Advice on a LandRover as a weekender car

Hello everyone, congrats for the forum, plenty of good info!
I am Matt and with my wife we are looking for a weekender car, we are outdoor people and every weekend we ride to the coast for biking, hiking and camping.

I am not a pro when talking about LandRovers, I only need enough space to load my bikes, maybe a roof tent. We often do gravel and fire roads so it has to be tough and reliable.

I would prefer to stay under the $20k with all the extra parts I need, I searched the web to get to know more but I am really confused about pricing, I can easily found a 2007/2008 Range Rover Supercharged for 17k with 150k miles on it (more or less), but when I search for a 2009 pricing goes up a lot more and I really don't know why (I guess new motor?).

Maybe I should buy a 2003/2004/2005 and spent some money on make it more rugged within the budget I have.

I am looking for some general advice and more than anything, what YOU would do with that budget to build a weekender car?

Note: I am based in NorCal.

Thank you

Welcome to the forum. If it is just weekends only, but an 04 disco and with that budget the world is your limit. As far as the supercharged RR goes, it wouldn't be my first pick for off road use. You could even get an older LR3 and do lots to it and still be within budget. If Range Rover is what you want you will be more limited to setting up for more off road use. Don't get me wrong they are all tough and ride better than say a jeep wrangler, but the RR isn't what I would look for in a weekend off road vehicle.

Hi Joey, thank you for the reply.

Our weekends not always are offroad, we do a lot of HWYs too, my offroad is limited to gravel and fire roads, not too rocky, it happens that the camping spot we want to reach is not on paved roads and an Honda Civic in not ideal (even if she always took us to the place we wanted to reach).

Then in that case I would go LR3, the RR is nice but for camping the LR3 will give you much more room and more options. Also for the price you can get a better deal with camping options and upgrades for your money.

Thank you, this are the kind of tips I was looking for!!

Now, the RR seems bigger than the LR3 but you are talking about more space, is because of internal dispositions of seats and stuff? Or just because the RR in being more luxurious take more space with extra gadgets?

Also, I read about the terrain response option that in RR is missing before 2006, is that correct? Is the terrain response the ability to lift the car if the terrain is rugged?

Keep in mind the RR is riding on air bags, air bags can and will fail. When they do you do not want a used Rover out in the woods riding on bumpstops.

And yes the RR will be more luxurious and have more gadgets, I test drove one the other day with heating/air seat that massaged you while you drove. Not an option in the LR3 that I know of, but then again if you have to buy any aftermarket items you will find more options for the LR3 than for the RR as well.

Thank you a lot Joey!

I got a 03 Disco!

Very nice... and how do you like it so far?

It's fantastic!!
I was lucky enough to find an owner that took good care of the car and it's in perfect conditions!!