Reflections on 6 Months of RV Research! ;)

rv4jimnme wrote:

Bordercollie wrote:
You have done a great job of gleaning info from this forum and realize that your choice of motorhome or other type of RV is a matter of personal taste, your current understanding of what is available and how often and in what ways you will use one.

A class C motorhome is a box truck full of appliances and other gizmos that when working properly, give you some of the comforts of home while on the road, camping, or as a support vehicle for local sports, hobby, and family days at a local park. We bought a 27 foot 2004 (bumper to bumper) Fleeetwood Tioga Class C model 26Q new in 2003 that is our idea of the best compromise for our forseeable use. It has a rear bedroom with RV queen bed, a huge lighted storage area in the rear, and standard mid bath, galley, comvertible dinette and barrel chair and large overhead bed/storage area. It does not have or need slides for our use.

Bear in mind that total cost of ownership includes early depreciation, taxes, vehicle registration, insurance, scheduled maintenance of truck part, maintenance of apppliances, airconditioning, charger/converter and batteries. Our fridge, roof air conditioner, converter/charger and batteries, awning fabric and fresh water pump all required replacement at around 10 years. Annual inspection of the roof and resealing of potential water leak entry points will prevent dreaded water leak damage.

You should look at and compare the cost vs workmanship, design and features, including roof construction of "entry" level to luxury brands and models in your quest for knowledge. Owning a motorhome is actually taking on a "hobby" including periodic maintenance of batteries, and performing minor DIY fixes and replacements, and getting professional services from dealer or rv repair as needed. Owning a motorhome is similar to owning and maintaining a cabin cruiser boat. If you use and enjoy it a lot after the first year, it may be worth the total cost and effort of ownership.

We recently sold our 2007 Pace Arrow, I was told don't add up what you have spent on it for the 9 years we owned it. But I could not resist. The figure was aprox $27,000.00. The larger items included $4,000 in new tires, $1,500 in new magic sleeper sofa (not comfortable my $100.00 futon metal frame worked much better. And sumo springs at around $2,000.00 A great deal of the money was committed to keeping the roof in good order, i.e. inspections, reseal and constant up keep, also the marine toilet vacu flush system was an issue until we became knowledgeable on it. Lots of money went to washing and waxing and keeping stuff like the levelers and slide out clean and working. So being the money wise person I am I took what we purchased it for added the $27,000.00 (which by the way does not include your gas which we went across country when gas was $5.00 a gallon or so and of course camping fees. I then subtracted what I recently sold it for then divided that figure by 9 years (and months) and got a monthly figure of what it costs to buy (new) own and maintain an RV. Because we full timed in it for part of those years and were able to rent our home the figure works out fine for us. We saw almost all the United States and we would not trade our memories for any amount of money, however, that being said if you take the above figures into consideration and you do not use or travel much you need to make sure you want to spend your money that way. My advice to younger folks is never put a great deal of money in an RV, instead buy a trailer or 5th wheel and use the truck each day as your commute. In that way the only thing depreciating is the trailer and you did not spend an arm and a leg buying it. We are too old to do that now and we loved our home on wheels. In fact I never would have wanted a trailer to begin with but if you are saving for college for your kids it makes better sense to me. My figures came out to about $112,000.00 spent totally over 9 years but that figure for me is reduced by rental income and full timing to about $60,000.00. So I am a happy camper. Especially because my mini home was 1.5 baths, washer dryer and had all the comforts of home. I am on this forum now looking for a small class C so I must have not learned any lessons or I just love RVing so much I will not let go!

As a curiosity comparison, we've had our 2003 Southwind since new, and ironically in the past two half years had a new engine, solar and battery 880ahr install, refurbished to a residential fridge, flat screen TV, just gone in for alignment and leafs in the springs passenger side and are due for $3500 of new tires. When we add up what we've spent on Tires and actual repairs (not counting in services or oil changes etc) and tires since we've had her it comes to about C$28,000 in 12 years, the vast majority of that has been in the past 2+ years. If we take into account the depreciation and the fact we paid on a US1 to C$1.65 at time of purchase it's cost us in reality around $165,000 for 12 years to date, and hoping we won't have any more expenses other than services for hopefully at least another 5 to 7 years. Based on today's figures where we are at, it's cost us around $13,000 per year and the memories have been priceless. If we assume that we keep this as mentioned until she's around 20 years old (hubby is desperate for a DP so that might be a long shot!) and no more major updates/repairs and allowing further depreciation to zero then it will equate to an average of C$9,000 a year.

So for us, that is our estimates of what this wonderful lifestyle/memories has cost us as extended timers, YTD around C$13K a year and going FT in a year onwards if we keep the same rig until she's 20 years old then will have averaged C$9K per year assuming no more major expenses and depreciating her to zero at that juncture.

FWIW and as a side note comparison, our Fla home we've owned since 2009, with just property taxes, insurances, minor yard work and upkeep costs being a new build and utilities costs us around US$18,000k per year and we have the same view continually. Hence that puppy is now up for sale readying for us to FT.