Newbie...So Confused

You have a lot of research ahead of you, but let me give you a few rough rules of thumb: For your truck, I would stick with a travel trailer that is less than 30 feet long and weighs less than 6K pounds empty. You may add as much as 1K pounds to the trailer when towing (and maybe more), so I'm estimating that you'll be towing up to 7K pounds in reality. Yes, you can easily add that much weight. If you have a full 50 gallon fresh water tank, that alone is around 400 pounds.

Using those parameters, it then really comes down to floor plan. For example, do you want the living room in the rear? Island kitchen? Dinette or free standing dining table? Where do you want the TV?

Once you get an idea of floor plan, then you can start thinking about a particular manufacturer. The major ones all offer similar floor plans, so then it comes down to other factors like features, the look, water tank capacities (very important to me), warranty, etc.

Like I said, you have a lot of stuff to research but I would stick with the rules of thumb above and then go look in person. It'll be overwhelming at first but you'll soon find that you gravitate towards certain floor plans and designs.

Great advice so far. As you can see three things have to match.
1.) Floorplan usually a DW thing.
2.) TV capacity usually a DH thing.
3.) Cost. A DW and DH thing.

If you are unsure, see if you can rent a simlar unit. It can be a real eye opener.

my first cut hasn't changed in 20 years, no more rubber roofs.
bumpy

britt_777 wrote:
Thank you so much for all the feedback so far.

For starters I am the wife doing my homework....lol... Not the husband....Surprise surprise I know.
We tent and shelter camped for years when the kids were young. Now the kids are gone and we still have our 4 dogs. This makes traveling and getting away very hard. My husband does a lot of traveling on the road and we thought if we got a trailer it would make it easier for us to meet up once in a while and start doing a lot of camping/traveling again.

As far as our vehicle. Its a Ford F-150 FX4x4. Gear Ratio of 3.73 GVWR is 7350. If I researched right. We can tow a trailer of up to 9100 lbs and combined weight of truck and trailer GCWR up to 15,100. Does this sound about right?

Alsoo any length we should try to stay under. Our truck bed is the short 5.6.

Thanks again for all the feedback. Much appreciated. Husband doesn't have a lot of time to spend researching.

That's ok the DW usually always wins on what layout they get! :W

As far as the 'max' weight your tow vehicle can handle. Unless you want to struggle on grades and be on all the time driving which is very tiring for the driver stay way 'under' your max capabilities for a more pleasant experience RV'ing.

Regarding the number of dogs you have. Call around to the camp grounds you intend to travel to. CG's have some VERY strict rules now in regards to the number of dogs allowed and a maximum weight allowed. It may change your plans on RV'ing with your dogs.

We updated from a 40-year-old popup to our first TT this spring and went through the same confusion. We made a list of "must haves" and "must not haves" and then visited several camper shows and dealer lots to narrow down our choices.

Some of our "must haves" included:
Walk-around bed
Dual propane tanks (some small trailers only have one)
3-burner stove with oven
Lots of storage

We found it especially helpful to visit camper shows that featured several dealers and lots of different brands so you could compare them all in one location. Be sure to open drawers and cabinets, some are constructed better than others. Check out the bathroom, make sure there's room to close the door and sit down without banging your knees. Make sure you can live with the tub or shower, some of the smaller units don't even have tub surrounds. If the unit has slides, make sure you can still access the bathroom or kitchen with the slides in.

Collect brochures on all of the ones you like and then narrow down your search at home by researching all the features on the manufacturers' websites. We started researching about 2 years before we were ready to buy but are pleased with our purchase and feel we found the right TT for our needs.

Once you narrow down your choices, revisit your favorites. Spend some time in them. Sit at the table, lie down on the bed, make sure there's room for both of you (and the dogs!) to move around comfortably on a rainy day.

And yes.... we did end up going with MY first choice. :D My sister and her BF bought DH's first choice and he now admits he likes ours better...

Everyone tells you to look for a layout you like first - They're wrong!

Look at the quality of construction first. How its made, what it's made form, how its put together, is the frame strong enough, are the axles strong enough, is the roof constructed well, how thick is the floor, etc., etc., etc. Pull out drawers and look behind them, open cupboards and stick your head inside and look up, open cubby holes and stick your head in. Get down on the ground and crawl underneath and see what how the frame, axles, etc. are put together.

Don't be afraid to get your blue jeans dirty. Forget about the floorplan, figure out what is a well-made brand and what is a piece of junk. Once you figure out what you are getting for your money, then it's time to figure out whether they have a floorplan works for you. Best floorpplan in the world won't be worth squat on a bent frame.

Take your time, I shopped for over a year before I bought. Quality is the number one Beef on this site. Why would anyone recommend you buy a floorplan instead of buying quality? You can still buy entry level if that's what you want or can afford. But at least know the quality of the entry level you are buying as compared to other similarly priced units. Only you can determine that. No one else can do your homework for you.

bid_time wrote:
Everyone tells you to look for a layout you like first - They're wrong!

Look at the qaulity of construction first. How its made, what it's made form, how its put together, is the frame strong enough, are the axles strong enough, is the roof constructed well, how thick is the floor, etc., etc., etc. Pull out drawers and look behind them, open cupboards and stick your head inside and look up, open cubby holes and stick your head in. Get down on the ground and crawl underneath and see what how the frame, axles, etc. are put together.

Don't be afraid to get your blue jeans dirty. Forget aboyut the floorplan, figure out what is a well made brand and what is a piece of junk. Once you figure out what you are getting for your money, then it's time to figure out whether they have a floorplan works for you. Best floorpplan in the world won't be worth squat on a bent frame.

Take your time, I shopped for over a year before I bought. Quality is the number one Beef on this site. Why would anyone recommend you buy a floorplan instead of buying quality. You can still buy entry level if that's what you want or can afford, but at least know the quality of the entry level you are buying as compared to other similarly priced units. Only you can detrmine that. No one else can do your homework for you.

x2
sort of like the saying "putting lipstick on a pig".
bumpy

When considering length and weight, make sure you stay close to your payload rating, which (as mentioned) is on the yellow sticker on the driver side door. Based on what I have seen, I have similar capacities with my Tundra.

We have a Surveyor Cadet 29SQBLE. I tow it without much issue unless it is really windy. I do wish I would have been able to find something a little shorter, but the weights are well within my limits (5615 dry, probably about 6500 loaded), except the payload might be a tad over (I'm okay with that).

As far as the other stuff, I haven't seen anything that's wrong. Your #1 priority should be what you can safely tow. You need to be happy with the layout. You need to be happy with how the camper is built and what it is built with.

My only unique advice is to try to buy your second camper first. We were told by many that most people upgrade after two years, usually because of space. We had initially picked a pretty small (though still large enough) and inexpensive trailer. After talking to several of our camping friends, we realized we needed something with a slide (the one we picked did not have one). With that in mind, I believe we successfully purchased our second camper first, and I am already shopping for our third :)

I have been accused of not being able to purchase toilet paper without doing exhaustive web research. This made finding a quality trailer manufacture a futile task when we bought our trailer. Tons of research revealed that there is no such thing as a quality trailer manufacture. This means you should select a trailer that best suits your needs. Personally I prefer a shorter trailer with a slide-out. Shorter is easier to tow and fits into campsites easier. Slide-outs give more interior space when camping. Slid-outs do seem to eat up storage space through... there are always trade offs. You just need to figure which trade offs you are willing to make!

Buy your second trailer first is good advice.

Buying a used trailer as your first trailer is also good advice as you won't really know what you value in camper design until you have lived with it for a while. You will then have a much better idea of what is important to you.

The most important advice is "Don't believe anything the sales person tells you"! If they tell you "the sky is blue" I would seriously question that statement!

bid_time wrote:
Everyone tells you to look for a layout you like first - They're wrong!

Look at the quality of construction first. How its made, what it's made form, how its put together, is the frame strong enough, are the axles strong enough, is the roof constructed well, how thick is the floor, etc., etc., etc. Pull out drawers and look behind them, open cupboards and stick your head inside and look up, open cubby holes and stick your head in. Get down on the ground and crawl underneath and see what how the frame, axles, etc. are put together.

Don't be afraid to get your blue jeans dirty. Forget about the floorplan, figure out what is a well-made brand and what is a piece of junk. Once you figure out what you are getting for your money, then it's time to figure out whether they have a floorplan works for you. Best floorpplan in the world won't be worth squat on a bent frame.

Take your time, I shopped for over a year before I bought. Quality is the number one Beef on this site. Why would anyone recommend you buy a floorplan instead of buying quality? You can still buy entry level if that's what you want or can afford. But at least know the quality of the entry level you are buying as compared to other similarly priced units. Only you can determine that. No one else can do your homework for you.

To each there own. If I had waited to find a quality trailer I would still not have purchased a trailer. I think that buying a used trailer has an advantage here. With a used trailer you can see how it has held up. Manufactures only care about how their product presents itself on the show room floor and build it tough enough to make it through the warranty period. You are never going to be a le to see under the skin of the trailer which is where the quality counts and is almost universally lacking. But this is just my opinion!