Hi there! We’re Timothy and Megan Jones, and we’re full time RV-ers! With the full time RV life trend on the rise, I (Megan) get asked all the time about how we found the RV that we did, how we moved from a rental house to an RV, and how we simplified our lives enough to live in less than 300 square feet. Today I’m super excited to be talking all about our process of moving into the RV and all the events leading up to it.
For those of you that don’t know, we’ve been living in the RV for 2 years now and we love the flexibility it gives us. We have our home with us everywhere we go, and it has saved us so much money over the past 2 years.
My hubby is a full time filmmaker, which means he travels all over the country for work. For the first year of our marriage, I traveled with him and stayed in whatever hotel they put us in for the month. As you can imagine, I got tired of that really quick!
We were never home, and we were paying rent every month for a rental house that we weren’t even living in.
We had so many conversations about whether to buy a house or an RV. It got to the point where we decided that we either needed to get a permanent job and get a house, or continue to travel and live in a RV full time. I was just so over living out of a suitcase!
That’s when we finally decided to jump into RV life! I had actually wanted to live in an RV for several years, so this was a dream come true for me.
Over the next few months, I was constantly looking on Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace for a deal. We wanted something that was in good mechanical shape, but also something that we could renovate.
The tip that I always tell people when looking for an RV, camper, fifth wheel, or motorhome, is to expand the search area on Facebook Marketplace or on Craigslist to a 100 mile radius. You can also change the city you’re searching in to ones that are a few hours away. We ended up driving several hours to get our RV and it definitely sped up the process of finding one in good shape!
So after looking for awhile, I found one that I thought looked good and that was in our price range, and we decided to drive a few hours to go look at it. I remember walking in and re thinking our whole plan. There were no slide outs and it was TINY. I’m telling you, slide outs make alllll the difference when it comes to space in an RV. The shower was in the middle of the hall, and there was zero closet space. We knew we wanted to downsize, but not quite that much. So we walked away from that one really fast!
After that experience, we were feeling pretty discouraged about the whole “RV life” thing. But I decided to keep looking. Surely a good deal would turn up at some point right? One day, as I was searching Facebook Marketplace, I stumbled upon an RV that was just what we were looking for, with slide outs and everything!
I truly believe that we were meant to get the RV that we did. A couple had gone to look at our RV the night before we did, and decided not to buy it on the spot, meaning that we still had a chance to look at it. We drove several hours to go see it, but I was almost 100% sure that we were going to buy it, provided everything worked.
I remember walking into it for the first time and already noticing how much bigger it felt than the first one we went to look at (slide outs are absolute magic!). It was perfect in every way. To this day, we still haven’t had any mechanical issues with it. Yes, the decor was a bit horrid, but still not as bad as some of the others I had seen.
We bought it on the spot, and then literally parked it on our rental house lawn, which was hilarious! I’m surprised we didn’t get reported to the HOA!
And then began the process of getting rid of all of our stuff. It was a little stressful selling all of the things we had literally just bought for our house, but I felt so much relief and peace because I knew we were doing the right thing.
Over the next few months, we completely transformed the interior of the RV into a modern, cozy space that felt like home. I’ve said to Timothy so many times over the past 2 years that living in the RV is the first time I’ve felt at home since we got married. It’s the best thing ever to be a thousand miles away from our home base, but still feel at home.
I know that RV life isn’t for everyone, and some people prefer to have an actual house, but if you’ve been on the fence about pursuing full time RV-ing for a while, I would encourage you to take the plunge and just try it! It has saved us so much money and we feel at home everywhere we go. When we find cheap tickets to Iceland, we can just go for 2 weeks without worrying about house payments, or car payments, or utility bills. We absolutely love the freedom that it gives us to pursue our dreams as a young married couple!
Have any questions about RV life or topics you’d like me to cover in a future blog post? Feel free to leave them in the comments below!
Megan
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