Husband and I are planning to replace husband's vehicle in about 3 years, or whenever we have kid #3. We currently have a 2-yr old and are trying for kid #2, so it's not in the immediate future. We can't agree on what to purchase when the time comes. He currently drives a 2006 Dodge Dakota (I know--he's less of a mustachian than I am) and I drive a 2013 Chevy Cruze. We each work about 2 miles from where we live, and the good news is, we do bike much of the time. His truck doesn't get driven a whole lot, but once we have more kids we will transition to using his more as the "family vehicle" for when all kids are along, since it'll be very tight to get 3 car seats into my Cruze.
Here are the main needs/uses of the vehicle we'd be buying.
-3 car seats, plus occasional friends/grandparents/etc along for trips
-haul pop-up camper (2700lbs-ish) average of 1,000 miles per season, over 10 days throughout summer
-average of 8-10 trips to woods throughout year, 55 miles round trip each time—off-road part of the time, AWD actually does get used
-haul dead deer 1-2 days per year, dead turkey 1 day per year on a good year, occasional coyotes, etc.
-haul other misc – dirt, bushes, etc a few days per year depending on projects
-must be American made (per husband)
There will likely be many times we'll need something to seat more than 5, and with 3 car seats, a third row seems logical to me. I'm thinking most of the needs we have could be met with a small-ish SUV like a Chevy Traverse, some kind of crossover, or even a mini-van. His objection is that we won't want bloody, dead animals in the back of any of those, or piles of dirt and brush like he sometimes hauls. For that reason, he likes the flat-bed of a truck which can easily be hosed out. He also doubts whether a mini-van could pull the camper up hills/mountains if we ever take it far on a vacation. I am adamantly opposed to another truck, especially a bigger one, but he thinks a full-sized truck is the answer. He'd love to go out to the woods more, not less, and something with low clearance and no AWD actually will get stuck if it's snowy or muddy. My question is, how do we meet all of these needs in a mustachian-sort of way, ideally in one vehicle? What's the best kind of compromise? MMM seems to advocate renting trucks for when it's actually necessary, but I think we'd spend several hundred a year renting if we did that. Still maybe worth it, but husband would complain about it and feel like he's being held back from freely doing the things he wants to do on a whim, like deciding the night before that he'll wake up early the next day to go out to the woods and coyote hunt.
Imput/ideas appreciated!!
