The Best Kept Secret in Used Motor Homes 
The market place is all too often a minefield, and the motor home used vehicle market certainly is not much different. It almost never reveals its best buys easily. If you want to get some kind of feel for what is happening in that market, sit and watch the comings and goings of motor home owners (and trailers too) all winter in a Texas or Florida snow bird campground. You will see all makes and models of well built, fairly well built, and not so well built coaches parade in and out. When asked, most owners will tell you what a fabulous buy they got on a used coach, and how great it is, and go on to name higher prices for them than it would have cost for a good used Blue Bird. 
When I purchased a 1979 Blue Bird FC35 ft with over 180,000 miles on it, my wife was aghast. With that many miles things were certain to start going wrong real soon. Before long she noticed the upholstery was in very good shape and even if it was 18 years old! Then she could find no flaws in the wood work and cabinetry. It was then she began to really realize what a Wanderlodge was and how very strong it was built, and she began to relax. 
I recently had a couple of truck mechanics do some work on my coach and they marveled at the heavy duty construction. They compared it to a Kenworth or a Peterbuilt and both said it was more heavily made, and pointed out that it was likely to see 500,000 mile if serviced regularly. 
The Wanderlodge is a cousin to a top of the line school bus that a school districts fully expect will do daily service delivering 40 to 50 kids to and fro and not breakdown in the process or cost a lot to operate, and for periods of ten to fifteen years. Such service requires top designs and top components to ensure the unit will continue to serve. Well, that is a Blue Bird Wanderlodge!! 
The secret I mentioned is that few people buying used coaches really know how well built these units really are. Most, when faced with the decision, will buy a used 1996 whatever on a light truck chassis because it is newer and they only have to pay $70,000. Put 200,000 miles on it and it is ready for the heap. For the same dollars a fairly new Blue Bird will roll 500,000 miles and sit around asking for more. For sure I am, and now my wife is totally convinced we have the best buy around and what is a bonus, she still is a classy lassie! ( the wife too). 
So why am I Preaching to the choir?? Why tell a bunch of Blue Bird Owners what most already know?? Because the rest of the world does not know how tough these coaches really are, and they will never know unless you tell them. If you do not, Blue Birds will remain a best kept secret. If the person who you are talking to doubts you, you might point out that the Bird is every bit as well built as an MCI bus and they start converting an ex greyhound at 900,000 miles or more,. Only then does it start its life as a motor home. 
Harvey Lawrence VB8