As an auctioneer I've sold plenty of used lawn equipment. I can tell you that in general, John Deere is the name to have. More than one guy has brought me a 20-25 year old John Deere lawn tractor and a one year old Craftsman or Murray, (or whatever other econo-brand). What happened? The JD was starting to get a little long in the tooth and when they went shopping to replace it they choked on show room prices and ended up buying an off brand. That gets one lap around the lawn and now they are crystal clear on why they should have bought the JD in the first place. Yes, they border on obscenely expensive, but they work and they have very high resale value. My buddies that are lawn freaks buy Simplicity for it's marginally better cut but then whine about the kick in the pants they take on the resale. Simplicity does make a very good machine and they also last a long time, just not as long as the Deere product. The best sales pitch? My wife. I nearly had to pick her up off the floor when I dropped 8 bills on a JD 345 with 54" deck and snowblower. After she got over her initial wariness about using a larger machine, I found that I couldn't get her off of it. She insists on mowing our couple acres and gets testy if I want to. My buddies are goggle eyed over this development. Bottom line, for performance, longevity and resale, buy the John Deere.