I bought a couch from someone a year ago. It was a beautiful sectional, very comfy. Through chatting with the owners when I picked it up, I discovered they were selling most of their possessions in order to travel full time for a year in an RV. They were a family of four, the children both under 4 years-old. When I asked why, they explained they wanted to be closer together as a family, their jobs allowed them to work from anywhere, and that they were hoping to reduce their cost of living substantially by living on the road for a while. They also thought it’d be a great experience for the kids before they had to start school.
This kind of nomadic lifestyle often throws people for a loop as most can’t imagine living a life without being anchored in a single place. As a society, the common thought is ‘you need to have roots’. You need to pay rent or a mortgage. Every kid should have their own room. Every house should have a large kitchen, living room, TV room, play room, walk-in closet, etc. When couples and families decide to forego all that for a cramped camper or mobile home, ‘normal’ people often tip their head slightly to the left and look at them with a great amount of confusion.
But there are major advantages to downsizing and living life on the road. Here are just a few examples: (from full time RVers – heathandalyssa.com)
RVing across the country makes you not take normal things for granted (i.e good wifi, nice showers, and a dishwasher).
We aren’t being crushed under a giant mortgage. Our home is paid off.
An RV teaches you to be clean. One dish left out is no big deal in a large house, but in a 29 foot RV it’s basically going to make the whole place feel like a mess. Clean that up!
It takes five minutes to clean the entire house. Six minutes if you vacuum.
When you cook bacon, the whole RV smells like heaven.
When you watch the Walking Dead in the middle of the woods, it’s so much more intense.
RVing teaches you to fix things. I hoped I was going to be rich enough to pay a mechanic all the time. That strategy hasn’t worked out for me yet, so now I know how to flush my radiator, fix my generator, check gauges, and a lot of other manly stuff I couldn’t do before.
It teaches you to value experiences over belongings, and relationships over work. At the core of it, this is what our lifestyle is truly about.
These reasons are all well and good (particularly the bacon one) but how do people do this and still have a family? Have an income? Not kill each other while confined in such a small place?
RVing full time is certainly a lot easier when you’re either 1) A single person, 2) a couple, 3) Retired, or 4) A couple with young children (preschool age or younger). RVing as a family with children who need schooling can be done for large chunks of time but with school commitments and the amount of hormones that come as a package deal with tweens and teens, it can prove to be a little more difficult to live on the road full time.
Most people who fall into groups 1, 2, and 4, tend to work flexible jobs for fewer hours than a full time job and don’t require you to be in a specific place at any one time. With the reduced cost of living that comes with living in an RV, this sort of work-life balance makes a lot of sense and allows you to enjoy life on the road (look for a future article on how to make money while you RV, coming soon!)
Just imagine if this was your work cubicle:
Full time RVing isn’t for everyone. But if your lifestyle allows it, and you’re motivated to make a life change, it could be just the thing you’re looking for. Learn more about full time RVing at http://heathandalyssa.com/
