Must of been lucky. Bought an MTD at Ace hardware (Ace Special Edition) with a 42" cut and 16hp Tecumseh. Aside from the normal problems of your MTD of that era IE having the grille mounts break off after a few years) it's been great, and it was only replaced as it was really starting to not work well on hills, and in the last year has been a case of "What's going to break next when I mow?". A key to remember is any NEW tractor in that range is going to be light duty. If you have more an acre to mow with it, a newer, higher end, used model is a probably a better option. You'll get a lot of life out of one though if you keep it well maintained. Take care of it and there is no reason why you should not get a good, usable life of about 10-12 years. one other thing to keep in mind; the chief complaints of many people on a mower it seems is the motor. That is the most important part of a mower besides the transmission on a Hydro equipped tractor. The engine is going to what will go wrong 9 time out of 10 on a mower, and is often going to be to blame for issues with cutting (due to lack of power) and reliability.

Perhaps you should sit down and think about your plans for this property. Here are some questions to ask yourself. 1. Will we be doing all this work in one year or will this be stretched out over several years? 2. Once all of the landscaping work has been completed, what tasks do we expect our tractor to perform every year from that point on? 3. What sort of access do we currently have to our backyard and will that change as the landscaping work comes to completion? If you hired a Pro landscaper to perform this work, he would stake out the various areas, shoot grades and then bring in either a small, tracked excavator or skid-steer loader to quickly take care of all the initial dirt work. Any excess fill would be removed from the property immediately and trucked away unless it could be placed in a low spot or used to create a berm. Once the heavy work was done, then he'd use the same skid steer to bring in top soil, stone and any other materials that were labour intensive to move by hand. Hopefully, he could place those materials immmediately but if they were placed next to the area in a pile, then shifting them with a shovel and wheelbarrow would be simple. All of this work could likely be carried out with a single weekend rental of a medium size skid-steer loader and there would be no need to agonize over what tractor with a Johnny Bucket would be best. If your husband does not feel confident that he could operate a skid-steer proficiently, then hire someone. An experienced operator can dig out, carry away spoil and shift tons of new material so fast you'll be amazed. Even if this process was to drag into a second year, all of the above could be done this year. Piles of dirt and stone don't go bad. At least all of that stuff would be sitting right there waiting for the weather to break and your ambition to return. Pretty much any entry-level Lawn Tractor (LT) is adequate to cut the grass, blow some snow and pull a garden cart around a property that is 2 acres in size or less. If you foresee doing more than those tasks once the landscaping has been completed, then perhaps a true garden tractor is what you need, but I don't think that it should be predicated on these short-term projects.

Thanks for all the comments. I've gone back and forth on this decision so many times and looks like I'll go back and forth maybe another couple more times before deciding. Good thing is I have time to weigh the options. So the driving factors behind getting a lawn tractor are dealing with leaves in the fall and needing to cut the lawn more often during the growing season. I do own a regular mower, a leaf blower, and a weedwacker. I've tried many things to deal with these leaves. I've tried raking and bagging, leaf blowing and bagging, leaf blower mulching and bagging, mower mulching and bagging. In the end I, and sometimes my son too, end up being out there for several hours on the weekends cleaning up leaves during the fall. Things I've ruled out: so-called standalone leaf shredding machines, mowing the lawn twice (once to mulch up everything real small, and another pass to pick them up. I think my poor push behind would get bogged down trying to mulch all those leaves). I've decided to start a compost pile with my mulched leaves so maybe that will help by eliminating the bagging. I stopped by one of our local dealers the other day. One of the Toro mulching mowers (twin blades) was selling for $1000 I believe it was. Maybe a walk behind mulching mower would do better than what I currently have, not sure how much better though. Mine for the most part just throws the leaves in the bag with very little mulching. I saw the Honda HRX (about $700) where supposedly you can barely open the bagging opening and it will mulch up the leaves until small enough to pass through to the bag. It's not clear to me how effective this would be though and I have a feeling both these mowers would bog down with all those leaves under the deck. Part of my thought process was that instead of buying a quality new push mower, I could add some money to that and get a quality used tractor. Maybe I should look into how much it would cost for a lawn service to do my lawn in the fall. I do mulch the leaves into the lawn early in the season but it's not long after that that is no longer viable. As for the lawn tractor and the leaves, after some more reading, I concede the point about needing to empty bags just like you would with the push mower. Although, the tractor bags do hold more than the push mower bags. I see some people have opted to mulch the leaves and use a lawn sweeper in tow for pickup. Reason is the sweeper can hold much more and dumped easily. As far as cutting the grass more often, some have suggested that a push mower might be just as fast if not faster than the tractor. I don't know. A couple of my neighbors (tractor owners) lots are about the same as mine and I start mowing before them and they finish before me. It takes me 1 hr 15 mins walking pace. Doesn't take them more than 45. Actually one of my neighbors does 2 yards in about the time it takes me to do mine. He does have one of those Deeres with the foot pedals so maybe that helps. If I do go this route that may be the way to go. As for the leaves, one of my neighbor uses a bagger and it goes relative quickly. Although he doesn't have the leaf volume that I do and he goes over it about twice a week. He doesn't allow it to accumulate. My other neighbor goes the old fashioned route (rake, leaf blower, bag). He's got 5 huge trees that are all by his property line in the front so the area he has to cover is small. Plus much of those leaves fall on the road and just get blown into my lawn, increasing my leaf volume considerably. As far as buying used, if I go that route, maybe I can pay a lawn/garden tractor mechanic for his time to check it out for me. Same as you would for a used car purchase.

The words "inexpensive" and "quality" don't go hand-in-hand but I do understand where you're coming from. You have X number of dollars that you want to spend, at this point in your life, so you are trying to get a machine that will give you the best bang for your buck. Simplicity is well known for making a pretty sturdy machine so if you like the Regent, then choose the one with the larger deck. Personally, I think that you'd be better off with a 54" deck but if seat time isn't a big issue, then the 44" will work....even when there's 2 to 3 acres to mow. After all, no one says you have to cut the front and the back on the same day. The secret to getting longevity from any piece of machinery is maintenance. If you neglect it, you will pay the price. If you change oil and filters at the correct intervals and look after the machine really well, then there's no real reason why you can't get a good ten years out of the Regent. I can't see you putting more than 100 hours per year on this machine and the non-commercial engines have a life expectancy of at least 1000 hours. It's easy for some to advise you to spend more than five grand for a mower when it isn't their money being spent. I don't disagree with the concept that a true garden tractor will outlast a lawn tractor but when there's only so much money to go around, then you have to draw the line somewhere. Eight to ten years from now, your financial situation may be vastly improved and you can move up at that point if you feel the need. Right now, either the Regent or the X-300 would be good choices.