Are We Overpaying for Overlanding?

all right guys so as i mentioned in the intro today i'm talking about the overland tax and if you're watching on youtube or spotify i'm walking around my truck i'm going to kind of show you some things that i think are great examples of the overland tax but i'm going to describe everything i talked about too so even if you're just listening on the podcast on your way to work or something you'll totally know what's going on as well so first and foremost the biggest thing that you can probably see if you're watching is there is definitely an overland tax on rooftop tents on canopy campers on smart caps on caps for trucks right there are all these brands that are in a lot of cases sourcing them from china anyways and then just re-labeling them or white labeling them and reselling them now there are some that are made in the us and of course always we i would prefer to buy us if i can but unfortunately the the pricing of them because of the cost of labor and manufacturing and everything is just really prohibitive So, you know, I recently got this Alibaba camper from a company called Hyperlion out the door, including taxes and everything.

It was about $5,000, which was about what I had into my bed rack and rooftop tent before, plus my drawer system.

So to be able to swap to something like this, that's a hardwalled camper.

with a nine foot long by five foot across footprint.

It goes straight up and down with four gas struts.

So you've got tons of space in there for the cost of basically a rooftop tent and a bed rack is just unbelievable and never even occurred to me before because of the overland tax.

Because for a camper, you just always were assuming you're talking $8,000, $10,000 minimum, sometimes up to like $15,000, $20,000, $25,000.

I've seen some of these things.

So there's just not a lot of budget options.

I don't want to be, you know, flippant in saying that this is just all overland tax and they're just gouging us.

I know that a lot of these American companies do have higher costs of labor.

They do have higher costs of materials.

They have to, you know, invest in the things that they need to manufacture them.

But unfortunately, it's like one of those catch 22s where it's like overlanding is getting popular.

So companies are popping up that want to do these things and make them.

But since their costs are so high, it's almost unattainable, I think, for a lot of us, right? Like to have a truck, you know, I bought this truck brand new three years ago.

It was about 47 to 50 grand.

To spend almost half that on a camper is just that's way too cost prohibitive for me.

That doesn't make sense.

I bought a Nissan because it was inexpensive but still reliable.

I want a reliable inexpensive camper that is not $20,000.

So not maybe technically part of the overland tax but in a way sort of the overland tax because the the space is blowing up and in order to make products it costs a lot of money to do here in the States.

So definitely campers are one of those things.

Now, here's the thing is, though, if you are if you're talking about a company that is just buying these exact things, these Alibaba campers and buying them in bulk and then white labeling them or relabeling them, then that is the overland tax, right? That's just people gouging.

That's people going, hey, I can buy these for three grand a piece and sell them for eight or ten.