Full time as a both a necessity and a lifestyle choice

[namtrag]

Hi All,

My wife and I are 50ish, and without going into many details, are not in the greatest financial shape. My house keeps dropping in value, and despite putting my life savings down 6 years ago, and paying 6 years of house payments, we are still upside down by 40k +. Divorce obligations are pretty steep as well, so for another 3 years, minimum, we will have zero money to save. To top it all off, we have no retirement of any kind.

We love being outdoors, and found backpacking and car camping as a way to get away from our stress fairly inexpensively. We have started discussing a plan where anywhere from 10 years from now to retirement at 67, we can somehow get out of our S&B house, buy an RV (class A or C), and go on the road as FTers, not driving constantly, but putting down for a month or two at a time. I am an accountant, so I could do bookkeeping, income taxes, and the like from the RV as long as I have an internet connection. The hard part will be finding clients!

I see RV living as fairly inexpensive compared to my S&B existence, with its mortgage payment of $1700 (PITI), 250 electric bill, 100 water bill, 50 sewer bill, and all the repairs and maintenance on top of that ( all through the age of 75 before it's paid off) . I almost see no other option for us as we grow older, or very few other options. I cannot see the logic of continuing to pay on a house which will never come back to what I owe. Much less having to work until 75 just to pay the mortgage off.

I see short-selling or renting out my house at a 200-300 negative cash flow per month, then RV or renting a small condo as one slightly viable option as we approach "retirement" as we expect our SS at 67 to be about 2800-3000 per month, which would hardly cover our current housing costs plus food.

I know we are not the only ones in precarious financial situations, but it seems like most of what I see on these types of forums are retired people with ss, full military or civilian pensions, and financial security, who are rving as a fun way to retire vs doing it because you can't afford other ways to live when you get old.

I would be interested to hear from those who are doing it on ss or small pensions, and is it doable, or a big struggle?

[midnightsadie]

seems to me you need to lower your life stlye your living way higher than most on your income. no rv is gonna cure your problem. sell the house move to a apt not a condo!!.

[AprilWhine]

In your situation, I would default on the mortgage.

[Aridon]

Francesca Knowles wrote:

Aridon wrote:
We have a permanent site which we use as a home base. We are young, well off financially and have a young baby.

People wonder and ask all the time why we don't have a house and can't fathom why we don't buy one. Well I broke it down for my inlaws the other day who wanted us to buy their home so they could FT in their RV (i'm not kidding).

250k for the house
$4,700 in property taxes
$2,400 in insurance
$600 a year for HOA (no benefits)
plus landscaping, water sewer, cable etc..

New roof in a few years and every 15 years
New AC since its 12 years old and likely to die in the next 5 years
Same with the water heater etc.

Compared to living in our RV:

$216 / mth which covers everything
HOA, water, sewer, cable, trash pick up, pool etc

$1,100 a year for taxes.

:h

Not gettin' the math here- $316.00 a month including taxes gets you what, exactly???

If that's a piece of ground where you park your ever-depreciating "house", I'm thinking it's only relevant for comparison purposes if you never take that house anywhere else where you pay to park it. In that case you'd need to factor in campground cots plus all expenses connected to all that moving around, including depreciation of the house.

Not when I would keep the RV regardless. Even if we bought another Stick and Bricks or moved into a property we already own and rent I would still keep my RV. Making the cost sunk and irrelevant to the calculation.

[namtrag]

Now for the positive side of why we want to full-time. We are active, and began backpacking about 18 months ago. We go on 3 day weekend trips with a group in our area, and really enjoy being outdoors. We want to stay active and hike, backpack, and stay outside as much as possible as we get older. Living in an RV would allow us to set up for a month or two (or more) in different areas, where we could go hiking, backpacking and exploring as much as we want...then when we get bored, we move on.

Just appeals to us a lot, not to mention it would allow us to spend time hiking that we now use on mowing grass and doing chores to keep our house up.

[Francesca_Knowl]

Aridon wrote:
We have a permanent site which we use as a home base. We are young, well off financially and have a young baby.

People wonder and ask all the time why we don't have a house and can't fathom why we don't buy one. Well I broke it down for my inlaws the other day who wanted us to buy their home so they could FT in their RV (i'm not kidding).

250k for the house
$4,700 in property taxes
$2,400 in insurance
$600 a year for HOA (no benefits)
plus landscaping, water sewer, cable etc..

New roof in a few years and every 15 years
New AC since its 12 years old and likely to die in the next 5 years
Same with the water heater etc.

Compared to living in our RV:

$216 / mth which covers everything
HOA, water, sewer, cable, trash pick up, pool etc

$1,100 a year for taxes.

:h

Not gettin' the math here- $316.00 a month including taxes gets you what, exactly???

If that's a piece of ground where you park your ever-depreciating "house", I'm thinking it's only relevant for comparison purposes if you never take that house anywhere else where you pay to park it. In that case you'd need to factor in campground cots plus all expenses connected to all that moving around, including depreciation of the house.

[namtrag]

This is some good stuff, and I thank all of you for your good responses. I can't do that TARP program refi as I refinanced a month after the last date the program will allow (it was a rate refi, not and equity out refi). I liken our situation to being circumstances, bad luck, and a lot of poor decisions younger in life. I am glad no one has lectured me, because believe me, we know we are in a pickle, and it's time to figure out a plan before it's too late.

Aridon, it's amazing how well you see where we are. It's very distressing to pay month after month for something that continues to depreciate, and we have all that stuff coming in the next year or two...heat pump is at least 12 years old, the water heater at least 7, and the roof is starting to peel, and the fence planks are disintegrating. On top of those costs, the house would probably need 10-15k of updating inside to even put it up for sale.

In the old days people would spend money, knowing the house would appreciate and repay them and then some...now it's like owning a boat to own a house.

Anyway, I do appreciate each and every one of you taking the time to give me some feedback. I am also glad we have lots of time to decide a course, and I plan on being OCD about my research on it!

[Aridon]

Hopefully you won't get too many high and mighty people posting and lecturing you.

I understand where you are coming from. We sold our McMansion just before the housing bubble and watched as homes declined by 300k and more over a year or two. We realized the 255k we put into the MH would of been gone either way so it was nothing but a sunk cost to us at that point.

We have been FT for 6 years this May and love it. We have a permanent site which we use as a home base. We are young, well off financially and have a young baby.

People wonder and ask all the time why we don't have a house and can't fathom why we don't buy one. Well I broke it down for my inlaws the other day who wanted us to buy their home so they could FT in their RV (i'm not kidding).

250k for the house
$4,700 in property taxes
$2,400 in insurance
$600 a year for HOA (no benefits)
plus landscaping, water sewer, cable etc..

New roof in a few years and every 15 years
New AC since its 12 years old and likely to die in the next 5 years
Same with the water heater etc.

Compared to living in our RV:

$216 / mth which covers everything
HOA, water, sewer, cable, trash pick up, pool etc

$1,100 a year for taxes.

Now I realize we will have some maintenance on the rig but I'm fairly handy and it really is minimal overall. Especially since if we tried to sell the MH we would get nearly nothing for it and we would likely keep it regardless to travel.

So even if property values go up a reasonable amount which is hardly certain, they will get eaten up by just my taxes and insurance. Much less any large expenses or deductibles that crop up.

Is RVing a great deal? No.


For us though its not a great deal to really go back to a house. We have rental property and other investments, have zero debt and one of us works so the other can stay home with the baby. We live in a 5 star resort people pay $1,600 a month to stat at in season. We can travel when we want, do what we want and are happy.

That is all that matters. Is a house a better investment? Overall yes on average it is much better. Mostly because people can't save any money and a house, so long as you don't rape the equity you build, saves money automatically for you.

However if you are already in the game (rv) and love it the cost to stay in it really isn't that big a deal once you're there.

Do what you want and enjoy it. No reason to be a sheep. Try and be smart and you can always turn around your situation. Bankruptcy might be a good option to get things straight and sorted out and you can start fresh.

[HappyKayakers]

I've been fulltiming since '06 on a partial military retirement (ex wife got about 30% of it) so I still need to work. There are places other than campgrounds to work and make decent money, especially with both of you working. I've worked the Christmas rush at an Amazon fulfillment center for $10+/hr plus they picked up the campground fees. I've worked the sugar beet harvest in northern MN for $14+/hr. With your accountant background you could travel the country working at tax centers while your DW worked a campground office to pay for the site.

If you'd rather keep doing the accounting work remotely, create a small business now and start getting your clients before you hit the road.

[doxiemom11]

namtrag. If you are losing value on your house, there are special programs now for re-financing for people like you who make payments on time. Contact your mortgage company and discuss with them. Do an internet search and you should find information about these government mandated programs. MY mortgage company contacted me this summer and refinanced my loan at 2 1/2 percent lower interest and I was not required to provide proof of income or anything else. All closing costs and fees were paid by the mortgage company (not added to my principle) and my payments are lower. I have Chase Home Finance, but they are all required to participate and are supposed to seek out loans like yours to refinance (unless you already have a minimal interest rate). Mine was a very good rate in 1998 when I closed, but high for what they are offering now.

[the_bear_II]

To see a realtime example of fulltime RV lifestyle costs see this website:
www.rv-dreams.com

These folks have been on the road for 8 years and post their monthly expenses on the website. You'll be able to see a running tally including unexpected costs, medical, vehicle, RV problems....etc.

It's not as cheap as most people think it is.

Also, if you haven't already, listen to Dave Ramsey (financial talk show host). He has several books plus several seminars that help people overcome their financial nightmares and prepare for retirement.
Here's his website http://www.daveramsey.com/home/

[namtrag]

I wanted to clarify to add a plan or two we had contemplated, so as not to sound as if I am whining about my situation...we are just needing to make a plan of some sort, and carry it out!!!

One plan is to work full time until 67, saving as much money as possible, and continuing to live in our house...then at 67 get rid of the house or rent it out for as much as we can per month, pay cash for an RV, and go on the road on SS. I would continue to work part time as an accountant or we would workamp as camp hosts or the like.

The other possibility is to buy an RV on credit in 5 years, take 5-7 years to pay for it, taking it on occasional trips to see how we like it, then go on the road full time in our early to mid 60's, and scrape by as best we can until we reach 67, possibly short selling the house. In this scenario we would at least be a little younger so we could enjoy the lifestyle a little longer in our lives.

We go back and forth, but we both know we can do RV full time living. We are together all our waking time when we are not at work, and both love being together with the other. Downsizing and living in a small space doesn't bother either of us at all!