My wife and I have looked at trailers for sale until to be honest I am tired of looking at them.  We have researched the internet as well.

Want to spend our money wisely.  Everyone has an opinion as to what is good or bad.

Our needs:

3 horse   toilet   shower   kitchen and etc.

Three we are strongly considering:

I found a 2011 Bison  3 horse trail hand express    $21,000

I found a 04, 06  Gensis Keifer 3 horse        $19,000 - $26,000

I found a Equistar Merhow 3 horse for 20,000

How do you tell what is the best value? 

Steel / Aluminium  vs. Aluminium.

Resale value

durability

I am at a loss.  I don't know what to buy to be honest.  This will be our

first living quarters trailer.  We plan to camp two weekends a month.

We have found some 4 stars that are like 1998 that people say we should buy.

I don't know!

They may be right...

On my way back from vacation I pull in to have my brakes checked out at a business that his full time job is working on horse trailers.  In conversation I asked him what was his favorite trailers since he's worked on them all and he said he really likes 4 Stars and Elites and the Bison is his number one trailer that comes in the be worked on even the new ones.

When I was shopping, the more I looked at used trailers, the better I got at recognizing a good trailer.  I decided to buy a used Sidekick trailer that I felt is a good quality built trailer.  I looked for an used aluminum, good quality built trailer that I could afford to get into and my price range was about the same as yours.  I figured I was as risk in the future to replace a refrigerator & hot water hearter and knew I'd need new tires but figured I'd be able to pay for that along the way down the road.  Three years down the road my refrigerator and hot water heater are still working fine and I did replace tires.

I wouldn't be afraid to by an older 4 Star trailer that's be well kept and it'll hold it's value for resale.