How to sell a used 5th wheel

Price it right, post lots of high quality pics and write a good, honest thorough description. CL is fine. 98% of the people who struggle to sell quickly overpaid when purchasing and have unrealistic expectations when selling.

Craigslist. Follow it and rvtrader for awhile to get an idea of fair value, and then knock a bit off for a quick sale. I've sold both trailers and vehicles that way and a quick sale is worth it versus making a little more but having it listed and showing it for multiple weeks. Craigslist dominates classifieds in my area but you might need to try whatever equivalent you've got in your area if it isn't CL.

guidry wrote:
I've sold several things on Craigslist, including a TT. From my experience clean, clean and clean. Then take a lot of good photos showing everything clean and maintained (roof caulking for example). Lots of pics allow potential buyers determine if it is worth seeing in person and eliminating lookie-loos. Lastely, don't expect to make a ton of money on the sale; your RV should be priced so the buyer can't turn away. Check other similar RVs on the web then price yours accordingly. Good luck

Totally agree - especially about the roof seams - inspect and re-caulk if necessary. Then clean the roof and take pictures of it for the ad. I did this to my previous TT, as well as clean inside and out. Sold on CL in less than 24 hours.

I have bought and sold several campers in the last 5 years. Do your homework and set reasonable expectations in terms of what you can get for your 5ver. For whatever reason my experience has been 5vers are much harder to sell than TT. Because of this they seem to really depreciate quickly. If you have a 5ver that is 2 years old and you paid $45,000 for it, it is highly unlikely you’re going to get more than $35,000 for it. At least that has been my experience in southern PA. They are great when buying but not so much when selling. I’m not trying to discourage you but again do your homework and set reasonable expectations.

We sold ours in less than a week. The only place that it was advertised was Facebook. It was clean inside and out and everything that made it personal was removed. The dealer offered $9400, it sold for $14,500.

big bird 2 wrote:
What are the best ways to sell a used 5th wheel?

RVTrader is the 600 lb gorilla as far as traffic goes. IMO, the site is dated as far as searches go and gives a lot of false hits when searching for =specific= models. Listing times are limited and, if you're not lucky (like me) and your listing goes on for > 1 year, you have to re-list for a new fee. Attitude of CS leaves a lot to be desired, too.

RVT.com, however, is =very= friendly and has a "run 'til it sells" policy. Almost NO false positives when doing specific searches, in my experience. Unfortunately, traffic there is about 1/10 of Trader's.

Craigslist is also a good option, but it's very caveat emptor for both buyers and sellers. While CL is meant to be a local "classified" listing, there are a couple web sites that can search CL nationwide (also Canada and Mexico). The one I favor is called Searchtempest.com. There's a learning curve for it, but the search functions are pretty straight forward and you can tailor your results using "-xyz" or "+xyy" strings to weed out specific things or add specific things. There are other, newer, options, too, like Offerup and some others I've heard of, but can't remember off the top of my head.

Parking it on a corner with a sign on it can work, as is a consignment to a dealer.

Lyle

Or if you don’t want the hassle of selling it yourself, contact a good RV consignment dealer and ask if they think they can get you the price you want after commission. Some only charge a fee if they sell it, not to list it.

We have sold both a TT and a used fifth wheel on Craigslist. Both of our buyers came from 250-300 miles away. I spoke on the phone several times with each buyer prior to them driving all that way. I sent them extra pictures.

On our last fifth wheel, we had cleaned everything out and cleaned carpets and everything inside. They left their home after attending church service on Sunday morning and drove to our local campground where we had set up our fifth wheel. There was grandpa, grandma and 3 grandkids. I told them they could spend the night in it, but would need to bring sheets, blankets, etc. We unhitched, but pulled our truck about 1 foot in front of the hitch, locked it up and they spent the night. He called first thing the next morning that they definitely wanted it, we went to our local bank and the transactions were taken care of them. (We had previously discussed how the transaction would take place).

The appreciated that we were willing to let them "try it out" before they purchased it and it cost us the total of $30 for the night. They treated it as an experience and was worth the drive. When they left, they headed about 3 hours away to the GSMNP and spent another night or two on their way home.

We priced it $2,500 more than we were offered as a trade-in, but they offered us $4,500 less than the NADA price, just to give you an idea of what the costs were.

Craigslist. Free.

I've sold several things on Craigslist, including a TT. From my experience clean, clean and clean. Then take a lot of good photos showing everything clean and maintained (roof caulking for example). Lots of pics allow potential buyers determine if it is worth seeing in person and eliminating lookie-loos. Lastely, don't expect to make a ton of money on the sale; your RV should be priced so the buyer can't turn away. Check other similar RVs on the web then price yours accordingly. Good luck