Me and my SO are flying on Monday to your beautiful country to drive around in a campervan for 3 months. We booked 3 great walks, and are super excited to check out your nature, culture, wines and dines.

I am a little bit anxious to buying a campervan though. Like, what if takes weeks to find a good one? What if we find a good one after some days which breaks down a few days afterwards? You know, standard stuff.

If any of you have any tips for buying a used 2-birth campervan around Auckland, I'd love you forever. Is it better to go to a dealer, or get one from Trademe or Facebook? Should we wait a few days to get the AA pre-purchase check? Which dealers are good or infamously bad?

Thanks!

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[–] AnAngryAlpaca@feddit.de 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Star far away from any "Backpacker cars/vans" type car dealerships or rentals, or brands that have Backpacker, Traveler or Autobarn in their name. They spend a lot of money advertising on social media, via flyers in hostels and with paid articles in all big travel blogs and forums ~~writing~~ advertising how great the company is.

The online reviews on google or yelp look good on the surface, but if you watch them for a while you will notice that any new negative review will disapear within a short time.

Had exerience with them, and the cars overpriced or in a bad condition. In the forums a common theme was that the money from the "buyback scheme" was never paid out, and since the customers at this point already had left the country there was nothing they could do. The other issue here is that the buyback scheme is a scam, where you essentially pay $4000 for a car worth $2000, and at the end you will (allegedly) get $2000 back. You might as well just but the same car from a private seller for $2000 and then give it away at the end of your trip, saving you the hassle.