Address issue

[Terryshirley]

Now that we are almost full-time I need a little advice. I watched a utube on domicile , n this case S.D. the man said that it is illegal to use a PO box as your address. Now I'm thinking here in Illinois that we have 60 days to get out license address changes. Am I right to assume that if you don't have an address then you do not have a valid driver's license. That means no insurance sand a host of other issues. So what do you think. I can do an " in care of address" but do think I could get by with that. My concern is a legal driver's license

[LJowdy]

This park in Livingston Texas lets you use their address as your home address. Many, Many full timers use this as their address.

https://www.escapees.com/support/par...vingston-texas

There are several other options, private mail box companies have an actual address that you can use or, find a friend or relative and use their address.

[Stripe34]

Starter reading on the subject:

Full Time RVer - How to Get Your Mail, Vote & Driver's License | Technomadia

Residency, Mail & Insurance as RV'ers

The Costs Of Fulltime RVing (Part II) – Specifics & Links – Wheeling It

[Barbaraok]

Originally Posted by LJowdy

This park in Livingston Texas lets you use their address as your home address. Many, Many full timers use this as their address.

https://www.escapees.com/support/par...vingston-texas

There are several other options, private mail box companies have an actual address that you can use or, find a friend or relative and use their address.

Escapees is a MAIL FORWARDER. You don't use the park address, you join the company and get an address which will be abc Rainbow Dr #1234, Livingston, Tx 77399.

We've been with Escapees since April of 2006. Very happy with them.

[Terryshirley]

My intent was to make sure what the laws are concerning changing your address on your driving license. If you don't have a current address on your driving license you are subject to a ticket and if you are in an accident you might not have insurance

[Sue46]

We just became Texans using the Escapees Mail Service. Very easy. Normally would take a day but DL office had flooded and we had to drive to a different one. The govt. offices at Livingston are use to dealing with future Texans and are very accommodating. On the Escapees website are details of becoming a Texan.

[paz]

Originally Posted by Terryshirley

My intent was to make sure what the laws are concerning changing your address on your driving license. If you don't have a current address on your driving license you are subject to a ticket and if you are in an accident you might not have insurance

As far as I am aware, all the mail forwarding services in SD provide you with an address that is recognized by the state as being a legal address for vehicle registration and driver's license. You have to meet certain identification requirements which the mail forwarding service will explain. The requirements include having a receipt for at least one night's stay in a motel or campground and having 2 forms (I think) of photo ID.

[twogypsies]

OP: Your question was about using a P.O. address on your driver's license. I don't know the answer to that so you might want to contact your DMV office to get the ruling.


However, if you get a mail forwarding service such as Escapees, you will be given a real, street, legal address, not a P.O. address. We traveled full-time with that address on our driver's licenses for over 16 years with no problems. That street address was also used for everything - taxes, Medicare, financials, etc. No problems.


By the way.... the Escapees 'RV Park' didn't give us the address. Their mail forwarding service did.

[Sue46]

The Escapees is not a park, it is an organization that offers several benefits. As an organization there are numerous parks within the organization. One of the other benefits is a mail forwarding service(additional fees) that provides a legal address for obtaining drivers license and registration in Texas, South Dakota or Florida. The Escapees organization is headquartered in Livingston, TX. Additionally there is a rally(called Escapade) once a year which provides numerous seminars over a 4 day period.

The website for additional information is:

www.escapees.com

the forum that is provided by the organization is:

Forums - Escapees Discussion Forum

[Don_T]

We too are Escapees. It is easy to join and set up mail forwarding and it works great. The DMV office is a couple of blocks away from them too. Our driver's licenses, voter registration, insurance, etc. are all legally tied to the address. We just email Escapees our address to forward mail when we relocate. The service is well worth what we pay for it.

[Barbaraok]

Originally Posted by Don_T

We too are Escapees. It is easy to join and set up mail forwarding and it works great. The DMV office is a couple of blocks away from them too. Our driver's licenses, voter registration, insurance, etc. are all legally tied to the address. We just email Escapees our address to forward mail when we relocate. The service is well worth what we pay for it.

Your definition of "a couple of blocks" and mine are certainly different.

[Sky_Boss]

There can be a couple issues where a SD PMB address can get tricky. Let me start with the understanding that my SD PMB address is used for many functions without a problem. That includes driver's license, vehicle registration, health insurance, auto insurance...

There are 2 things where it can be a problem/oddity.

1. There are some/many bank, credit card, investment accounts that will NOT accept a PMB or even the base address. Much of this is tied up with federal regulations that are attempting to stop money laundering and such. Even if you use the address of the provider without the PMB it is being flagged as a batch address.

2. Voter registration (at least in SD) is NOT based on your DL or PMB address. It is based on the address of the hotel/campground you used to establish your SD residency. This will also affect the county you may get called up for jury duty.

As a side note, we found out about item #2 by accident. We establish our SD residency 4 years ago through Dakota Post in Minnehaha Co. We followed DP's recommendation and stayed at the Tower's RV Park. After we got set up with DP they changed their street address. This spring as part of our preparation for our DL renewal we decided to get our addresses on our DLs corrected. The initial plan was to stop in Sioux Falls, SD to get it done. This would also provide us the documentation we would need in the next few month to renew our DLs. Unfortunately, our timing in Sioux Falls was July 3rd and they closed the DL station. Instead, we got it done in Rapid City. Coincidently, at the same time Minnehaha Co had sent us voter registration verification cards. When I called them about it I told them what we did and they told us that would cause us to be removed from their registry and I would be registered in Pennington Co.

[Dan McMartin]

Originally Posted by Sue46

We just became Texans using the Escapees Mail Service. Very easy. Normally would take a day but DL office had flooded and we had to drive to a different one. The govt. offices at Livingston are use to dealing with future Texans and are very accommodating. On the Escapees website are details of becoming a Texan.

We did it today. The DL office is still closed but he folks in the jail said it would be open in about a week. It took us 3 hours to get our Jeep registered and our DL's even with the drive to Cleveland to use their office. We had to wait but it was only about 90 minutes. Considering Livingston and Woodville's offices are both closed, not to bad.

As far as banks, our credit union (I know, not a bank) told us the address wouldn't be a problem. Haven't dealt with our Chase credit card or American Express. We can use my mom's address if we have too.

And as far as using Escapees address, it is important. You wouldn't get to far using their address. You need to join Escapees and pay for mail service. Semantics, maybe but it's not an insignificant up front cost and for someone that isn't well versed in all of this (just about everyone) we wouldn't want to confuse them. Not just the OP will read this post and correct information is important.

[FlyingDiver]

Not OK. You don't start at the park. You start with the organization (https://www.escapees.com) and through them subscribe to the mail forwarding service. The particular park in Livingston is another part of the organization and has nothing to do with the mail service.