To be a Fulltimer or Not?

[BucketList]

Just joined the forum and do not yet have an RV. Considering a Newmar DP Essex or King Aire 45' long coach. When I was a kid my family camped several times a year with a truck mount camper. My bucket list dream is to be a fulltimer. However, right now I own a home and have a full time job. And to be a fulltimer I will have to radically change my life by retiring and selling my home. How can I know if fulltiming is for me before make these types of decisions.

[RickO]

Welcome to the forum!

It does sound like you might need to do some research, some self examination, and some field work to answer you own question. It also really depends on the degree of emotional ties that might exist to your current home and area as well as your financial flexibility to "change it all back" if you find you don't like it after six months.

We had never owned any kind of RV when I retired six years ago. We decided to purchase a brand new Itasca 40DP. We traveled about 3/4 time for two years and decided to sell the house in California and go full time until we didn't want to do it any more.

We spent the next two years full time and were perfectly happy doing it... all the while keeping an eye out for that perfect place to someday "settle down". Last year we found it and the depressed real estate market made it something we didn't want to pass up. Now we travel about half time and are loving it.

Renting would be a good way to get your feet wet but there's not much chance you'll anything like a 45 ft DP to rent. Some times we just end up having to grab ourselves by the seat of our pants and taking a leap of faith.

Best of luck to you.

Rick

[Victoriaten]

I am a young full timer with a teaching career. I decided to take the plunge so I could travel more economically during the summers and move closer to work during my coaching season. I still have many year before I can retire soooo my point is you don't have to be retired to ft. depending on what you purchased, you could keep the house as a back up plan. I purchased a TT for cheap from family to take the plunge. The garage sale of all of my belongings was the most cleansing thing I've felt. If u are a glass is half full kind of person then full timing will always be for you.

[steelheadbluesman]

I've done both. It's hard to know for sure. If you spend time in the ft forums, you'll probably get a better feel. But in the end, it is probably about how well you know yourself, and how high your adventure meter goes.... In my opinion, it is a belief in who you want to be and how you want to spend your time. Lao-tsi said, "muddied water let stand, becomes clear." When the time comes, you'll know what to do.

[Abnmarine]

We haven't begun yet, still have a couple of years before the youngest finishes school. I'll be retiring from the military next year and I've become accustomed to travelling a lot with minimum conveniences.

We both love camping, travelling, seeing the beautiful country and meeting new people. I embrace the idea of reducing our "things" as I've lived with much less when deployed.

We have a ten year plan of FT. We will go from there depending on if we wish to continue. Won't really know until after we begin but look forward to the freedom.

[Arch Hoagland]

The only way to find out is buy an RV, perhaps a used one so you don't have too much tied up in it, and go out on the road for as long of a period of time that you can arrange.
Full timing sounds fun but there can be some drawbacks that only experience will teach you.

[paz]

Quote:

Originally Posted by BucketList Just joined the forum and do not yet have an RV. Considering a Newmar DP Essex or King Aire 45' long coach. When I was a kid my family camped several times a year with a truck mount camper. My bucket list dream is to be a fulltimer. However, right now I own a home and have a full time job. And to be a fulltimer I will have to radically change my life by retiring and selling my home. How can I know if fulltiming is for me before make these types of decisions.

Full-time RVing will be a lot different from the weekend truck camping you did as a kid. Try finding full-timers' blogs and follow some of them a while to try to get a flavor of not only the joys, but also some of the trials we full-timers run into. There used to be several good books on full-timing, but most of them are pretty far out of date. Blogs can have some excellent, up-to-the-minute information.

The freedom of full-timing is priceless, but it's not like being on vacation all the time. You still have to do many of the same things you do in a stick house like get the oil changed, have vehicles repaired, do your banking, visit the dentist, do the laundry, grocery shop, go to the doctor, pay your bills, get your mail, etc. Most of the time you have to do this in unfamiliar surroundings. Oh yeah, then there is dumping the holding tanks.

You may want to start out by renting an RV and taking a several-week trip just to see what RVing is all about before buying an RV of your own.

[Vegasdan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by BucketList Just joined the forum and do not yet have an RV. Considering a Newmar DP Essex or King Aire 45' long coach. When I was a kid my family camped several times a year with a truck mount camper. My bucket list dream is to be a fulltimer. However, right now I own a home and have a full time job. And to be a fulltimer I will have to radically change my life by retiring and selling my home. How can I know if fulltiming is for me before make these types of decisions.

You didn't mention if you are married. If you are, then both of you need to be "on board" with the idea. I doubt if it would work if one person isn't sure about fulltiming and the other is. We met up with one couple who were fulltiming and the wife hated it, but the husband was living his dream. Not a happy situation. You mentioned looking for a 45ft coach. Be aware that in certain parts of the country a 45 footer will be hard to fit into some of the older parks and many of the state or National parks.

[RickO]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vegasdan You didn't mention if you are married. If you are, then both of you need to be "on board" with the idea. I doubt if it would work if one person isn't sure about fulltiming and the other is. We met up with one couple who were fulltiming and the wife hated it, but the husband was living his dream. Not a happy situation. You mentioned looking for a 45ft coach. Be aware that in certain parts of the country a 45 footer will be hard to fit into some of the older parks and many of the state or National parks.

Great advice. I'll bet the number of state and national park sites that can handle a 45 footer with toad is a very small minority.... also true in many older parks. Traveling with a "big rig" is a different ball of wax.

Rick

[Ed-Sommers]

In my opinion, which is only worth as much as you pay for it, is that if you have to ask that question, you are not ready to do what you ask about.

Ed

[Barbaraok]

I agree, the doubt expressed in your OP means you're not ready. I'd second the idea of getting a smaller used unit to use for weekends, 1-2 week long vacations to try out and see if this is something you would like. For us, we had a Class C and every Sunday when we had to turn it back towards our house and work, it would leave a longing to turn the other way, that's when we knew that fulltiming would work for us. We've been fulltiming for 6 years and still enjoy it very much.

BTW - yes those big 45' rigs are impressive. My "if I win the lotto" dream, but they also limit where you can go. While most private parks as well as most city/county/state/national parks will have spots that a 40' can get into, when you get to 45' you will find the selection of places to stop (besides Wal-Mart) is really limited.

Barb

[BucketList]

To all, thanks for your comments. To answer a few questions that were posted about me................yes I am married and my wife is in the same place as I am right now about "considering" fulltiming. We are both cautious since this would be a huge decision. I too have been questioning if getting a 45' coach would be a limiting deecision. On one hand, I am thinking that living full time in a RV might get a bit confining, especially smaller units. So my intial thoughts would be to go as big as possible. Another reason for looking at the larger units is that they are more luxurious, more features, tag axle for driveablity, more power, etc. However, as I continue my investigation into my dream I am realizing that the large size will limit where i can stay. So I need to now ask what is the largest unit I can get and still get into most natioanl park campgounds? My initial thought is probably 35'. Is there a good website that lists all the parks across the nation and the max allowed lengths of RV's that can stay in a concise manner? The only way I have seen this info so far is going into each parks website.....which is very time consuming.

[oldbluejay]

Having visited 16 NP's in the last 2 years IMHO you will have to confident in your driving skills trying to land even a 35' MH in some of them. Don't know of a web site that list the size of lots in the NP's. Be careful even if they say they have spaces for your rig. There may be only a few of them and they may not be available when you get there. Good Luk

[Barbaraok]

No, there isn't one list for all of the parks. And if there were it would be out of date rather quickly.

Things you need to decide is what do you see yourself doing? Travel as if on vacation ( which gets very tiring very quickly), spending a week or two in each place so you can explore it with your toad( car pulled behind) or spending months at a time at each place.

Then comes the kind of places - boon docking in the desert, public parks either local, state or federal, all the way up to Class A Resorts with concierge service, or combinations.

What do you like to do as a couple? What hobbies do each of you have?

Read as many blogs as you can to get an idea of all of the different types of full timing there is and whether or not that is what you want to do.

Barb