I recently saw a link on Facebook that made me really think about some advantages of RV living.
This disturbing video showed people how they can find cameras at Air B&B locations to keep the owners from being creepy! Personally, I don’t think I’d have a problem with KNOWING the cameras were in their homes, but I would FREAK OUT if they were in the bedroom!
My immediate thought was, “THAT’S ONE GREAT REASON TO OWN A CAMPER!”
ADVANTAGES OF RV LIVING
7 – COST OF LIVING
Homes are expensive; bills are expensive; utilities, groceries, and stuff are expensive! If there’s one thing I love about even part-time living in my RV is that it is CHEAP!
I know, I know, not ALL RVs are created equal…some are HUGE and GHASTLY EXPENSIVE. That’s your choice, but compared to home costs, it’s still cheap. Utilities are covered in your campground fees. Some people choose to outfit their rigs with solar power and generators so they can boondock, but even still…CHEAPER than utilities for a home.
Even with renting campground sites, it still comes out cheaper than my house payment! Everywhere we go, the campsites all have monthly rates that are CONSIDERABLY cheaper than their nightly rates!
Also, you tend to eat out less when staying in your RV…so that’s a money saver, too!
6 – FLEXIBILITY
Change of scenery, loose schedules, not in a hurry to get anywhere…these are all flexibility advantages of RV living. Even if you’re not a full-time traveler, you can stay in one area and move around every weekend (this what we’re doing right now!).
Since we are self-employed, we camp three nights per week around town. We are getting to see more of our home state and surrounding states than we’ve ever been able to before!
I’ve also read about full-time travelers that find somewhere they LOVE and decide to stay a few more weeks. That’s my ULTIMATE GOAL!
I’ve also read that the full-timers like to take their time getting from point A to point B. They have the flexibility to do that. We’ve actually done it on short trips, just because we know where we’re sleeping every night!
One of the advantages of RV living is that your home/hotel is always with you which creates that flexibility!
5 – COMFORT OF HOME
This is one of my favs! Another of the advantages of RV living is that you can dress it up and make it homey!
Hotels sometimes feel sterile to me. They aren’t really personal like home is.
I can decorate, paint, remodel, and personalize my RV as I see fit.
If I want to paint the interior Pepto Bismol pink and put flamingos in my yard everywhere I go, I can! (Although that’s VERY unlikely!)
Personalized pictures and fabrics are what makes a home to me…I can do as much of this as I choose with my RV because I can!
4 – SIMPLICITY
Let’s face it, there’s not a lot of space for STUFF in an RV. I prefer to see this as one of the advantages of RV living! Some people think it’s a disadvantage, but I’d say less stuff=more simplicity!
When you live in a smaller space, simplicity is a MUST! It forces you to clean up after yourself since you’ll trip over something if it’s not properly put away.
At first, this was MADDENING to me, but now that we’ve been camping off and on for over a year, I LOVE IT!
We either eat on paper plates or do the dishes IMMEDIATELY. When we finish a shower, we put our dirty clothes away and hang our towels! Shoes get put up as soon as we take them off.
The small space also FORCES you to downsize. You only keep what’s ABSOLUTELY necessary. I am not now, nor have I ever been a girly girl. I only need a few pairs of shoes, some jeans and shorts, and a few t-shirts and I’m good. This life will be PERFECT for me! 🙂
Of course, once you’ve learned to embrace the simplicity, you can enjoy the little things in life much easier.
3 – COST OF TRAVEL
Another of the advantages of RV living is the cost of travel.
When you take a vacation like non-RVers, it usually involves airfare, hotels, rental cars, etc. If you take all of that into considerations, RVing is WAY less expensive!
Most campsites that I’ve encountered are between $25-50 per night (even at the beach). For most campgrounds, electricity, and water are included…some even have pools, wifi, and cable tv for that price!
We do lose gas mileage when we tow, but once we’re able to go full-time, that will be negated by being able to stay in one location for a week or more at a time.
2 – FREEDOM
I think this is one of the advantages of RV living that goes along with flexibility. You have the freedom to do things you’ve never done before because you are able to be flexible!
You have the freedom to work anywhere and the freedom to go anywhere. You’re not chained to one location because you own a house or have any other ties.
You can just pack up and go when you’re ready to move on! Or you have the freedom to stay somewhere as long as you want. It’s all up to you!
As mentioned earlier, if you find a location you ABSOLUTELY LOVE, then you have the freedom to stay until you’re ready to go!
1 – PRIVACY
Because of that disturbing video I watched, number one on my advantages of RV living list is privacy!
I don’t have to worry about some creepy kook spying on me (unless it’s my husband…LOL!). I can do what I want when I want, how I want in the privacy of my own RV.
As long as I don’t loan it out to someone I don’t know (which I won’t), I can be fairly positive my privacy is secure!
If you’re interested in starting your own blog and creating the freedom to work from anywhere, check out my blogging resources page!
There you have it! How do you feel about this list? Are you a full-timer and have something you’d like to add? Are you a wanna be like me and have some ideas too? I’d love to hear from you in the comments! Be sure to check out my pros and cons of camper ownership post too!
You nailed it! And I find many people say that RV living does not save them money. Our house payment is $2500/math. I could stay at RV resorts for an entire month and still not hit that…even cheaper when boondocking or staying at state parks.
Right?! Obviously, I don’t live full time in my RV yet, but I have done the math. When you throw in how much it costs to work, including two cars with insurance (ESPECIALLY if you have car payments), utilities, house payments, etc. it costs WAY less! This lifestyle is looking more and more attractive to us all the time. We figure we can cut our salary in half and still make it work! Thanks for commenting! 🙂
I totally agree with your list. For me, I think simplicity would have to be my number one. I love the idea of being able to take everything we own with us, and keeping the number of possessions we own down to only what we really need. 🙂
I suppose it’s obvious, but it’s one of my favs, too! There’s just not as much to worry about when your whole world fits in one tin can! 😉
It’s great that you mentioned how RV living would let you have the freedom to work anywhere and the freedom to go anywhere. RV living sounds fantastic so I am thinking getting an RV too. I want to add every conveniences that I could have on it, like a SatKing automatic satellite for example.
It’s nice that you pointed out how one of the advantages of RV living is that you could dress it up and make it homey. We own an RV and I recently got interested in trying out RV living. I heard there are month to month RV parks now, so maybe I should look into that.