Bought a cheap mortar mixer from a yard sale in Tacoma and it broke after two jobs
I picked up a used mixer for about 80 bucks thinking I saved some cash. The motor gave out while I was trying to finish a small patio, and I had to hand-mix the last batch. It cost me more time than the money I saved. Anyone have a good brand of mixer that can handle daily use?
Sometimes you just get unlucky. My main mixer for years was a cheap used one I found, and it never let me down. It really depends on how the last owner treated it, not just the brand. A lot of those homeowner models can be fixed pretty easy too, if you're willing to open it up.
That's the classic yard sale gamble right there. For daily use, you really need something built for contractors, not a homeowner model. My old Multiquip mixer ran for years on job sites before it finally quit, and even then it was just the belt.