Looking for a new travel trailer, where to start?

[Askibum02]

I'm looking for a new travel trailer, and I don't know where to start. My budget is $20-25K, and I'm looking for a bunkhouse trailer with a bunk room, not just bunk beds. Two models that have a floor plan I like are the Forest River Wildwood X-Lite 282QBXL and the Keystone Passport 2920BH. Is there anything about either of those that I should look out for? The Wildwood is Aluminum sided and the Passport is fiberglass sided. Is there another brand that has a similar floor plan that might be better?

[Askibum02]

It would be tight, but I think it would work. According to the yellow sticker on the driver side door jam, the payload is 1582 lbs. There's four of us weighing about 600 lbs total. Everything besides us would go in the trailer, add a 100lbs for the hitch, that would leave us with about 880lbs of tongue weight, which should be enough.

[downtheroad]

Another consideration is the holding tank capacity. The Keystone only has a 30 gal. gray tank...My experience with a bunkhouse and kids is that's going to be a problem...

Stuff you don't think about pops up later. i.e. holding tank size, counter space, pantry, slides that block the bathroom or frig when they are in.

Good luck with your search.

[SoundGuy]

Askibum02 wrote:
I'm looking for a new travel trailer, and I don't know where to start.

Always start with what your truck is rated to safely tow and don't be fooled by those pie-in-the-sky "tow ratings". 😉 Both those trailers you've mentioned are pretty big and could easily push beyond the limits of most 1/2 ton trucks, especially when it comes to payload capacity. A trailer with bunk beds infers you it won't be just 2 adults in the truck when towing so keep in mind that the weight of people and cargo in the truck count against it's payload capacity, often leaving insufficient capacity to account for trailer tongue weight transferred to the truck once hitched up. 😞 Family trailers like this also tend to run GVW awfully close to GVWR because all those extra people means a lot of extra "stuff" that an adult couple alone wouldn't be dragging along.