They'll basically last as long as you can fix/put parts into it. Only something catastrophic would outright destroy it (like a bad accident). I'll keep mine going pretty much til I'm dead or too damn old to keep it going lol.

 

My stock Dodge Ram Daytona has 142000 miles and I have only changed serpentine belt, brakes, fluids and plugs and upgraded lighting. Keep it clean, use mfg inspection guidance and address issues before they become problems. Not a single big problem...yet. 4th Ram and all of them driven 100K+. Could drive coast to coast tomorrow being relatively comfortable it would make it.

 

Major wear or parts replaced on mine in 15 years have been
- front wheel bearing hubs. on the 3rd set
- cv axles, on the 2nd set
- front drive shave, CV joint, due to be replaced, 1st time
- lower ball joints, 2nd set
- rear fender rust, the arch over the rear wheels
- exhaust manifold bolts broken, once
- leaking radiator, replaced

Other things over the years, considered standard upkeep, regular maintenance. These are NOT your "adding up" repair costs. These are normal cost of ownership and use.
- brake rotors and pads, as required
- complete fluid change-outs at 4 year intervals; coolant, transmission oil flush and filters, power steering, differentials, transfer case
- batteries at 5 year intervals
- engine oil changes at 5000km, regardless of whether running Dino oil or synthetic
- spark plugs set replacement at 40-50,000 km NGK5306
- shocks at 60,000 intervals, Rancho 5000
- tires
- bulbs
- gas tank fillups

 

Bought mine new in 04 (SLT Sport QC, leather, towing, 20" wheels). Sold it in 2015 with about 150k miles, after looking at the inside of the bed sides over the wheel wells (covered with deep rust). Truck looked great on the outside, but I could tell I was going to spend plenty to fix it. Corrosion is usually the most damning factor to value and owner dissatisfaction. Recommend that you check it out really well for corrosion issues. If you find a clean one, have it sprayed with Fluid Film or something similar to protect the investment. Mechanical stuff is usually easily fixed.

 

I have one and bought it brand new. I have 180k on her now. She’s burning a little bit of oil but not bad, running good and strong. I run Amsoil. I have all above you mentioned. She’s a great truck. I pull a 7500 lbs travel trailer around with from time to time also. The tow/haul mode is awsome! Sense I’ve owned her, I’ve replaced the ECM, radiator, water pump, and the EGR valve. I’ve driven it across the country and back going from California to Virginia and back. She eats the gas around town getting about 10-13 mpg, on the highway 16-18 if I stay at 65 mph on flat ground. I love this truck however considering and ram with a Cummins for better fuel economy and pulling power over mountains with my trailer, plus I want a mega cab as my kids grow. If not I’d keep her, I still may anyways.

 

Wouldn't be bad to keep it as a second vehicle

 

I was able to start a 2006 that sat in someones yard for 3 years, all i did was put in a new battery. They will live a long time, just keep up with maintenance.

 

Just flipped 165K on my 05 and still runs strong like the day I got it. Keep up regular maintenance and it'll last a long time!!

 

I bought new an 05 SLT 5.7 Hemi QC. It now has 145K with only one repair worth mentioning. The exhaust manifold bolts busted, dealer fixed that but managed to tack on some questionable work (found that out later), otherwise routine maintenance. The dealership in question wasn't the dealer where I bought the truck, it was just much closer to my house. I'm a stickler on fluide changes, running Mobil One. I changed out the 16 spark plugs and wires at either 60K or 90K miles, I forget. I'm no gearhead, but after doing that I wished I was double jointed. It was a four advil job. I also wished I had one of those contraptions that allows you to lay vertically over the engine compartment. I did it myself because I recall the fees the dealer charged was way up there. I'm sure a professional mechanic can do it a lot faster than I can, but it's still labor intensive and time/money adds up quickly at the dealer. For any DIY types, bring along extra padding to lay over the radiator and other exposed parts, just so to minimize contact bruising while trying to access the rear plugs. Also, a good set of swivel heads/extensions of various lengths is mandatory, there are many twists and turns you have to make. I was told you are not supposed to use an air ratchet to cinch down plugs, but I freely used one to unscrew the plugs (where I had enough room) and a couple times I did install plugs too, but stopped before hitting bottom (or tried, lol). I simply got tired of making dinky turns because of obstructions.

The truck had a major suspension flaw and that occurred at freeway speeds, especially while negotiating a higher speed curve and then running over a moderate crack in the roadway. This resulted in the truck lurching either left or right and sometimes as far as a few feet. Some of these incidents were pucker moments so needless to say I took it in to the dealer. The service manager contacted me and advised this was a problem that even affected his own Dodge Ram. At that time there was nothing from the factory and apparently it was a hit and miss situation, but even a buddy of mine with an 04 Ram had the same problem. His wife even experienced it while she was driving and it freaked her out so much she refused to drive it afterwards. I could find nothing anywhere about it, but was told to mitigate the problem throw some weight in the bed. That is what I did and the extra weight helped keep the rear end on the ground, it still lurched, but not to the point you thought you were going to lose control. I worked around the problem by anticipating roadway cracks ahead of me and kept my speed down while negotiating wide sweeping freeway curves. The dealer tried to help by installing new shocks, but this showed little improvement. I wanted to sell the truck and actually what I should have done from day one was to insist a mechanic take the wheel and test drive the truck under those conditions where the issue revealed itself, but I more or less lived with it for years.

Finally, a couple years ago I decided to go with Bilstein shocks and a Hellwig 1.25" rear sway bar and believe it or not, that cured the problem. The upgrade worked so well that I thought I just bought a sports car, it was that amazing. It felt like I just bought a high performance road machine and it brought back the fun in mountain and hilly driving.

The truck doesn't burn any oil, the tranny is still holding together even though a friend of mine who owns a transmission shop specializing in drag racing transmissions told me the stock trans is a piece of junk. The only issue I had was figuring out the correct trans fluid level after I experienced a slight delay when shifting manually. I thought the trans was going out so I watched the level closely and it was a bear trying to get the dipstick to indicate full as I had to add oil sometimes and suddenly I was a quart high. I would then pull the excess out and would over shoot the mark a few times. I went back and forth with this gremlin for awhile until it stabilized for some unknown reason. I did have what I believe were a couple filters inside the trans that were not working correctly, apparently the oil wasn't dumping correctly from one part of the trans to another. My trans friend replaced these and all was good.

I used to pull my 7x14 dual axle trailer, often times loaded with two motorcycles to the race track and back and a couple times to LA and back to Sac with motorcycles on board. The trailer was heavy to begin with and looking back I wished I kept my 6x10 single axle trailer. Smaller, but much lighter and I could still manage two bikes. Tighter fit, but you could pull it no sweat up any mountain and there were times I forgot it was behind me going 80mph on I/5. Very stable as well. It didn't require electric brakes either, unlike the larger trailer. In either case, the Hemi had no problem pulling them except it was noticeable with the 7x14 while climbing the Grapevine on I/5 going into LA. Sorry, off topic but I threw this in there for anyone towing cargo trailers.

It's been a great truck overall and I made some nice upgrades to it, both cosmetically and some performance too. I wanted to post some recent pictures I took of it, but I guess I deleted them while trying to clear out excess baggage on my hard drive. I did get a nice compliment from the owner of the dealership where I bought the truck, he was walking by it and paused to say, "nice truck, tastefully done". That made my day.