Tell me.....

We bought our 2004 Country Coach Allure 33' Class A with 2 slides because it is well built, had a good size diesel engine. It had a walk around queen bed, a fairly large shower, HWH air bag leveling and satellite TV. DH bought it for the engine and bells and whistles and I bought it for the inside floorplan and neutral decor.

I don't know if this was the rig I would have chosen had we known we were going fulltime BUT it was the rig we had (and was paid for) when we decided to fulltime. We had done a 7 month, 15k mi. trip around the country so we were pretty certain we could make it work. We have just completed our second year of F.T. and starting our 3rd around the country trip. Want to keep this rig to determine if this is the lifestyle we want to pursue before we invest in another rig. My major reluctance is starting all over again at the bottom of the learning curve with a new rig.

While floor plan is huge, finding the right mfg is much more important. Not all RV's hold up well over time. Not all RV's are 4 seasons. R-value was very important to us. Only one of the reasons we stayed with 5th wheels.

Storage comes after floor plan. Amenities available comes next. Which if you find the right mfg, then they usually have the appliances, etc that make your living more comfortable.

Like others, the layout was the most important. We had a Keystone Sprinter TT from 2006 to 2012, only the last year and a half full time. However, we would roll out for 9-12 weeks in the summer with the TT. Thought we knew in 2006 what we would need/want. Only after the 18 months full timing did we KNOW what we wanted to full time in. Upgraded to a BigHorn 3670 5'er last August and couldn't be happier. All about the layout and your own personal lifestyle. If you're going to roll most of the time vs. going somewhere and setting up shop for a month or so.

Finally purchasing my RV and full time home was a multi-year journey. Originally, when my wife was still alive, we’d planned on a large 5th wheel with slide-outs and a heavy-duty 4X4 tow vehicle. After cancer took my wife’s life I decided to move ahead on the plan, but with a 34’ Avion TT. Then in 2011 I took a 4,500 mile road trip in my Dodge Caravan. After the trip realized I’d gained quite a bit of weight, mostly from eating truck stop junk food (yes, I’m a junk food junky!) and making poor meal choices. Based on that experience, I decided that a Class A pulling a Toad was the way to go. That way if I needed a pit stop, or it was meal time, all I needed to do was pull off the road. The only time I needed to visit a truck stop was to take on fuel, and I could do all that out at the pump.

After much research (because of my profession research comes naturally to me) I decided on a Holiday Rambler, mainly because of their reputation for quality and the fact that they were built with an aluminum body shell and internal frame work. I couldn’t afford much, and I thought I was going to have to get an 80’s vintage HR to keep costs down (they also have beautiful interiors). Then fortune smiled on me and I wound up purchasing the 1994 Holiday Rambler that’s shown in my profile. I’ve been living in “Escape Plan” for two months now and love it. Towards the end of September, when the Texas weather cools down, , I’m going to do about $2K worth of deferred maintenance and repairs and then it’ll be off on the first of what I hope to be many annual North American tours.

Overall the floor plan was very important to me. I wanted a mid-bathroom, I’m tall so a shower with a skylight was a feature I wanted and got. I wanted a kitchen/dinette area that was separate from the “living room” space. I’m currently using the dinette as a computer work station. The rig also needed ample storage space. The end result, I soon learned, was that I needed a rig longer than 30’. To be frank, my 33’ Holiday Rambler would be better if it were 36’ long, with a bit more kitchen counter space. I should be able to fix that issue with some remodeling, however I’ve decided to live in the rig for a year before I embark on any type of major remodeling projects.

Steve

We have a Class C and will stick with that. Easy to load up and take off on a whim. 28 feet so it's easy to find a spot in a campground that might have smaller sites. We like to see local museums, observatories, festivals, re-enactments, etc. We also like to visit with other folks in the campgrounds, especially if we're at a dutch oven gathering.

One item on our wish list is to have a twin bed setup. Maybe some day. Rv beds can be uncomfortable so we added a sleep number clone to our bed. Works well but we would also like to have a twin setup for when one of us has an aching night.

The other must-have item on our list is a full length closet for winter coats, wife's dresses and anything else that won't fit into those tiny, stubby "shirt" closets. With all the modular options in the closet industry you would think that the rv manufacturing community would take notice. I've seen some absolutely pitiful closets in the most expensive rvs. I wonder if they think we just ride around in our rvs and never change our clothes? Okay, off my soapbox. Can you tell the closets are a pet peeve of mine?

The floor plan,we wanted to go as big as we could, and we really liked having two toilets. These are usually found in Diesel pushers, but was out of our price range. A few manufactures of gassers have now in the larger Class A's have been adding this feature.

Like others have said, the floor plan. In our case, our needs were "different" that the usual retirees or families.

My wife's mentally disabled sister lives with us, so we needed two adult sleeping areas that did not have to be "folded up” for daytime use. It had to be travel trailer as we wanted to put our motorcycles in the bed of the truck.

In a way it, made our shopping easier because we had specific needs and it eliminated a lot of units right off. We would enter an RV lot, explain to the salesman what specifics we needed and asked him/her to show us only those units that met our needs. Saved a lot of time. Even had one salesman say: ”We haven’t got anything like that.” Hours saved there.

Floor plan has to be very high on your list. After all, this will be your home and you will be living it. Just not camping for a short time where you can tolerate certain items. For my wife, it was also a walk around bed, not having that, was a deal breaker.

I am of the opinion that no floor plan is perfect so you find one that fits best, which we did. However, manufacturer was vitally important to us. We wanted a company that was still in business (Monaco and HR had gone under at the time) and we wanted a company with a good reputation. We looked and looked and test drove and test drove. We landed on a Newmar product and we have been very happy. They stand behind their product and make appointments at the factory, were many are first come first serve, with owners waiting up to two weeks just to get in a bay. That would not ever work for us. Hope this helps!

we wanted storage and strength so we went with a bus conversion.
Did one ourselves then bought one that was done very house like. large kitchen, pantry, 38" shower. need I go on?
We love 'Liberty' she has been good to us.