Information please

S

scarlett6

Guest
Could some of you with more experience than those of us who are just now considering buying a Fifth Wheel, please give us an idea of what people should expect to spend living in this manner full time. Also, please describe the lifestyle adjustments, if possible.

The advantages I see are no property taxes, after 30 years, not so much house to take care of and the opportunity to see things and places we would never otherwise see. Do most people keep their homes, or do most sell the majority of their possessions and their homes and scale down their needs? Our home will be paid for within 8 months.

I noticed some posts advising people to rent and try this first, to see if people would like this lifestyle. The dealer here said to forget renting because he felt it was too expensive.

If people liked camping, what would be so different about living in an RV? I am sure there are things I am not even thinking of, since my exposure to this has been very limited.

Thank you,
Cathie
 

mrcomer

Past Ohio Chapter Leaders (Founding)
Hi Cathie,
Although I am not a fulltimer I will give you my 2-cents worth. First of all I have known many people to sell all their belongings, house and cars to go camping fulltime only to find out that fulltime camping was not for them. So then they are having to re-build their lives with a house, vehicles and belongings again. Others that we know have done this and love the fulltime camping lifestyle. My wife and I talk about this but do not feel as though we could give up our "home-base".
My suggestion for anybody that thinks they want to fulltime is to try going out for a month or two or three at a time before selling off everything. Kind of a try before you commit. It obviously will cost a bit more to maintain a home and be on the road for such a length of time but if things turn out that part timing doesn't work for you then you have your home to return to.
I terms of cost for a fulltiming rig. Well that a hard one for anybody. I personally would put a fair amount of money towards my new home on wheels because I want a good quality, dependable unit.

Hope this helps a little,
Mark
 

Midastouch

Well-known member
scarlett6 ...

I am not an experienced fulltime RVer but I wanted to respond with my situation/point of view to your questions. I love to camp/travel etc... and have family up north and down south. I am not retired yet, but decided to sell my home and property to my son. I, in turn, have purchased a Grand Canyon (pick it up next week:D ) and will be living in it fulltime, on the back acre of property that I have lived on for the past 10 years. Now, if I want to, I can hook up and stay at varios lakes, etc...or travel to see my family, with my home. I may find another piece of property, build ... who knows. I am excited about the idea of simplifying my lifestyle without compromising on the necessities and the luxury I feel I will have with my fifth wheel choice. I can still enjoy all the things that my former property supplied and be close to my son without interfering in his life. I also just found out that he is going to have my 3rd grandchild and I'm excited about being close by to spend time with them! My other son and grandchildren live in SW Florida and I don't get to see them much yet.

My situation was a "win" "win" for both of us ... still on the property, have my own space, didn't have to move anything and he is benefiting from the home being furnished and who better to give a great start in life to than your children!

That's my story .... good luck in your decision! I feel great about mine! :D
 

jbeletti

Well-known member
For what it's worth, if Nancy and I were to consider fulltiming, even if only for a few years, we'd keep a home base albeit simplified. But there are many, many others who have no alternate home base of their own. Having the ability to park the rig on the land of your kids, other relatives and friends would be nice too.

Best of luck to you. And also chck out the full-timing forums over at rv.net, 5thwheelforums and Escapees.

Hey John (jpmorgan), perhaps you can share your plan.

Jim
 

sailorand

Past British Columbia Chapter Leader
An old fellow told me to never sell home. They had and had traveled for 25 years and all they have was an old trailer and an old truck with nowhere to go in thier last years. They did not feel that they could carry on moving.
Once out of the market it would be very hard to get back in, in like mod that you are in already.
Our friends who have fulltimed for the last 27 years are now trying to find somewhere to settle down in and are having trouble finds something they can afford now
 

kognito

Well-known member
Cathie,

I see you are located in Texas. One of the largest RV clubs is based in Teaxs. Have you heard of Escapee's? They offer Mail forwarding as well as a bunch of other services. My wife and I are members, and there are close to 80,000 members nationwide.

Escapees caters to full timers, and owns and operates reduced rate parks all over the country, as well as a CARE center for rv'ers that can't travel anymore due to health problems. They also have a forum that I have found to have a huge amount of info about full timing.
 

jpmorgan37

Well-known member
Hi Cathie;
I retired in 1999 and my wife and I took our fifth wheel and travelled the US for five months and 14000 miles, during which time we bought a beautiful lakefront property in Minnesota. We built our home there and continued to do some short term travelling. Three years ago we started talking about fulltiming. We went for three month, came home, left again for four months, came home, left for eight months, came home. Well, to make a long story short, we sold our home and just about everything else last Saturday and are hitting the road. We have a six months contract with the COE for the winter at Cedar Ridge Park on Belton Lake in Temple. I invite you to come down and meet us and we will give you as much information as you want. We have met so many full timers that have been doing it for 5, 7, 10 or more years and never looked back. We have met several that for health reasons have had to stop and say, no regrets. And met some that couldn't do it. My suggestion is to try it for a few months-don't rent out your home so that you do have a place to come back to. You will know after a few extended trips if it is for you. For us, it's less expensive to live on the road than it is at home. PM me if you have any other questions.
Good luck in whatever you decide
John
 

J-W&E

Well-known member
We are Full-timers now..........

Jim and I closed on our home this past Friday and are now "official" full-timers in our Grand Canyon. :) :) We are staying around the Wisconsin Dells area till we start heading south towards TX for the winter.

We spent 5 weeks end of June thru July in Custer SD and had a WONDERFUL time.

We are now on our way to Elkhart IN to have some warranty work done. We love our Grand Canyon.

See you down the road...........
 
S

scarlett6

Guest
Thank you

for all of your kind replies. Sorry, I had a little difficulty finding my original post, so I could respond. I know there must be some way to do this, but so far, have not figured this out.

We have not had the opportunity to look at many 5th wheels yet, but I think there is an RV show in Dallas soon, so perhaps we will be able to see a bigger variety of models. So far, we really liked the NuWa, and especially the one with the island kitchen (2004). We missed getting a barely used one from a consignment place at a really good price. Actually, I am not sure we have enough information yet on what to consider buying one of these.

As for fulltiming, we still are trying to soak up information on that. Would some of you consider posting information that makes full timing different than your time spent vacationing? Is there a lot of extra work that makes this difficult? I can see why it would be good to have a home base, but am not sure we can manage costwise with both, although our home will be paid for in 7 months. Any information would be most appreciated.

Maybe the best thing to do is as suggested-take a trial run. I suppose you have to buy one in order to do this. One of our neighbors, an avid fifth wheeler, said that we should probably buy a used one for our first unit, then see if we like it, and go from there. We were not too sure about buying a used Dodge 1 ton truck, because there was not really a way to tell what it had been used for. Perhaps new is better in this case.

Again, thank you. I hope I can find this topic a little easier next time, so I can reply sooner.
Thanks,
Cathie
 

Cheryl

Well-known member
Sorry, I had a little difficulty finding my original post, so I could respond. I know there must be some way to do this, but so far, have not figured this out.
If you click on your user name in any of your posts, you get a drop down menu then you click on "find all posts by...". That will open a page with links to every post you have made.
 

SmokeyBare

Well-known member
Cathie,

My bride and I started our "Next Adventure" on November of 2004. We are coming up on our second year anniversary pretty soon. We have just today taken the next step in our Full Timing life style. We have ordered a new Heartland RV. We love this Life and have no regrets or thoughts of turning back!!

I can honestly say if both are not fully commited to the decision to go full time... then please do not burn your bridges behind You... Do not sell your house before you give full timing a very good try.

We have camped for a very long time. We knew we were both in agreement before we placed our home on the market. Yes we sold our home and are living fully in our Fifthwheel. Our present Fifthwheel is a 31 foot Challenger by Damon with a single Slide out livingroom/kitchen. We have just ordered a 3400RL BigHorn Fifthwheel from Heartland with several options we wanted.

We placed our order after we visited the Factory and was offered a tour by a the Company's Product Manager, Ron Dickeson. What a fantastic chance to see the very product we entend to live in... to see how well it is built... and just as importantly... meet one of the Founders of this Company.

Now to a few of our thoughts:

Cost of full timing is very different for one than another. All depends on what choices you make. We started out with a budget and have stuck with it for the most part. Yes even with the ever rising cost of fuel we are still able to keep within the original budget. Our largest costs each month are Going out to eat... and Fuel charges... We are always striving to spend no more than what my pension pays me each month. We do not use any of the investments for our monthly expenses nor do we ever want to touch the money we got out of the sale of our home. We expect this will some day end and when it does.... that money we hope to use to find our next place to live. We to this day do not know where or what that will be. A home? An Apartment? A Condominium? We just are not sure at this time.

We have found this is quite different than "Going on Vacation" For if you live each day like vacation... expenses are very high. We tend to look for lower cost Campgrounds. When time allows us... we stay for a Month at a time. This usually offers a lower rate than a daily would. The longest we have parked has been three months at one time. That was in Yuma this last winter, from January to Early April.

If you entend to travel you may want to explore one of the several discount clubs. We have Passport America. Passport offers 50% off the usual daily rate for select campgrounds. Please note that there are restrictions with several Parks. Read carefully the restrictions before you plan to stay. We also belong to a Camp Club called Escapee's RV Club. Both I would recomend if you entend to travel a good deal.

Our Mail service is through a Company in Emery South Dakota called "My Home Address" We call for a delivery... and usually have it in 3 or 4 days time. We have selected a Internet Bank. We do all our banking on line which also includes paying our bills. We use a Computer program for our budget, keeping track of our spending and our income.

I would suggest to not purchase a new RV... but to buy used and test the full time lifestyle first. Keep your home and wait to see if it is something you both can live with. This is a 24 hour... 7 day a week ... living very close together. Perhaps with only one vehicle. Not for the ones who shudder at the thought of doing that !! You both Best LIKE Each other alott !!!

I could go on and on.... but I know others have far more experince than we do. Hope this will help some.

Marv Osborne
 

jbeletti

Well-known member
Marv,

Congratulations to you guys on ordering your new Bighorn.

Sounds like you guys have a couple years of solid experience full-timing. Thanks for sharing.

To all,

Months ago, I came across the website of a full-timer and the site was recently posted over on another forum. For those who want even more information from full-timers that have been on the road a couple of years and have detailed their experience online as well as all the planning prior to hitting the road, check their site out here.

Over a couple day period, I got sucked into reading their travel blog/journal for hours. Feel like I know them :)

Happy trails all,

Jim
 
Fulltiming in the BigHorn. Is it set up for that?

We are going through a real mess right now with an Open Road 5th Wheel and hoping that the courts will settle this in our favor. Once that happens, we're going to be shopping again. My wife has taken a real liking to the BigHorn, and it seems to me like a pretty good rig. My big question, though, is concerning its suitability as a full-time coach.

I haven't found much of anything on that, so far, in the available documentation. Do any of you have any first-hand knowledge/experience about this?

Thanks ... Richard Demers/Front Royal, VA
 

cramor

Member
deb and i got rid of everything we figure we didnt need. rented an apartment for 9 months with no furniture except for a couple lazyboy reclines, that went into our fithwheel, card table and an airmattress. not much else. both of us felt a weight had been lifted as we got rid of stuff. things you though the kids would want they really dont. a house isnt a home with no one there our bighorn is our home. we understand that at one point we may get to old to continue this life style and need to settle. my parents are still kicking one lives in a house the other in a park model in mesa. i dont know which one has more fun. but i do know one isnt moving grass.
 

madigand

Well-known member
We began Full timing May 2006 after our house sold. We then had a 28' 5er with a single slide (Dinette booth and couch). We stored some things we did not want to part with in a 5 X 8 storage unit. We used this rig for full timing for 10 months. Crowded, yes; but it suited our needs and gave us a chance to see what we really wanted and needed in a bigger unit. We got our 3670 3 weeks ago, and are very happy. I feel that spending time in the unit and deciding if this is the life style we wanted to pursue was priceless. It enabled us to see what all we really needed and what we wanted in a new unit. We only took out 7 small boxes of stuff from the storage building. So far have really been pleased with our Bighorn. Good luck and happy camping.
 
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