Could you live in your RV for a couple of month and not go crazy?

jonrjen · 12-19-2014, 07:58 PM

The wife and I are talking down sizing of our home residence. We will be building a new house about half the size of our current house. Of course we have been working on a floor plan and getting ready to move forward.

We already own the land we plan to build on, but now we have to figure out how to move forward with the sale of our current house and start on the next house.

My thoughts are to take out a loan for the construction of the new house and get it started in hopes of listing the old house and maybe be finished about the time the old house would sell and close. I know that's a whole lot of hoping.

Her thoughts are to get our current house ready to list on the market and then do so. Once it sells and closes start construction on the new house without taking out a loan.

During the time between the sale of the old house and the completion of the new house her plan is to live in the 5th wheel. Now granted it should only take 2 to 3 months to complete the new house weather permitting. I just don't know if we could both adjust to living in such a confined area.

It would be interesting to day the least. Of course she says to keep it interesting we could make use of some of this time for RV road trips to break things up.

Which would you choose? Or would you ever consider living in your RV for a few months?

And yes I know that many fine RV'ers live in their rig full time, I'm just not sure its for us.

arpipeliner · 12-19-2014, 08:33 PM

For me the less debt or worry is the way I would go. After a fire my family will be in the RV with me. It's what you make of it.

You can make it an adventure unless doing sweat equity.

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Sirsea · 12-19-2014, 08:44 PM

When we retired and decided to move from Texas to NC, we cleaned out many years of junk, put the rest in storage and listed the house which sold in 10 days. We traveled a bit, then parked the camper in a relative's driveway and lived in it for 6 weeks until we found a house. For us, there was too much hassle and expense of taking out another loan while waiting for a house to sell.

maxum1989 · 12-19-2014, 08:55 PM

I think your decision shouldn't be based on if you could tolerate living in your fifth wheel for a few months. I think it should be based on if your stress tolerance and financial position could handle owning two houses at the same time. I am in the new house construction business. I see both ways all the time. I promise you, the new house build will be much more enjoyable without the constant and heavy feeling of wondering when your old house will sell.

hkreck · 12-19-2014, 08:57 PM

I think the end result would be worth the confined space for the period of time your looking at. :-}

**Terier** · 12-19-2014, 09:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by arpipeliner

For me the less debt or worry is the way I would go. After a fire my family will be in the RV with me. It's what you make of it.

You can make it an adventure unless doing sweat equity.

Sent from my iPhone using Forest River Forums

This option would be on top of the list for me too especially if it just the two of you living in the RV. During nicer weather months you can extend the living space to outdoors.

slide5r4fun · 12-19-2014, 09:13 PM

I think we could handle living in ours for 3 - 6 months under those circumstances. Don't get me wrong, we love RV'ing and look forward to the days where we can spend longer periods on the road but I still like the feeling of getting home and being able to "stretch out" a bit.

jtstromsburg · 12-19-2014, 09:50 PM

We're in a similar situation. Closing on selling our current house in March, house we are buying isn't available till June of 2016! So, we are deciding whether to try and find a rental for 16-18 months, or live in the 5er? Note are little town is only 1200 people so rentals aren't easily come by. We are stutteringly considering the camper, with the thought of "camping" during the season by hooking up and moving around, but staying at a quiet fhu campground 15 minutes from our work and current home

AVid · 12-19-2014, 09:54 PM

For me, as long as the weather was nice and we could sit outside, a few months would be fine. But up here in the cold season, being trapped inside for a long period of time would be tough.

John

**dcheatwood** · 12-19-2014, 10:39 PM

Yes. Everything but w/d.

SKnight · 12-19-2014, 10:55 PM

Honestly, that's my future plan. List my place, sell, move my stuff into storage, move the 5er to the area I'm thinking of moving to, test the waters, move again if necessary, until I find a new home.

Up to a year I'm guessing. It'll be cool I think, but we are all different.

B and B · 12-19-2014, 11:23 PM

If we needed to do it for a year I would buy a larger unit for some larger room but being as it gets cold we would have to find a apartment somewhere for a couple months.

**ependydad** · 12-20-2014, 12:41 AM

If it were me, I'd want the old place sold before the new place.

But, to answer your question - this past summer, we did 2 months in the camper with our family of 4. At times it became "cozy", but it was also my home office. Other times it was "cozy" because we had 2-5 visitors staying with us for a few days to a couple of weeks.

Go for it, I say!

donanddona · 12-20-2014, 12:45 AM

Big step. Yea we did it. It took a few beers, a few fires, family support (mail/pills/back-up/training) but heck you got a sound plan and light at the end of the tunnel. Don't know your details or your location but you need to review the "snow bird" rule. I would highly recommend south (Arizona/Texas/Florida) for the cold spell (Oct-May) if your sell-build falls in that time frame.

dj3spots · 12-20-2014, 02:33 AM

If it was me, I'd put everything in storage and live in the RV. If the RV is home, live in it until you gussy up the old place and while the new place is being built. I think taking a few trips while waiting on the new place is a great idea. Go for it!

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rjshiflet · 12-20-2014, 06:42 AM

We live in our fifth wheel at least 8 days out of each month, and in October when I retired we were home only 5 days during the entire month. The rest of the time we were on the road celebrating retirement. It was nice to get home to our 5 acres, but...we managed to enjoy the whole time (except maybe the couple of days the campers next to us set up their reclining chase lounges directly below our bedroom slide-out. That's simply rudeness, and sometimes...you can't fix RUDE.

gasman94 · 12-20-2014, 08:10 AM

Are you thinking about having an outbuilding or unattached garage or workshop? If so, maybe this could be put up first and add a place to store some of your things while you are finishing your home.

Witch Doctor · 12-20-2014, 09:13 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SKnight

Honestly, that's my future plan. List my place, sell, move my stuff into storage, move the 5er to the area I'm thinking of moving to, test the waters, move again if necessary, until I find a new home.

Up to a year I'm guessing. It'll be cool I think, but we are all different.

Surprising seems we are not alone on that plan. We are planning to put our house up for sale in Spring, It's hard to sell a house on the lake in the winter months. Plan to sell the house and put it all in storage until we find the area we want to live in. We have picked the State of New Mexico, now just where. Plan to just use the camper and move around take our time to soak up the area then choose. We have been through NM but only for a short 2 week stay. We get updates on Zillow once a week what the prices are and what is for sale now. NM is a Veteran friendly state which is tops on my list, 2nd is I have to beable to park my RV at home. Which is both in NM. We just got to get closer to family now which is California. within 2 days we can be there. Not like living across the country. We are looking from Albuquerque south. Anyone have any places that they live or like in that region, please let me know.....

steveh326 · 12-20-2014, 10:24 AM

my parents lived in their older motorhome, 28' no slides, for 13 months while building their new house. they built a detached garage first that included a half bath, laundry hookups and 30amp plug for the mh, everything else was in the motorhome. it can be done, and they are still married today so it must not have been too bad... wife and I are considering doing the same thing soon.

mark0224 · 12-20-2014, 10:44 AM

We are planning on downsizing next summer and we are looking at staying in our trailer and putting everything we will be keeping in storage until we find the home we are looking for. Had a practice run last summer lived in the trailer for almost 30 days with no problems. We were looking forward to traveling a lot next year and spending a lot of time in our trailer. Maybe having time with no bills and no ties and few responsibilities would be a good thing.

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