The Advantages of Financing your RV Purchase through your Selling Dealer
by Marcel Desjardins
So you’ve found the perfect RV and now it’s time to purchase it. Not surprisingly, less than 5% of all RV
buyers actually have the cash in hand to pay for their purchase. Not too many people I know have the $30,000
or $50,000 ready in their chequing account.
I asked Tammy Akmens, our business manager, to discuss the advantages of financing with a selling dealer rather
than the customer seeking financing from other sources.
She remarked that a dealer with a large sales volume will get the purchaser excellent rates and terms.
The dealers’ finance and insurance office personnel will “shop” lending institutions, at no cost to you,
the buyer, to get an excellent interest rate. It’s important to note that dealers are not in the money
business and are more concerned about their customers than they are about the banks.
Dealer finance plans are very competitive and sometimes the rate of interest will be much lower than you
can get from your own bank. Typically, the plans allow much longer amortization periods and that means
more affordable payments for you. As an added comfort, life, disability and critical illness protection
is available on most dealer finance plans. Tammy suggests that you use your line of credit with your own
bank for emergency purposes only.
Another advantage with dealer arranged financing is that the loan is fully “open”. You can repay or prepay
at any time without notice, bonus or penalty. You are free to make a larger payment or even pay it all off
at any time, which makes your dream purchase that much cheaper.
Financing with your selling dealer allows you to affordably add extras such as hitches, towing equipment,
extra warranties, paint protection and undercoating, eliminating “out of pocket” spending.
Perhaps best of all, dealer arranged financing is simple. In most cases approvals are given within a couple
of hours. Almost everything is done for you by the finance and insurance office personnel. This office is
an integral part of an RV dealership and is considered to be a main factor in a dealership’s “Consumer Satisfaction Index”.
You will be doing yourself a favour if you consider dealer approved financing when you purchase your next RV.
Marcel Desjardins is the Sales Manager at O’Connor RV in Langley, BC. He can be reached at
marceld@oconnorrv.com
