Quote:
Originally Posted by boggo
Howdy, came to become an expert on RVs. Want to have a rig for a full time primary residence. wanna max out the rv tech tree
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Welcome!!! We went full time in 2018 and love it.
Many questions you need to answer before you dive in (and please do not dive in unprepared...questions and preparation will save you much heartache alter).
Where are you located (what part of the country), and where would you domicile (where would your "official" residence location be)?
How many people will you have to house (just you, you and spouse/other, kids, pets, other)?
Do you plan to travel a lot, or just occasionally? We both still work (I can work 100% remote, wife can work remote sometimes), so we are not always on the road (but have spend large amounts of time in other places around the USA). If you plan on traveling to new places a lot then you will want to consider RV size as it relates to fuel costs.
Do you want a motorhome (everything available when driving...food, toilet, etc), or a trailer? If a motorhome, will you want to pull a towed vehicle for driving when at your destination? If a trailer, do you have a tow vehicle that can safely pull what you want to tow?
Layout, layout, layout...very important in any RV. Does the RV has a large enough shower for you (I am 6'2" so I need a tall shower)? Is the main TV in a stupid place where it cannot be comfortably watched (important if you are full time)? If it's you and a partner (or more), do you want 1-1/2 baths (wife and I would not be married if we had only one bath). Queen or King beds (know that "RV king" are a bit smaller than normal kings).
New or used? This is "the big debate", and you will get lots of opinions. We always purchased new because we wanted newer features, etc. Others would say to purchase used and save money. Both approaches have their merits.
Will you keep your main S&B (stick-and-brick) house? If not, where will you park the RV if you are full timing? Unless you have the time (and budget) to just travel all the time, you will likely want a "home base" somewhere...and you will need to have some place for license and registration. There are services for this that can handle your mail and domicile location for you...Escapees is a very popular one with several states available. We bypassed this and just got a permanent spot where we home base in Florida at a resort...a physical spot with real address on a real street (unfortunately for me it's only minutes away from several in-laws). Others use services like Escapees and have no physical base they return to.
If you plan to travel much/all of the time, your tow (or towed) vehicle is important...it may be where you keep your tools and such. Our F150 be (with tonneau cover) is our "garage" for pretty much everything when we travel.
Internet and/or satellite? Don't count on RV parks having any form of decent WiFi or cable. Our "home base" (the resort where we have our permanent spot) has free high-speed Internet and cable (part of monthly fees), but we use a T-Mobile Home Internet Gateway for Internet while traveling (and when local Spectrum fails, which is not infrequent).
This is a *short* list of questions...you will need to develop your own list to match how you wish to full time.
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