Buying used truck from large fleet?

If you can get ecm downloads and repair history it’s possible to find a few gems... anything that has a bunch of emission repairs will often continue to need the same

 

I can tell you that in my fleet, the manual shift is disabled. The only time mine even sniffs an rpm over 1250 is with the engine brake. So they don't get abused too much, if you can even call it that. Where are you located?

 

Go to a Taylor Martin auction. Take your mechanic the day before the sale and have him look over and hook computer to the ones you are interested in. I bought a daycab Volvo from the sale for $8,000 and haven’t done a thing to the truck for 9 months, not even tires. Have made that money back. Went to the last sale on September 13th and some Volvo vnl630s with 315k miles sold for $35,000. I went this week to the Volvo dealer and seen the same truck with auction number still in the widow. Went inside and asked how much are the vnl630s and the salesman said $70,000 they only have 315k miles on them. That’s the markup. So I’d say buying from a Auction you get same truck as dealer without the markup. I been looking for a cascadia myself and found one at a dealer and the price is $49,900 with no warranty so I will be buying from the sale with no warranty for under $30k.

 

Do you need a dealer license for these auctions? Unfortunately I don't have a mechanic that I'm on the kind of terms with to drag to a truck auction, but it still sounds like a neat idea. Where do they get their trucks?

 

No it’s a public no reserve auction. Trucks come from Walmart, Penske, and other big companies along with individuals. Every sale I been to there is always dealers there buying the trucks that they turn around and sell for a huge markup. But they usually don’t buy for more than around $30,000 each. And that’s Cascadias with DD15 around 400-500k miles. I’m sure you can find a mechanic and pay him his time and service call and he will go check it out. It’s worth the money to pay him than bid blind. My mechanic charges me about $300 to go out but he will tell me such things like not many miles but has idled a lot, no active codes or if a engine light on it’s a dig deal or not a big deal and about how much to repair.

 

Hmmm, interesting. I do have the connector box and a ####ty version of Detroit diesel software on my laptop, so I can pull codes and history from freightliners, so that's at least something even if I dont have a mechanic.

Do they give you time to inspect trucks before buying? No moving them or testdriving though, huh... And obviously you have to have cash on hand, no financing?

 

Well if you can pull codes then you are good. You can look at driveline and all that yourself. From the time the trucks are at yard you can look at them. I always go the day before due to they are all lined up and numbered so I can keep notes with numbers on truck. You can start them but can’t move. You can take cash, certified check or a letter of guarantee from bank. If you take a $30k check and only spend $25k they will write you a check for $5k right then. They give you a title and transport sticker. But no financing. What I do is I tell my bank I’m looking at a 2014-15 Freightliner Cascadia with xxx miles and they approve me. I got the money in bank to cover the truck that day. They write me letter of guarantee saying I’m good for the money. I write a personal check and then take title to them and they finance the truck and put money back in account and now I have payments and money in bank. They look up the 2014-15 cascadia with xxx miles and say that’s a good deal at $30k cause they sale for 45-60k

 

Whats Werner or Schneiders service like? Do they keep their trucks ship shape and in road worthy condition? If so i'd be in the market for one otherwise i'd be steering well clear of them, if there cheap its cause they've run the life out of them and there's nothing left to give.

 

That’s not true. They depreciate a truck on taxes for 3 years when they can 5 years on a new truck. They make the money and do it all over again. They may not be tip top shape but for $20,000 savings you can fix a lot. Heck most are emission problems and that’s a $4500 fix if you want to.

 

Google Taylor Martin, click upcoming auctions and a list of places will show up. Click on one and you can see what they have. Stuff is added daily and close to the sale they put pictures of the actual truck being sold