Tacoma or Ram 1500

Tacoma, if you go with the Ram, get the manual, Dodge has always had the reputation of building the worst truck/SUV automatics ever made, thats why you see so many new Dodge trucks with a manual still. Before I decided on the Tacoma, I was looking at a 4 door Wrangler Rubicon and read the consumer reports and what steered me away from the Jeep was the fact that the automatics were horrible, and the safety ratings were not that great.
A V6 Tacoma will serve your needs just fine, no need for a big ass truck if you are just gonna be commuting and towing a small trailer. You will love the fact that with a Tacoma you will be able to park in tighter spaces and get around better in heavy traffic. I have driven big Duramax diesel trucks in traffic and that sucks, just like driving a tractor trailer pretty much.

 

I thought about this right after I posted... It could be just the area I'm in, but even including cars I see more old toyota's booting around than dodges hands down.

 

Dodge motors are solid buutttt their rear diff and auto trannys are not very forgiving even with dd use.... if they fix these issues they may be more appealing

 

I beg to differ, my 05 dodges 4.7 blew up at 850 miles. 3 weeks after purchase. Hole in a piston, fuel leak, electrical short. Literally went boom and flames and melted my front end.

Dodge refused to replace truck or give a new motor. I got a junkyard motor out of a wrecked truck that supposedly also had under 1k miles on it..

That was followed by 8 power steering pumps, 1 transmission, and water pump. All in less than 80,000 miles.

And it was a 2 wheel drive street truck. Never abused and never towed more than a wake boat.

 

Wow, that sounds pretty awesome. I love old Yotas.

So I live in the heart of the midwest, in a smallish town. Before that, I lived in Oklahoma. Both of these places are crammed full of old rusty, stinky domestic trucks.

 

Just giving a generalization .... this is just what I see from working at an auto parts store and having a few dodges in the family.... Im sure there are these cases with about every brand having catastrophic failure occasionally and sorry it had to be you.... I am by no means telling the OP to buy a Dodge lol just stating what I have seen

 

No worries bro. I just do my part to convince people to steer clear of Dodge.

I wasn't mad at the truck every one gets a lemon sometimes. I was mad at how dodge handled it. After the 4th power steering pump even though it was still under warranty they refused to fix it saying I had to wait like 90 days before they would touch it again and that it was my fault eventually and only wanted to cover the part not labor..ugh.

But I have a taco now and I am very happy.