astroturf wrote: I stand behind what I said, and will say it again.
A 1500 dollar van is not a good long-term business investment.
buying a $25,000 van is not a good long term business investment.
i can get 8 years out of it @ 25k miles a year/junk it with 200k. that van costs a little over 3 grand a year over its usable life.
or i can buy an astro with 1xxK miles and use it for 2 years and junk it.
my 95 was $800 including repairs over the 2 years and i junked it for $550. the net cost of the van was $150 a year
my 98 was $800 and i have not put a dime into it, drove it for 2 years, will get $550-600 from it in scrap. same deal, net of $125-150 a year for my work van.
so the last 100k miles i have put on astros to the tune of about $600 out of pocket could have been spent in a new van to the tune of $12,500. i can keep repeating the astro process until there are none left for over 50 years before the cost hits that of a new van that will get me 8 years. usually i'm on the ball and have another one waiting ready to go, but i don't right now because i was not expecting my 98 to be out of commission, but if you plan right all you need is a day to swap ladder rack/hitch/tools/plates when one dies and move on to the next. the problem with astrofaris is that nobody made something similar enough to replace them, and they are perfect for so many guys working that do not need a fullsize van but need to do more than one of the little FWD crapbox caravan/venture/windstar can do. cable guys, phone company guys, painters, handymen, etc.... i'm a remodeling contractor and prefer my astro over my big dually with enclosed trailer. 2.5x the mpg allows me to park the big rig 90% of the time and save tons of money. if i were doing drywall or something else that involved big sheets of stuff an astro wouldnt make sense, one of the bigger ones would, but i can carry a ton of tools and still slide stuff down the middle like countertops or doors, and hook up a little trailer if i need to carry more.
plus it makes 10000% more business sense to pull up to my customer's house in an american vehicle. if someone showed up to work on my house in a foreign truck i would send them away and tear up the contract and let them know exactly why i did so.
=D> 
