Holes in our Plan?

[Barbaraok]

I just looked up a Class C rental for 7 days in Olympia, WA on Cruise American right about $3500 for the week for one large enough to sleep 7. This is what you want to rent to Try Out RVing.

Or go buy something ultra cheap and hope for the best. We bought a Class C before we went fulltiming, to learn on, etc., but didn't go 'cheap', rather found a good quality only that was 4 years old. Sold it 2 years later for almost what we paid for it and we happy with using it for those 2 years to really learn about fulltiming.


Barb

[twogypsies]

https://rvshare.com/rvs/details/1072022

[Barbaraok]

Originally Posted by twogypsies

https://rvshare.com/rvs/details/1072022


[emoji33]

Notice it is 5K for 1 night, but 10K for a week or 10K for a month! And site shows many, many more at reasonable prices for a rental in different parts of the country.

[Whirrlly]

seems like living in 400 or less sq ft is in question so go do it.
Rent a small cabin or room with micro kitchen and 1 room and bath and do a few days. Thing is everything is an adventure the first time , but thing is can ya live in a small space long term.
All long time rv'ers know the answer to this thru their experiences.

find a small space to live and go for it and see what goes down

you don't actually need an rv to find out if small confined space is for you. Most who can't handle that won't even go the rv route.

tent camper here to start and you grade up if you enjoy that type of lifestyle and restrictions.

get a tent and go for it for a few days and then consider how much nicer an rv is from there LOL

[OlYeller]

My advice is to do it as soon as you can. I am 65. I had a heart attack and ruptured my heart at age 57. I almost died. It came overnight. It took years of rehab for me to get to where I could consider RVing again. Once we did, we had a couple of years enjoying nature and each other in our newer RV. Our plan was to wait until my wife's mother passed, she was in her 90's, to go full time. My wife was her only caregiver. A year and a half ago my wife contracted a tumor in her spinal cord. After a botched surgery she was rendered quadripegic within a few months after her diagnosis. Ironically her mom passed 6 months after. My wife is now in home hospice. I am her primary caregiver. It is a tough 24 hour a day job. The expenses are incredible. This was not what we planned for at this point in our lives. I don't mention this to elicit sympathy, but to let you know that there are many outside forces that happens as you plan. I understand the saying,"Man plans, God laughs".

There are lots of "if only's" I have in my head now. I am finally physically able to go fulltime but my wife is tied to home and services. I stay because that is what a man in love does. Go while you can. You never know if you will be able to do it later.

[okmunky]

I don’t think anyone intends to attack you for your plan and I'm sorry you are feeling that way. Many of us have had friends buy an older Moho that turned out to be a money pit. The experience soured them on RVs and their dreams became nightmares.

Since you are capable of doing your own repairs and know about the vehicle portion of an RV I’d suggest you carefully inspect any potential RV purchase and either hire an inspector or take along a VERY seasoned RVer to inspect the RV portion. Things like refrigerators, holding tanks, heating and A/C systems in RVs can be very different from home systems.

Once you find the rig you like, ask a seller to allow you to spend a weekend in the RV before you make the deal. Have the seller move it to a local RV park (you pay) and show you all the systems and how they hook up. In 48 hours you should get a good feel for what isn’t working. That will give you time to do a detailed inspection of all the RV systems and many of the vehicle systems. Take your own bedding, towels, food and kitchenware for a few simple, well planned meals.

Good RV dealers have on-site hookups so their customers can spend a few nights and discover issues before the RV leaves their lot. Many new RVs come from the factory with problems.

And I’ll echo others "don’t wait". Life is too unpredictable.

[Mike and Cha]

I was one of the first ones to suggest renting a MH prior to buying one to see if you like the experience. And no I'm not rich, I spend my money wisely and pretty much don't waste what I have worked hard for. But my main point was that you may end up spoiling the whole thing if you buy a run down MH, take your wife out in it, and she doesn't like it( or you not like it for that matter). You really need for the first experience to be a good one. And even with that you may not fall in love with the RV'ing lifestyle. Renting would be a good way to find out, and I've seen them for as low as $1500 for a week. Not a bad investment for your future happiness.

I know of people who never had an RV, went out and bought a new one, didn't like the experience or something scared them and they turned around and sold it as quick as they could. You see them advertised all the time, some not even a year old. Those people most likely lost thousands of dollars.

I know when we were looking for one we started out looking used. We saw a lot of MH's that I would have been happy with but my wife just didn't like. We were looking in the $50,000 to $100,000 range and even at that we ran into some real dumpy MH's that were not cared for. We never found one that was in the condition we both wanted, or the right floorplan ect. We eventually went with a new one as we didn't want anyone else's problems, we wanted to pick out the floorplan that worked best for us, we got a great deal, and most importantly it made my wife happy to start with a new one. Now she really enjoys MH'ing, but that could have been totally different had she had to deal with other people's problems, or a low end, uncomfortable MH to start with.

Only you can make the decision of what works best for you. I think others like myself are only trying to help by giving our opinion based on our experiences in RV'ing. If you are going to go with the $10,000 MH to start with, I would start looking now. You may find a diamond in the rough and will have time to work on it. Good luck and remember planning it and looking for one is half the fun.

[Mike and Cha]

So after reading back through some of the posts and seeing where you were saying that it costs "thousands" per day to rent an RV, and some of the more reasonable ones were upwards of $3500 a week to rent. I went on the El Monte RV rental website to see what it would actually cost to rent one. I picked a week in September, after Labor Day, to avoid the prime time season. I found that the smallest Class C was about $938 for the week and their largest Class A was about $2,200 for the week. Even cheaper in October. Not a bad investment to see if you'll really like it.

[GoneToTheDog]

Originally Posted by McRod

The big hole in your plan... is waiting till your 70.

That is the truth. Let the kids make their own way, and life. Quit worrying about them. Go live.....your life.

[winniman]

Im with the others on not waiting for 12 years. You are about the same age as me. I have had a class A for almost 7 years. My first one was a gas unit, 37 ft long. I got it for close to half price of what it was worth. It had a few dings from the rookie driver who owned it, but everything worked. I put 12,000 trouble free miles on it. I had it for five years, and sold it for the same price as what I bought it for. Start looking now. It takes a long time to find a good deal. You wont find it at a dealership. You need to find a divorce sale, estate sale, just need it gone sale. They are out there. You just have to be always looking, and have cash ready to close it fast. My policy is free toys. You have to buy them below market value if you want to resell and get your money back. This way you can afford it now. I have older friends who had big plans on retiring and going travelling. Several died, and one his wife took a stroke, so he no longer wants to travel without her. Life is short. Get out there and live your dream in small steps as much as you can now. Good luck.

[TechWriter]

Originally Posted by winniman

Im with the others on not waiting for 12 years.

Unless the current healthcare situation changes for those under 65, OP should plan on waiting at least 10 years . . . when he's 65. Although his wife will be under 65 then.

[Coldjensens]

Originally Posted by Barbaraok

I just looked up a Class C rental for 7 days in Olympia, WA on Cruise American right about $3500 for the week for one large enough to sleep 7. This is what you want to rent to Try Out RVing.

Or go buy something ultra cheap and hope for the best. We bought a Class C before we went fulltiming, to learn on, etc., but didn't go 'cheap', rather found a good quality only that was 4 years old. Sold it 2 years later for almost what we paid for it and we happy with using it for those 2 years to really learn about fulltiming.


Barb

Thank you. Maybe we should take a loan and buy something a bit nicer. I am adverse to more debt. We got into trouble with debt and I do not want to go back there. If we could buy one for say $30K and sell it for 20 after 5 - 10 years, we would not lose any more than buying one for $10K and scrapping it when it dies. A travel trailer might work for a while, because I already have a half ton pick up (but it has 150,000 miles so I am not likely to have it any more than 4 - 5 more years). Class Cs look so tiny. Can you really get a feel for what it is like to live in a bigger RV with one of those? I guess if the class C is doable, a bigger one would seem like heaven.

[Coldjensens]

Originally Posted by TechWriter

Unless the current healthcare situation changes for those under 65, OP should plan on waiting at least 10 years . . . when he's 65. Although his wife will be under 65 then.

My original plan was to work to 70, then I decided I would be too old to enjoy things for long enough. I bumped to 67 because that is when you get the full SS payments. I would love to retire at 65, but financially that will probably not work plus my wife will not be ready to retire. She is on track to become director of the library where she works and wants to give them ten years or at least five plus if they eventually make her director.

That is a concern. I need to find out what healthcare if any our company provides on retirement. Also I need 10 years to build up my 401K and HSA a bit more. The experts say I really need to wait until I am 97 because only then I will have enough to retire, but they also say I will need the equivalent of 85% of my current income in order to survive. I think that is nuts. With only two of us to support and a very small or no house, few or no pets, little or no property tax etc, I cannot imagine we will need half of what we use now. If we successfully go full time, we could probably live on a quarter of our current costs. Our utility bills alone could probably pay for RV living, at least it appears that way.

I do not know how medicare and plan B and supplemental insurance works at all. Is there a cap? For instance under our current insurance, we pay no more than $4,500 a year for the family, no matter what (not counting premiums). Does Medicare have any out of pocket cap? Maybe that is what a supplemental plan does?

My Dad retired at 57 and really has had a nice retirement. He is 87 now and starting to run out of money. He says he never expected to live so long. GM early retirement with a nice pension is pretty much a thing of the past now I think. Funny how a massive seeming pension and seemingly massive amount of investment gets to be really small after 30 years.

[Coldjensens]

Originally Posted by GoneToTheDog

That is the truth. Let the kids make their own way, and life. Quit worrying about them. Go live.....your life.

Thanks. We lived a bit too carefree of a lifestyle on the other end of life. We still have to pay for it, but it was worth it. Also kinda need to at least get the kids all through high school (one more week there). But we also have a way to go financially and there is little point in my retiring substantially before my wife. Her career started late and she is just approaching the zenith. I stopped liking doing things by myself decades ago. Now I hate it.

We have quite a bit of debt to retire first, including her master degree student loans. I also need to get some things done on the house before anyone would even consider buying it, at least anywhere near the price I am expecting. Then we need some time to experiment with RV living and make sure we like it as much as we expect to. Also it will take a while to get to shows etc, and finally decide between a diesel pusher and a 5th wheel. We may well sell the house and buy a very small place in a cheaper area a few years before retirement. At that time we could buy the big RV and have a bit of time to tweak it so it is perfect when we permanently hit the road.