a few malcontents. In fact, I consider the disconnect between what FR (or other manufacturers) promises in its warranty, and what it's dealers deliver, close to a fiction. This is not simply an East Coast thing, as one poster suggested. I assume this is not exclusively a problem with FR products.
5) RV'ing is a lot of fun. If you can accept the above, and especially if you are handy, and not too much of a Type A, you will enjoy it. If not, don't get an RV. It may drive you crazy before you get to enjoy it.
My biggest beef is with those posters (who usually have 100's or thousands of posts), who seem to frequently suggest that the OP (who is often a newbie) doesn't know what he or she is talking about, did something wrong, or is a "ranter" These "oldies" often claim that they never had any problems with getting warranty work done, or with quality control, or with FR in general (perhaps they have friends in high places there). They often provide contact info at FR which should have been provided to the purchaser in the beginning by the dealer, should problems occur. It's like there is a secret society out there that you have to learn about through many hours of trial and error before you can get anything done. I have been specifically told by FR personnel that there is little incentive for a dealer to provide warranty work to a non-customer, as if this should be perfectly understandable (guess what: it has to do with money). In my case, I was once told by a nearby Coachmen dealer that they weren't allowed to provide warranty work to non-customers because of a "city law". Hah!
I believe it is this disconnect between promises made, expectations risen, and then failure to perform that creates all these bad feelings. There must be a better way.
Rant over. Thanks for listening.
We feel your pain, FR service after the sale absolutely SUCKS! Anything and everything for us has been a battle. The only thing they did for us was replace 4 tires as they got caught selling RV's with old, and I mean old, tires on a new RV. Thought we had a pretty good dealer to work with too, that just made the confirmation that some people really do SUCK! Never another FR product for us, too bad, we were going to trade up, now it would be trade out if we get to the point we've had enough.
A repossession is a repossession the voluntary part is a miss nomer. And yes it shows on ones credit bureau. At times faulty products are disappointing to the consumer, but the product and ones credit are two different worlds.
On my third fr unit in 16 years, all quality units and always had exceptional service from my dealer and from fr directly.
I've had issues fixed well out of warranty.
FYI. I owned a Thor unit before this FR. If you want to understand what SUCKS buy a Thor product. I've been well satisfied with FR.
Russell
Quote:
Originally Posted by TURBS
On my third fr unit in 16 years, all quality units and always had exceptional service from my dealer and from fr directly.
I've had issues fixed well out of warranty.
See my previous post regarding "oldies" (no disrespect intended. Just comparing them to "newbies") Note how many postings by these two gentlemen.
I am in no way questioning the facts of their postings. I am glad they had such a good experience.
This doesn't negate the experience of so many others who have had a bad experience (this doesn't include me), and probably doesn't make them feel any better, or help them with their current problems. Even accounting for the obvious fact that unsatisfied, angry customers are more likely to participate in forums like this one, I still believe that the shear volume of complaints about warranty issues and quality control issues indicate that there is a problem, which FR and other manufacturers should want to address.
As a FR owner, what would please me is if FR made it a policy to provide excellent machines and insure excellent post sales coverage, and charge a little more for their product, if necessary. Soon, they would have a special reputation in the industry, and,I bet, more sales and profits. Also, less headaches from dissatisfied customers whining at them on forums, by telephone, and at dealerships,
See my previous post regarding "oldies" (no disrespect intended. Just comparing them to "newbies") Note how many postings by these two gentlemen.
I am in no way questioning the facts of their postings. I am glad they had such a good experience.
This doesn't negate the experience of so many others who have had a bad experience (this doesn't include me), and probably doesn't make them feel any better, or help them with their current problems. Even accounting for the obvious fact that unsatisfied, angry customers are more likely to participate in forums like this one, I still believe that the shear volume of complaints about warranty issues and quality control issues indicate that there is a problem, which FR and other manufacturers should want to address.
As a FR owner, what would please me is if FR made it a policy to provide excellent machines and insure excellent post sales coverage, and charge a little more for their product, if necessary. Soon, they would have a special reputation in the industry, and,I bet, more sales and profits. Also, less headaches from dissatisfied customers whining at them on forums, by telephone, and at dealerships,
Maybe I missed something here. I did not dish on any newbie--more over I help them anytime I can. I've had issues with my unit and people on here helped me when I was a newbie-- Go back and check on demand water heater. I been there done that.
And as to Turbs I doubt there anyone on this forum that helped newbie & others more than he has.
So if you have a problem ask it. To trash on FR probably not really get you much help on a FR forum.
Voluntary repo is exactly the same on your credit report as any other repo. It's not like you get bonus points for being nice and giving it back. The only thing it saves is you won't have to pay the costs incurred by the repo man. Yes, you gotta pay for repo too.
When your property gets repoed, it is sold for whatever value they can get. any costs incurred are deducted, the proceeds are applied to the loan, and if there is any left over (there never is) it gets returned to the consumer. If there isn't enough to cover the costs and loan, then you are STILL on the hook for the leftover amount. Just because you don't have the property anymore does not mean you are through paying. You will still owe, and the only way to clear that is pay it off, or bankruptcy.
My wife is a collector and loan officer for an auto finance co. She has to explain this to people on a daily basis.
Tim
All of that is exactly right. The lender didn't loan you the camper...they loaned you the money. Good explanation, Tim.
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