barney , welcome to the club; I too am agonizing between Deere and Kubota-I own neither and am only an expert in used pricing on both and it is insane, with Deere being more insane than Kubota.
After a year of seriously trying to find a used machine here is what I have concluded, it ain't worth the time that you will invest in trying to find one.
The problem with Kubota is that there are so few that come to the used market they will be sold very, very quickly and generally speaking you will find the T's and G's, a GR is rare indeed-for a mid 80's up machine with starting hours in the 500's, count on paying 4k-and believe me when I tell you that 'good' condition is, shall we say, a very relative term.
The problem with Deere is that you will routinely see machines with a thousand hours for 3/4 the cost of a new one-low hour machines (under 300 hours, or ten years of work for the average homeowner) will run you about less than a 1,000 or so dollars LESS than a new one-it simply does not make any sense to me.
Deere dealer pricing on used is simply bizarre-a machine with a hundred or so hours, $500 less than a brand new one, count on it-I have seen numerous ads for 1200 hour higher 400 series for over 5k$.
EVERYBODY is of the opinion that their used Deere is worth the very very long dollar.
Is the true 'deal' out there, yes-I missed by an hour, an '08
GR2110, under 30 hours, for $5,500 AND it was only six hours away.....
BUT new GR's can be had for roughly $20 more per month, so really was it worth it to buy one that had been sitting for over a year, with fuel in the tank and system,-poor guy died, in my mind it isn't.
You will waste hundreds of hours of your time, hundreds of dollars in fuel in driving (with the risk associated with travel), significant money in wear and tear on your vehicle, long distance phone calls, blah, blah, blah.
Forget ebay, too many scams going on-three times I was the 'winning' bid, and each and every time the item was withdrawn.
Craigslist ain't bad, especially with craigs list helper-or the software that alerts you to new ads, 10 bucks I think-but unless you check serial numbers how do know what you are buying isn't stolen-and speaking of serial numbers, get in the habit of checking both the frame and engine number-it gets interesting sometimes.
It simply isn't worth it.
Good really is bad, very good is average, and 'pristine' is good-its truly amazing what some people are trying to sell.
Bite the bullet and buy new, break it in correctly, take care of it the way you want, and then you also can try to sell it for crazy dollars.
How about a new
GR2110, for $7,900, only sitting outside for a full year.................
Now for the Kubota v Deere question.
The Deere 500 series would do nicely, the dif lock would be sufficient, but I do also need power steering-arthritus, so that means either the 534 or 540, I think I want liquid cooled so that means the 540, bottom line 800 bucks less than the Kubota which will give me that seductive sounding diesel.
Yes early model GR's had hydraulic issues, and rear bushing issues, both these have been taken care of-transmissions are upgraded and now there are bearings in the rear-**** them for making that 3 cyl diesel.
Don't know which way to go, but I do know I have to find out just why the Kawasaki engines smoke, or rather, why some smoke-no one can tell me, and I don't want to hear that it is 'normal'.
I can say the 595 is quite the workhorse. I mow from one (my yard) to two (if my next-door neighbor doesn't mow his) acres, and the 595/54" MMM handles it with aplomb. Lotsa' hills and such, so the 4WD gets some use (that is a GREAT feature).
