My biggest piece of advice is this, if you buy outright make sure you get some warranty, and take the mechanic with you that you’ve put on you O licence, as at the end of the day he’s the guy that’ll be fixing it, he can look it over and give you a rough idea of what it’s going to cost you in the near future.
I didn’t, and it cost me dearly, almost bankrupted me, I bought a bulletproof MY58 FH, mechanically sound, but what I didn’t intend on having to do in the 1st 6 months was brakes all round, clutch, all the tyres, ishift ecu (covered by warranty, £1800) amongst other things I can’t remember now, all in all around £6k of work, I eventually gave up with the truck, took a huge loss and went to Thomas Hardie Volvo and bought another FH this time though with 24 month warranty and guaranteed parts wear, also got the mechanic to take a butchers, in 18 months I’ve replaced 2 tyres, some pads and some other nigly little bits that’s it, I’m still in debt because of the first truck, but now I’m happy and I’m buying my second truck in January, learning from my own lessons this time.
Over the cost of the 2 wagons and over the 2 years I’ve been an o/d, this was still cheaper than hiring/rm, although the stress was 5x.
Hope this helps.