Is this completely ridiculous?

[Lady_Katie]

Hello there, I'm brand new to this forum. My husband and I (along with our two little boys) currently own a 1700sf home in upstate NY. I have to tell you, I thought I would enjoy home ownership, but I actually hate it with every fiber of my being. Most of all, I hate feeling trapped in this one location. Secondly, I hate feeling like no matter how much maintenance we do, and how many upgrades we can squeeze out of our budget, there's still more that needs to be done than we can ever get to. In short, it's choking the life out of me.

I've spent most of the time we've lived here (4.5 years) trying to figure out a way out that makes sense. We could rent and share walls with people to save a buck (uuuuuuugh), or we could rent a house and still be trapped in one location and have to move all of our stuff every time we get sick of it (which I can guarantee would happen often). Then I read on a homeschooling forum that I'm a member of that some people actually live in RV's with their children. I have to admit, this idea makes me giddy.

My husband and I are not complete strangers to RVing. My parents owned a small RV when I was a teenager, and my inlaws owned a travel trailer. So, we both grew up camping, for what that's worth.

But before I research any further, I need to know if my idea is plausible. I understand that it is basically not possible to live this far north in an RV. We get a ton of snow and regularly have negative temperatures. We worry about the pipes IN our house freezing in the winter, even though it's heated regularly, so I would never consider living in an RV here. However...my husband may be able to transfer to Charlottesville Virginia, where it is considerably warmer. He can also likely do some of his work remotely to make traveling regularly possible, with Charlottesville as our base. I'm just not sure about their temperatures. It looks like their climate is considerably warmer than what we have here, but for a few months out of the year their lows are in the upper 20's/lower 30's while the highs are around the upper 40's. Is that kind of weather too cold for RV living? I have read that there are "arctic packages" available. Would something like that make the idea more worth considering? I know we'd be fine during the day, but obviously we wouldn't want to suffer at night. We'd probably be fine heating it to about 60 at night, a little warmer during the day. Is it difficult to heat to about 30 degree's warmer than the air temperature outside?

Thank you!

[carl2591]

ain't that the truth brother..:) I remember Snow in columbia SC some 20ish yrs ago at a depth of almost 2 ft.. now with global warming or whatever it called that is a bit rarer but you will need to get down around jacksonville florida or at least to somewhere north of orlando to make sure you are not real cold. OR head out west and go to bottom of NM, AZ calif.. etc.

wbwood wrote:
You will be surprised how cold it gets in the winter in Charlottesville, Virginia...you would need to head further south...towards lowers SC, Ga or florida...Even here in NC it gets very cold (below freezing) for periods of time and snow...

[4X4Dodger]

To me, with all due respect, this should be about the children not about you. While traveling is one of the best educations a kid can get, opening their minds to new places and people and ideas, doing so full time also robs them of some important childhood experiences.

Home schooling, no matter how good is IMO a poor substitute for the real thing. A child needs to experience the daily give and take of building relationships both personal and working that being in a public or private school affords. Most teachers are professionals who know what they are doing and know their subject matter. The classroom also provides a window into other ideas and opinions which home schooling by definition is meant to avoid.

Think ahead of the SAT and college entrance for your kids and where they will stand if home schooled. I truly believe you will be shortchanging them and their future.

Doing this for a year is one thing, that would enhance their education immeasurably, especially if done well with an emphasis on using what you visit and see to teach the kids. But full timing for the duration of their elementary or longer years?

I would say a serious examination of the possible repercussions to the children would be your first order of business.

[wbwood]

You will be surprised how cold it gets in the winter in Charlottesville, Virginia...you would need to head further south...towards lowers SC, Ga or florida...Even here in NC it gets very cold (below freezing) for periods of time and snow...

[themoreweexplor]

Lady_Katie wrote:
Thanks so much, everyone! I'm really glad that I started by asking you all who have more experience with this. I think I'm just finding the home ownership lifestyle to be extremely mundane. My kids don't seem to enjoy being in the house very much, and mostly it just seems like a waste of time and money. I do like the idea of maybe buying a smaller trailer and going camping every weekend/vacation. Ultimately though, I really want to sell the house. Maybe not live in an RV, but I think I would like to downsize and have much less land, or live in the woods. I know that 1700sf isn't considered large for a house, but to be honest, we only use about 1200sf of it at most, and that includes a playroom. I don't like heating or cleaning extra rooms. I guess I'm kind of a minimalist at heart.

We can relate 100%. We sold our house, and we're gearing up for full-time life on the road. We don't know if it's going to be "better" than life in a house, but we sure feel a lot better not owning a house now (I never thought I'd say that). Feel free to follow our journey and learn as we learn. We are by no means experts, but we have enjoyed the journey so far.

www.themoreweexplore.com

[rekoj71]

Every kid I've met in a fulltiming situation loves it. Mine actually love the closeness we have. Having space?!? They have the biggest back yards anyone could ask for and the most diverse educational opportunities anywhere. Aren't all of the parent these days complaining that their kids just sit around and play video games or are glued to the internet anyway.
Homeschooling is a challenge, but every study done on homeschoolers actually proves how much better they do especially in college and even in SOCIALIZATION (Google Homeschool Statistics, or read the Wikipedia post on homeschooling, I dare you).

[chrokeva]

It has been interesting seeing peoples thoughts on raising children in rvs. Although much of it is accurate I would like to add a different spin on it. I will need to change my experience to a boat rather than a rv. My husband and I sold our home in 2005 when my daughter was 15 years old and moved on a boat. We had a large house, lots of bills, and my husband and I where so busy working and making money to pay bills we barely had time for our daughter never mind each other. My daughter was unhappy and starting to have problems in school. Moving aboard changed everything! Although my husband still worked I was able to stop working and she had her parents again (perhaps more than she wanted). She started going to a amazing school and she thrived under this situation. Sure we had some major adjustments to make but we got through them and when she graduated high school (at the top of her class) she decided to spend a year traveling Mexico with us on the boat before returning for college. Now she is a senior at UC Davis (Microbiology Major). We are very proud of the woman she has become and none of us regret the time we spent living this lifestyle and we in fact credit it with my much of my daughters success and the amazing relationship we have with her.
I must also say that our boat is probably much bigger than any RV out there (4 staterooms) however it is still under 600 sq ft. down below so I would be hard pressed to say it was roomy :).
I am not saying that the op should go out sell there house but I think that to only hear negatives is not seeing the whole picture.

[carl2591]

that is quite amazing.. but the RV is a fricken 42ish foot bus.. not a regular RV by any means.. still that a lot of people in one place.

gemsworld wrote:

kohai wrote:
I would focus on why you are unhappy and not so much on the RV being the end-all solution. In my opinion, you'll find the same unhappiness, just in a different way.

X2

Good luck!

[JayNewman]

FloridaKash wrote:
We are fulltiming, for a year in a class A with three kids. We are 5 months in. We love it, the kids love it too. It really depends on your family dynamics.

I work 40+ hours a week from my computer in the RV. It works fine. So far, we have traveled 10,000 miles.

May I ask where do you store the children? And how many bathrooms does your motorhome have?

The reason I am asking is that I am planning on fulltiming in a class A motorhome starting before before Christmas. I have also asked a woman with a six-year old child (Internet dating) to marry me. Now, one problem is that I hadn't planned for all of this to happen at once, but it seems to be heading that way.

Where do the children find the space to be children? Where do they sleep? I'm guessing on the convertable couches/beds.

I'd like to find something to give children at least a small bit of private space, and the only motorhome I've found with the things I think I need (washer/dryer, bath and a half, and bunks for the boy) is the Newmar Mountain Aire or the London Aire. Very nice motorhomes, but also on the extremely pricey side. If I sell my house first, I should be able to afford something in that range. Of course, then I'd have to find a place to live and store the stuff I'm taking with me while I sell the house and then get the motorhome.

Does anybody have any suggestions for a good motorhome for fulltiming that has a washer/dryer (or hookups), 1.5 baths, and a private area for a growing child to sleep in?

Thanks in advance.

[FloridaKash]

We are fulltiming, for a year in a class A with three kids. We are 5 months in. We love it, the kids love it too. It really depends on your family dynamics.

I work 40+ hours a week from my computer in the RV. It works fine. So far, we have traveled 10,000 miles.

[Roy_Lynne]

Have you thought about Tiny Home Living? I've been watching show after show about living tiny and I think its a wonderful idea. First, the homes are affordable and you could probably find one cheap enough to pay cash for it. Many of them are movable to new locations.
http://smallhousebliss.com/category/small-prefab-and-modular-houses/

[MotorPro]

The only rediculous thing is worrying about what other people think is rediculous! You have to live the life that makes you happy.

[ependydad]

Lady_Katie wrote:
Thank you for your insight, your response feels the most accurate to me. Many of these responses are advising me to figure out the root cause of my unhappiness, and I've honestly been giving this a lot of thought. I can't help but conclude that the bottom line is boredom. I'm really not a "dig my roots into the local community" type of person, and neither is my husband. We've been here for 4.5 years so far, and we still cannot bring ourselves to call it "home". In all honestly, I think I might actually, truly and honestly be a wanderer. Once I hit my 20s, I moved around our state quite a bit for about 5 years, and I was pretty happy doing that. But about a year into "living the American dream", I started to feel like I wanted to relocate again. Here I am, 3.5 years later...still feeling the same way. I don't want to be one of the ones who suffer through a lifestyle that doesn't work for them.

Now, of course, having young children and my husbands job are factors. I've always planned to homeschool, so that's one non-issue. There actually is hope of my husband working remotely. We were talking about this the other day, and I guess he's been doing a lot of work that doesn't require him to be in the office. I used to actually work from home as a freelance designer, so there's hope of me being able to pick up work in the future too. I could probably even make money blogging about traveling (I worked in marketing and graphic design).

Looking at our future with these ideas in mind makes me feel a lot more optimistic, to be honest.

I'll second the recommendation for Fulltime Families. While not the "norm", LOTS of families live fulltime lifestyles. In fact, I'm doing it right now.

It's me, the wife, and 2 kids (11 and 3). We just came from a "NOT Back to School" rally in Branson where we were 1 of 40 families.

As long as your work is generally mobile, it's a great lifestyle.

[ramgunner]

My wife gave birth to our first child last month, and we are currently full-timing. I have a stable job in the local area, and she's able to be a stay-at-home mom. We decided to go full time just after buying our trailer (a 2016 Grand Design Momentum 385TH). We were camping in it, and realized we could easily - at this point - live in it.

It reduced many of our expenses, and our baby doesn't need a lot of room right now. We have a ton of room inside, and as she gets older there is a loft ready for her, used as storage right now. We can trim things down as time goes on, and are already working on that.

We have an off-site storage unit with some belongings that we might use again if we get into another apartment or house in the future.

There is a lot to it - but we like the flexibility (can relocate if needed/desired, either locally to another park or to another state if required for work), easy to go on vacation and have what we need/want with us, and it has a real "prepper" element with a 5500 watt generator and 60 gallons of fuel storage on-board, and being designed for portability and operation of many systems with only 12VDC and propane.

And since we are planning to home school later, many educational opportunities can be leveraged.

[Kels4g]

I felt the same way about home ownership. Every where I looked it was just endless project after project! I won't say I'll never own a home again but for right now, we are enjoying the freedom of living in our RV. We are new fulltimers though- only a month into our journey.

I don't have children myself but I do know that kids can live full time in an rv. For work reasons, my two siblings lived in an RV for a large part of their childhood (starting in their tween years). I was already moved out by this point. Both of them enjoyed the time in the rv and do not say anything negative about it. My family had a toy hauler and they made it work by the parents taking the bedroom and the two kids shared the toy hauler area by putting in a temporary partition to make two separate spaces (one boy/one girl) for privacy.