Tell us about it.
What happened to it? Still sitting around in the backyard or did you sell it? At a loss?
Near as I can tell from my neighborhood, everybody who buys one seldom uses them except to take up space on an already crowded street.
Anyone considering an RV or equivalent should do the math. They’ll often find that their “free hotel room” and “unlimited freedom to roam” cost them $10-15k per trip.
It’s called the ReCU factor… Real Cost per Use.
Most people don’t buy them to save money; they buy them for the same reason people buy a boat or a cabin. While you do save money on hotel rooms and avoid bedbugs and OPF (other people’s funk), that would be a silly reason to buy one. We make a minimum of six trips a year, usually to the mountains or the coast. There are few hotels in the mountains, and I got a bellyful of tent camping in the military. I’ve had three RVs in the past 15 years and don’t regret any of them.
I haven’t, but my parents did, in 1980. 19’ Prowler travel trailer. They thought they would enjoy traveling after Daddy retired. They used it twice, discovered that, for them, it was waaay too much work to set up, level, etc. etc. etc. Besides, my dad was a worrywart and the stress of driving the big station wagon with trailer attached made him crazy. They sold it for what they paid for it.
My in-laws did this. If you’re interested, it’s for sale - not a scratch on it!
Used RV lots are full of the big Class A buses that retirees bought, thinking to snowbird or even spend years on the road. Then they found out they couldn’t stand being in close proximity for all that time, or hated living in an RV parking lot somewhere, or that filling the fuel tank on one of those big bastards was a month’s income. It’s a really stupid purchase for someone who has never used one before. Rent first, then buy is the best advice I can give.
Oh, you met my husband.
Yes, we have one he absolutely must have and we’ve been paying the storage ever since. As it is now almost paid off I have been urging him to unload it, or at least try to trade it for a tiny little R-Pod or Retro 150 that we can keep in the driveway and might actually use.
It is just big enough to be a huge PITA to take anywhere unless we are planning more than a long weekend, and with his schedule and mine, a long weekend together is about as good as it gets. I try not to think about the wasted $$.
The first 5 years after my inlaws retired were amusing in retrospect but financially unwise.
They bought a 5th wheel, brand new truck to pull it and sold their house and headed off on their grand adventure. 9 months later they were living in our spare room while trying to figure out what retirement area they wanted to buy a house in. Sold the first 5th wheel and truck, both at a substantial loss. Next they bought a condo on the west coast in which they managed to live for an entire year before they decided they’d made a mistake and really wanted to be on the road. Enter 5th wheel #2 plus truck and off they went. This time they lasted almost 2 years before giving up, selling and buying a house a couple hours outside Toronto. They’ve been there for almost 7 years now but for a while I was convinced that they’d be broke by now.
The dumbest move that I’ve encountered was a couple who retired in Eagle River, Alaska. They bought a 42’ Class A diesel pusher and two huge Honda Gold Wing touring bikes. They took the RV out once, to the Eagle River campground, a distance of about a mile from their home. They never used it again. The bikes never left the yard. The outlay for the RV alone was in the neighborhood of $250-$300K. No idea what the Hondas cost them.
We owned sailboats for most of our marriage, finally selling the last one last year. Now my spousal unit wants to get an RV, and I fear it’ll be like our last years with the boat - paying to maintain and store it, but never using it. We looked into renting one, but doggone, is that an expensive prospect!! So we’re looking at ads for small used RVs. We shall see…
It seems like a shorter list would be the people who buy one and use it frequently.
The people I know who have one sitting in their yard find it very useful for storage space or someplace for the extra house guests.
That’s the smart way to do it. Our first one was about five years old, a Winnebago Warrior on a Toyota chassis. Only 21’ long, and low enough inside to bang your head on the AC unit. About 16mpg, could go anywhere a car could go. We had a lot of fun in that and we learned that we liked doing it for $12,000 instead of $80,000.
My in-laws were the exception. They bought one, used it lots, bought a larger one. They went to rallies (RV events), and roamed the US and even a bit of Canada (until FIL decided he couldn’t follow Canada’s gun laws, so smartly stopped going there) and when they weren’t in the RV, they lived in an RV subdivision where the houses had huge concrete pads where the RV could park and dock to the house. They enjoyed it, but spent a LOT of money on it. Oh well. Once they got too infirm to drive it, it eventually sold (in the middle of the recession) for quite a loss.
But it made good memories for them. Plus some memories of sheer terror.
I bought a mid-sized Jayco pop-up in '95. By the time I added A/C, I spent about $7500 on it. We used it about twice a year until 2001-2, so I figure I paid about $1000 a year to use it. We had some great trips with it - Yellowstone, Rocky Mountain NP, Arkansas, Galveston several times.
After the first year, it seemed like I was making a repair nearly every time I used it. I still remember crawling into it in the mid-day sun on the beach in Galveston to replace one of the lift cables so we could raise the roof.
I still have it. My step-son keeps it at his hunting lease. But, it’s worth zero at this point. It would probably cost me money to dispose of it.
I considered a 5th wheel for a while. I even kicked the tires on a used one. However, I could see the dollars flying out the window while I was using it and I figured I could pay for a lot of hotel rooms for the cost of the rig, storage, tires, and fuel. Campground fees with hookups aren’t cheap anymore, either.
When I moved in here (the entire area has turned over in the last 5 years - only 1 house still has the same owner as in 2005), there was an enormous class A - complete with padded cover and even matching wheel covers (protect the rubber from UV) sitting in driveway down the street.
Then the RV left, then the place sold as a foreclosure (as did mine and my neighbor).
My guess? One of those wonderful ARM’s for more than you can afford, but with a buy-down so the payments aren’t so bad the first year, used to sink 100K into a monster they couldn’t afford to drive. The covers were spotless. Never did see what was under it.
Haven’t seen an RV on the road in years - does WalMart still allow them to park overnight?
I remember a lawsuit against them from KOA and RV parks alleging “they’re stealing our customers”. Folks: if a WalMart parking lot looks better than the facilities you are operating, don’t blame WalMart. :rolleyes:
When I was traveling for work what used to crack me up was a couple of diesel parked in the hotel parking lot.
No they weren’t staying in the RV, the privacy curtains were open.
Could someone please explain the appeal of a 5th wheel vs a towable?
By the time you get a truck outfitted with a hitch, you pretty much have a 2-door - the bed is almost completely consumed by the hitch.
So you are paying the cost of a truck (purchase, gas, tires) and have the utility of a coupe unless you are towing the5th wheel.
Why not a trailer hitch and whatever type of vehicle you want?
It’s not whatever vehicle you want–you need a heavy duty vehicle to pull thousands of pounds of weight.
I was reading somewhere that a 5th wheel has better handling characteristics than a towable.
I can get a heavy van or SUV to pull - it doesn’t have to be a pickup.
The handling I can see - but unless you live in the thing, how many hours do you get that advantage vs. always having the limited usefulness of the crippled pickup?
I once worked with a fellow in San Francisco who actually lived in Michigan - he had a 5th wheel and a skillset in high demand - and made the most of it.
Didn’t ask how many years he had been/expected to be on the road.
He was the only person I’ve met who could easily justify the cost of the rig.