Ten things we've learned while living, working, and traveling in an RV full time

 

Nine years ago I wanted to get a recreational vehicle and travel more often. On December 19, 2015, two days after my 51st birthday and facing a move-out date in January once the house sold to a buyer, Paul and I decided we didn't want to go back to living in a house or apartment that required a huge chunk of money to pay for, plus all the hassles that came with it. So Paul and I took the step of getting rid of about 90% of our possessions, storing the other 10% in a storage unit, purchasing an RV on January 22, 2016, and embarking on a full-time mobile lifestyle. 

All either of us needs to do work is an Internet connection, so we could live and work from anywhere we chose. And when we wanted to travel, either near or far, we'd have that ability as well. We would live this lifestyle for as long as we wanted, and one thing was for certain: it would be an adventure that most people thought about, but never got around to actually doing. We wanted to actually DO it. 

We had all of 30 feet in our 1987 Ford Mallard Class-C motorhome, so paring down to the essentials was necessary. We also brought along our four dogs (Cosmo, Loki, Panda, and Freya) and our elderly cat who has an attitude, Isis. Our pets are like children to us—except they have fur, which my two adult children do not. Throw in our must-have items, like clothes, cooking supplies, dishes, food, bedding, our computers, books, and personal essentials, and there's not much else you can take with you. 

Here are ten things I've learned since February 2016 when we began living, working, and traveling in our RV, Lamia, full-time: 

1. No matter how much you think you've pared down for living in an RV, you'll find out there will be two or more passes you'll have to go through AGAIN in order to truly pare down your possessions to a manageable level. 

2. One of the worst smells in the world is a full black tank! 

3. The second-most worst smell in the world is a full gray tank. 

4. So far, Verizon Wireless has the best signal reach for Internet usage—even when you're at the top of a mountain out in the middle of nowhere. 

5. You're so used to city noise that, once you're out and away from people in the woods, the silence will almost deafen you. But you'll get used to it. 

6. The John Steinbeck method of washing clothes while traveling actually DOES work. Try it! 

7. Your stress levels go down to nearly zero when you're dry camping (boondocking) and away from society and noisy humans. 

8. All food tastes better when it's cooked over a campfire. Especially s'mores! 

9. You can do most cooking with a microwave, crock-pot, grill, and rice cooker/steamer. I have yet to use our gas oven or stove. 

10. If you're weird about your privacy, don't go on the road with people you don't like or aren't comfortable around. You will have 30 feet of space—if you're lucky—or maybe more if you can afford to own a Class A). Thankfully, I like and am comfortable around my husband! 

There are more than ten items overall, and I'm sure the list will expand in the coming months, but for now these are the ones foremost on my mind ;-).

Half a year of full-time RVing!

This Friday it'll be SIX months since Paul & I purchased our RV, Lamia, and prepared to launch the full-time RV lifestyle. A little more than a month later, the end of February, we began living in our RV. I cannot believe it's been half a year already! Where does the time go? ;-)

Are we glad we made the decision? So far, it's a resounding, "YES!"

Improved outlook...

Finally starting to feel a little normal again—not by a great amount, but at least my body isn't stiff with stress and worry as much as it was over the past several years. So today, for the first time since things got really hectic and down to the wire, I pulled out my crocheting! I have TONS to complete, both for friends and ourselves, so it's a good sign when I feel steady enough mentally and psychically to grab my yarn and hooks again.

It will likely take years for Paul and me to recover from the hell we've been through and the physical, mental, emotional, and psychic beating we've taken since 2011, but day by day, we shall recover.

Thank you again, friends and family, for being so kind, supportive, and encouraging through this long, arduous life journey. We can never say thank you enough. Please know that without all of you who supported and encouraged us, we likely couldn't have made it and we may not have lived to see this day. That is truth, not an exaggeration.

We want to give a special shout out to Brittany Elizabeth, Trevor 'Tack' Falana, and Rasputin Meraki Toska. These are three amazing young people who busted their asses and helped us in so many ways that we couldn't list everything. We love you guys, and Key West is in our future—plus anywhere else you wanna go! smile emoticon

Onward, one step at a time...

[RV lifestyle] Loving my new Boffice

Typing this from my RV boffice (bedroom+office=boffice). I love my new boffice, by the way. It's quite cozy. Not much room, but that's fine by me. Easier to keep things in order!

Whoa! Here's what's happening!

Whoa! This new year has already brought some surprising life shifts our way.

We sold our house and car. Bought an RV. We are hitting the road to live, work, and travel full time.

New year, BIG changes! To follow our surprising journey, visit our Ghouls on the Go travel blog and our official website, located here: http://www.ghoulsonthego.com

Another trick or finally a treat?

If we didn't know better, Paul and I would think this property enjoys playing sick games with us, giving us hope and then snatching it away when we get our hopes up.

Today we received a letter from the El Paso County Trustee informing us that there was an overbid on the property when it was sold on January 6th and we MAY have funds coming to us as a result of that.

I'll call Monday to find out, but Paul and I know this property too well to get too excited over this letter. Because, hey, what we truly need is enough to purchase an RV or camper so we can move directly into one of those and set up a home base. In other words, if the overpaid funds were enough, our preferred goal would become a reality.

We've had enough cruel jokes, so we are wary that this is yet another 'carrot and stick' situation. However, deep down I always keep a spark of optimism. One never knows, right? Gotta stay OPEN to good and unexpected blessings and things.

For what it's worth, focused thoughts and intent for a positive outcome would be much appreciated. Could mean the difference between having a decent place to move in 8 days or not. We purchased the storage space today, so we are ready to haul stuff over beginning tomorrow. FREE first month's rent, so yay for that (thanks, Triple A!)

Just a reminder that tomorrow is self-imposed Cave of Solitude Sunday. I won't be answering messages except from immediate family. However, once we know more on Monday, I'll pop in and post an update. Thanks for your support. Ready for the next chapter -- and a better one, too! :-)

A final word of thanks to Chandra and Mark for the delicious food and dessert tonight. Paul and I don't think these people are real because they are far too kind, compassionate, and giving to exist in today's world. An RV/camping trip to Taos, NM, and elsewhere are the plans we have for them as a way to repay them for their gratitude and friendship -- for starters!

Wishing you all a marvelous, amazing weekend. You guys deserve it!

Our house sold. Now it's time to move!

Update: the buyer we were working with bought our house at auction. This is a relief, because we will be dealing with him and not a stranger. This property is no longer OUR problem -- thank goodness!

We now have nine days to find somewhere to live. Our first choice is a camper, RV, or something similar. We already have a place to park it, thanks to our friend Lyn. We will live on her property in Falcon, CO, for a short while we get our feet back under us and decide which RV/trailer park we will use as home base here in the Springs.

We are also looking at houses, cottages, or apartments we can lease on a month-to-month or yearlong basis. If you have info about a house/apartment or, alternatively, a camper, pop-up camper, older RV, please let us know. Everything is on the table. We have a way to tow a camper should we find one to purchase.

Right now we need an affordable place to live. Doesn't not have to be a big place since we are already downsizing. Over the coming year, we plan to take trips once we secure a camper, pop-up camper, or RV. The end goal is an RV that can be driven, but we are in emergency mode right now, so HOUSING for us and the dogs is of utmost importance.

By Monday we will begin deciding on items we want to keep. Those will go over to the storage space we've reserved. We got the first month free for the storage space, thanks to our AAA membership, plus a $20 gift card. Also got a free membership to Hertz Gold for a year, just in case we ever need a rental car (we get a free full-day rental through AAA).

All for now. If you have any leads, please contact Paul since I'm in the middle of completing various writing/editing assignments over the next week or so. Thanks.

[Ghouls on the Go] Colorado will always be our home base

We love Colorado and it'll always be our home base! It's beautiful here and we've considered it home since Paul and I both moved here 1979 (we didn't know each other then, but...). So we are NOT abandoning Colorado AT ALL. Our plans are to keep our home base HERE and then travel extensively to see parts of the US and Canada that we maybe couldn't afford to visit otherwise if we took into account airplane, hotel, and other fees. [ 279 more words—click link below to read more at Ghouls on the Go Travel Blog. ]

https://ghoulsonthego.wordpress.com/2015/12/29/colorado-always-our-home-base/

[Paul's blog post] The RV calculation

So, my wife Bev and I want to do something that may sound crazy to a bunch of you, but it may actually be the best way for us to live.

As many of you are aware, because of financial difficulties thanks in large part to some health issues of mine, and extenuating circumstances that I won't go into right now, we are about to lose our home. This is a dire situation to be sure since we currently have no place to go, and because no matter what, we have to keep our dogs (they are all registered Emotional Support Animals [ESA], for the record). We will, however, not be sad to leave this house because part of the reason for our financial situation, and no doubt my health issues, is due to this property. It needs too much upkeep and repair which I cannot do thanks to my back and knees, and it costs too much money because it is old and was not built well.

This was my mother’s house and she left it to me when she died. The mortgage was never in our names, Bev just kept paying it because the house had been quitclaim deeded to me. Then the mortgage company accelerated the loan, which means that unless we come up with the entire loan balance by the end of December 2015, we have to move. Bev has worked herself into a crater trying to keep up with the mortgage payments, along with the endless repairs and code upgrades that cropped up due to the age of this property. We have dumped a lot of money into this property that we will never see again.

The utilities have also been a factor in making things rougher. Those utilities were the straw that broke the proverbial camel's back, because there is a cottage on the property, and due to that we were charged commercial rates whether there was a renter in there or not. Most people do not have to pay three separate utility bills – plus a gargantuan commercial deposit – as part of their bills, but that’s another thing we’ve been saddled with over the years.

In addition, once both of the kids moved out of the house, Bev and I discovered that we barely ever saw most of the place. There are whole sections of this house that we just don't need. All those places do is collect junk. We use a small bedroom, the bathroom, the kitchen, a small office and a tiny corner of the front room. Occasionally we use the laundry area, obviously, but even most of that space is superfluous to our needs. Still, we have to pay to heat the whole thing, and this place is, as I have mentioned, very drafty. All of the windows are old and warped, which doesn’t help. Overall, the place isn't put together well.

I guess the question becomes, “Why move from one place with a lot of space that we are never going to use, just to move into another place with space that we are never going to use?” Even renting a house or apartment for an extended period of time (over a year or more) would lead to us paying money into something that we wouldn't use most of. Add to that the fact that most rental properties, whether house or apartment, are not going to look kindly on us having four dogs, or would charge a pet deposit for each one and then possibly higher rent on top of that. For us, it has become clear that we need to find another, more cost-efficient way.

So, why not an RV?

We've been doing some digging, and there is a lot of information out there on how to live and travel in an RV for reasonable amounts monthly, even if we had an RV payment each month. Our cars are all paid for, so we have no car payments and no monthly credit card payments to make. This would actually be the best time for us to hit the road in an RV and switch our lifestyle, in fact. Our monthly costs would be much less than they would be otherwise, even with a monthly RV payment.

Now, I'm not dumb enough to think that it will be all sunshine and roses by choosing this path. There are still a lot of considerations to take into account. We would need to have a state of residence and a place to get our mail. We would need to make sure that we could get our medicine. We would need insurance on the RV. What belongings we are going to keep, but not take on the road with us, will need to be kept in storage. We will need to make sure we have a method of staying online so that Bev can work and we can communicate with everyone. We need to afford fuel, food, propane, and maintenance on the RV. There will be times when we may need to pay for a camping spot (although there are a lot of workkamp opportunities out there, and we can boondock some times). We will need food for the dogs. Even then, if we watch our money, it would be cheaper than living in a house or apartment, and we could keep our dogs with us without paying a huge amount of deposits or extra monthly fees added to our rent.

On the upside, if we don't like someplace that we end up, we can just leave. Also, we can travel, which is something that Bev and I both love to do but could never afford to do much of over the past ten years. We could see some of the places Bev has never been and that I haven't been to since I was a child. We could visit friends who live in other states. We could see the ocean again. We could see the badlands of Utah, Yellowstone, Upstate New York, and Maine. So many places that we've always wanted to see and just weren't able to. Or, we could end up stuck some place until we could get enough money together to move on, but that could be exciting too. We are more flexible than most of our friends, so I think that’s a definite plus. We would have to come back to Colorado Springs fairly regularly to get our mail and the like, but that would give us a chance to hang out with friends here. No need to worry about never seeing us again.

As far as how we would make a living, right now Bev is the only one who brings in any income (although I'm in the process of lining up possible work for the next few weeks), But if she gets enough article writing and editing jobs she can cover the cost fairly easily. I could do a nicely edited video blog about interesting and spooky, out of the way places that I could put up on YouTube and monetize (that's not a guaranty for making money, but it might,) plus I'm currently learning to code in PHP and Java Script, so I might be able to score some freelance work doing that. In addition, Bev has been after me to put up an Etsy shop that would sell prints of some of my artwork. Yes, Bev is the big breadwinner around here, but I have ways of bringing in money to help out.

Bev can work from anywhere that she can get a Wi-Fi signal, and a lot of the stuff that I do could be done in the same way, so that would work in our favor. Plus, as I said, there are workkamps where you do some sort of work at the campsite in return for your pad, electricity, water, and sewer. A lot of the more physical jobs I couldn't do, but I bet there would be something, even if it's walking around all night making sure that no one is up to no good.

The point is that an RV lifestyle for us is doable. It could end up being cheaper to live than a stick and brick house or apartment, plus, you know, the dogs. I guess what I'm saying is that we are committed to doing this. It's only a mater of time before we do. The truth? If I could buy an RV today and drive it off the lot, I would. It would really put my mind at ease knowing that Bev, the dogs, and I would have a roof over our heads after the first of the year. We also wouldn't have all this wasted, expensive space. It’s not just a dream of ours. It’s become our goal.

Manifesting the full-time RV lifestyle

NEWS (Yes, it's long): Paul and I are planning to hit the road, full-time, in an RV and live/work from the road in the near future, meaning within a year or two. Depends on the research and planning. And, of course, purchasing an RV. We have NO car payments because we've paid off three cars, two within the last five years. That is one good thing in our favor.

These are our goals and we firm about making them happen. I don't want to hear about why we CANNOT do this in a year or two; instead, I will only hear HOW we can make it happen -- concrete plans founded on research and info on HOW to do it. We have already begun the research and planning stage, with a year to three years as the window for making it a reality. It can be done. There is a way and we will find it -- period.

I was raised a military brat and I am familiar with traveling and moving from place to place. I've pulled up stakes and moved halfway across the US several times. Each time I planned, researched, and made it happen.

Colorado will always be our home base. That will NEVER change. However, I'm 51 and Paul T. Sninchak is 46. We have places we want to see. With my job, I'm able to work from anywhere with an Internet connection. We want to travel and see Maine, Upstate New York, Washington State, Oregon, Las Vegas, the Grand Canyon, New Orleans, and many others.

The best part is I'm newly approved to write travel articles for a German website (and they pay for them), so I'm building my article portfolio so I can earn income from our travels. I'll continue my existing writing and editing gigs, of course, but I can now add travel articles to my arsenal.

SO...all that said. The big thing NOW is that we need to find a place to move to for the beginning of 2016, first and foremost. Once we settle into a new place, Paul and I will spend the next year researching and planning for our upcoming RV adventures.

If you know of someone who has an RV they would like to sell, if you have resources we should check out (we are already aware of many), or if you have tips we should know about as we plan our FUTURE RV travels, comment here or e-mail me at scribequill@gmail.com.

And yes, the dogs will go with us on our travels. They are Emotional Support Animals (ESA) and with my PTSD and GAD, plus Paul's, wherever we go, they must go. wink emoticon

Tips, resource sharing (thanks for the Workkamp group suggestions, Chandra!), and anything you think might be helpful is appreciated. We already have several RV monthly budgeting websites/blogs we're checking out.

Bottom line: In order to make certain things a reality, you put it out there...and that's what we are doing NOW so we can manifest it within a year or two.