Preparing to Full-Time RV

We actually did it! I’m writing this from the road, somewhere just north of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania heading south in our truck and pulling our RV! What a whirl wind few months it has been since we decided to live and work remotely while traveling the coastline.

I’ve had a hard time starting the blog while we were getting ready, because for some reason none of it felt real until we actually started traveling. But now, I can finally say I’m excited to share our journey rather than nervous to get going. So we have a lot to fill you in on!

The Decision to Hit the Road

“Why?!”

We’ve gotten this question quite a bit since we decided to live in an RV full-time. Quite frankly I’ve struggled with the answer some days. Neither of us grew up around RVs, I definitely didn’t grow up camping, and we haven’t really had experience with trucks or hauling.

But despite all of this we decided to go for it and up end our lives for a little more exploration – well, that and to get out of the cold weather! The underlying motivation for the crazy plan comes from our ultimate goal to live aboard a catamaran and to sail around the world. That’s not something we could realistically pull off for a number of years, but to even make it possible, we had a few things that we would need to figure out:

1. Can we even live in small space together?
2. Can we work remotely and continue to work and support ourselves?
3. Can we rent out our home while we’re away?

All of these questions need to be answered in order to travel full-time, whether by land or by sea, but it’s easier to try to answer them from the road rather than from a boat. So last fall, we decided to visit the ports of the U.S. by land first, and then eventually see if we can accomplish our dreams of full-time sailing.

But there were also a lot of things that needed to come together before full-time RVing could become a reality.

Picking out the Right RV

Once we decided that we wanted to find a new home on wheels, I jumped right into researching RV brands and floorplans to find the perfect fit for our needs. What I didn’t realize is that there are HUNDREDS of RV floorplans. I spent hours and hours scrolling through different brands, types of RVs, and layouts over a couple of weeks. We had no experience, and had to quickly learn about the different options for RVs.

The first distinction we learned about was drive-aboard vehicles versus towables. We pretty quickly decided that we would prefer a towable RV, because we wanted to be able to drive around separately once we parked the camper at a park.

But there are severable different types of towables as well. There’s everything from pop-up campers to massive fifth-wheel RVs. We decided that something in between would probably suite our needs, so we started looking at travel trailers. They’re also smaller and lighter than fifth wheels, so we could probably get away with a smaller tow vehicle.

There are still many different permutations and combinations of travel trailers. We did quite a bit of research into brands, and of course were still searching for that perfect layout for our needs. Most RVs are designed for vacation travel. It’s in their name: recreational vehicles. We needed something that we could work from full-time. Rather than trying to retro-fit a space to set up an office (we’re not that handy!), I looked for floorplans that already had one.

The search for a desk brought us to one particular model by a brand called Grand Design. It seemed like it was designed for a working couple in mind. We also found out that it’s a relatively new brand, but one that has rapidly climbed to the top as very reputable and great on customer service. It didn’t hurt that this model also had a closet, which I was searching for and many trailers of the same length or smaller lack.

Finding our Tow Vehicle

Now that we had honed in on what we felt would be the perfect design, we had to find a vehicle to pull it around the country. This was actually both a very complicated but straight-forward step, that I ended up agonizing over, and honestly still do.

I have never driven a truck, and I wanted to get the smallest truck that we could get that could safely tow the trailer. We talked to a few of our friends who all have extensive experience with trucks, and had accepted that we were most likely going to end up with a “250,” which is a pretty heavy duty truck.

We considered a number of brands, but ultimately ended up at our local Ford dealer, in all honesty because it was the closet of the three brands we were planning on comparing. We went in late one evening, shortly before they were closing just to have an initial conversation. Well, of course that somehow turned into “we have the perfect vehicle to suit your needs” and we didn’t buy then and there, but put down a deposit and ended up getting the truck two days later.

What made the decision so nerve-racking, and what I still am anxious about even though we crunched the numbers, is that we purchased a 150, which is still a pretty robust truck, but not as big as what we planned on needing. We got a 2016 Ford 150 XLT with 3.5 EcoBoost with max tow package (no I really don’t know what that means). One of the truck friends we talked to said that was the only configuration of that size truck that could safely tow the trailer we wanted.

Noah even created a spreadsheet (thanks to Keep Your Daydream) that showed that we should be able to safely tow the trailer with that vehicle. We’ve had it for four months now, and really love the truck, and so far so good with towing!

Renting our Condo

One of the big three questions surrounding this whole grand plan was can we even rent out our condo? Well, I guess it’s no surprise that we did seeing as we’re on the road now! But it did take some time and was a fairly involved process.

We ended up listing our condo at the end of October, trying to get someone to rent it furnished. We didn’t receive a lot of interest over the next couple of weeks, so we decided to offer it unfurnished as well, even though we knew that would be a lot more work for us to pack up and move out.

I suppose I’m not surprised, but we did end up finding tenants that were interested in it mostly unfurnished. I was definitely a bit apprehensive about what that would mean for finding a place for all of our stuff, but Noah was confident we’d come up with a solution.

After only a few showings, we found a great couple to make the place their home for at least the next year, and maybe even beyond that if they like it and we like life on the road! It was also a good first-time landlord experience. I used my lawyering skills to draft what I think was a pretty solid rental agreement, and we’re using this really convenient website, www.cozy.co, that our neighbor told us about for all landlord related tasks, from listing, to screening to collecting rent.

Purchasing the RV

We didn’t want to move forward with the RV purchase until we had a signed rental agreement, but once we had that in place, we headed to the RV dealership in early December. We knew the exact model that we wanted, and Noah had already visited that dealer to confirm they had a new Grand Design Imagine 2670MK in stock. The visit to the dealer really ended up being a visit to purchase the RV.

We ended up going to Campers Inn in Merrimack, New Hampshire. Overall we had a good experience with them, although there were a few times when I think they had a hard time hiding their frustrations with us. Because we knew going into it that we were there to purchase, at the suggestion of a new friend, Noah had done some research into RV loans and lending rates. Between being paranoid newbies and asking a million questions, and also negotiating pretty hard on price and rates, I think by the time we ended up signing on the dotted line they were ready for us to just pick it up and go.

I will say that despite us being more difficult than their average purchaser, they were really patient with us, and we are really appreciative of their understanding as we made this life-changing purchase. We especially want to thank Cliff who, on the day we went to actually pick up the trailer, spent over six hours with us going over every inch and answering all of our questions (it was only supposed to be a two-hour session!). We came in with a 13-page checklist we had found online, and he was patient with us as we got through the whole thing.

I worry about everything until I see that it is going to work out, even though I know that is usually does, or we figure out a way to make it work.

Packing Up and Moving Out

While we were awaiting the pick-up day for the trailer, we were in the midst of getting ready to move out and significantly downsize. I have to admit, I really struggled with this process. And I definitely spontaneously burst into tears more times that I can count, with the stress of packing up and the unknown. I was mostly nervous about how we were going to fit everything we’d want to take, how to store everything we didn’t want to get rid of, and overall would I even like full-time RVing?

As we tackled our house, room by room, it was a confusing experience. It felt both good to be going through things and only keeping what we really wanted to keep or take, and strange to have to be making these decisions when we had only moved in two years ago.

Noah ended up having a great idea to build additional storage in our attic. We had a local contractor help build the unit, then Noah’s dad helped us put the many, many, MANY storage bins up there, along with furniture that we needed to store. We did end up getting one small storage unit for some of furniture that’s been in my family for a long time that wouldn’t fit in the attic, and for our big couch that I just wasn’t ready to part with.

Packing up was hard enough, but I was equally stressed about moving onto the RV. Looking at the piles of items we decided to take with us, I just couldn’t see how it all would fit. The pattern here is that I worry about everything until I see that it is going to work out, even though I know that is usually does, or we figure out a way to make it work.

Now, I can say that I am amazed by the amount of storage in our RV and while it is pretty packed, it all fits! We still need to do some organizing, and to make it feel more like a home, but I’m optimistic that we’ll get there.

Hitting the Road

Once we emptied the house, stored what we wanted to store, and moved what we wanted to take aboard, all that was left was to head out on our adventure. We left a day early to avoid a snowstorm heading towards the Northeast, and drove to Western Massachusetts to visit Noah’s mom and break up the first leg. We had a short but wonderful visit with her, and now are heading as far south as we can to miss any snow. We’re planning to stay somewhere in Virginia tonight at a motel, then head to our first campsite reservation tomorrow, at Forest Lake Preserve in Advance, NC, where we’ll be for about a week before heading further south to just outside Charlotte, NC. Then we’ll start making our way towards the coast!

Thanks for coming along with us! I want to write more often now that we’re actually doing this, and so I can capture everything that we’re up to, without a lot of time in between. Excited to get this adventure started!