alt Hacker NewsI would be willing to say that a small Japanese kei truck is more than the average American would ever need for hauling furnishings, appliances and lumber. If you really need something bigger renting a trailer or truck is dirt cheap
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I agree with you on the kei truck. They are pretty darn tough, and have so many uses.
However, they are TINY inside. If you are taller 6'1" and/or heavier than 200lbs, it is a tight squeeze, especially for anything longer than 30 minutes. The "average American" can't fit it a kei truck.
Also, the weird manliness of the average American man would make this truck unsuccessful, simply because it is too small. Which is hilarious, because some of the most resourceful, strongest, reliable and adventurous men I have met drive kei trucks.
I guess finally, the big highways with longhaul trucks and fast speeds are not so good in a k-truck.
I found out a couple of years ago that you cannot rent a vehicle and use it to tow. This is a major barrier to the argument "when you need to tow <X> just rent a vehicle that can do that" (an argument I would like to support).
Except most people also use trucks as daily driver vehicles. You can't exactly fit the wife and kids in a kei. Sure you could also own a car for that but now I need to own/store 2 vehicles instead of one.
>If you really need something bigger renting a trailer or truck is dirt cheap
It’s neither convenient nor cheap to rent a trailer in much of the US. Major cities have options, rural areas less so. Full disclosure I have a mid-sized pickup, but I recently looked into renting a trailer for a landscaping project that was above the weight limit for my truck. First issue I ran into was that there were not any trailers available for rent anywhere near my location. Second issue was that after factoring in driving distance + rental cost + dump fees, it was ~ the same price just to pay a junk company to haul the materials…and it was not cheap. Anecdotally, my pickup was cheaper than most other vehicle options at the time I bought it, my commute is short (so fuel economy is less an issue), and as a homeowner I use the bed to haul something at least once/month (Unfortunately kei trucks weren’t available at the time). So the cost/benefit/convenience factor of owning a truck over renting a trailer works for me. YMMV.