Vlog Episode 077 4 Steps to Afford the RV Lifestyle

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once you get on the road it might not fit your comfort style there's so many
things going on at once you may have to ease into that
along these roads we've roam we find adventure through traveling camping
boondocking and exploring hello everybody and welcome to vlog-cast
episode number 77 my name is Russ and I'm Kerry and we are The Roads We Roam
today we are an Elephant Butte State Park in New Mexico, another wonderful day
out here it's always nice and sunny out here ...we're gonna go exploring today
You went down to Truth or Consequences which is a town right by here ...we've
been there a couple of times recently but only in that ..like business area
right off the freeway so if you get off the freeway ...if you're coming through
this area venture past the Walmart / McDonald's area into the old part of
town it's really kind of cool! I mean it's
it's an old town and there's a nice little park down there by the water. There is ....it
looks like a Vietnam Memorial wall at the Veterans the New Mexico State
Veterans Home which they actually have a home there for veterans a lot of cool
things to see. A lot of different colors down there you've got the colorful, you
know, Southwest type of colors down in that city so I look forward to going
through there and really exploring Truth or Consequences out. Plus, I know you said
you found a couple of the ...what are they called... hot springs! that are dog friendly
...a lot of the hotels seem to be and I don't know if you can go in and do the hot
springs for like an hour or two ...I'm wondering what the setup is.. well
hopefully now that I think about it, might be kind of tough getting the dogs
in there, but I think that would be cool. I would love to do that I ...you know even
when we lived in El Paso I always heard about the hot springs here ..... well
we would just have to alternate... because one of the things that I do really miss is a
hot bath... yeah true I know that's why when we're the next place after we leave
Elephant Butte State Park is a resort and we picked that resort because they
have a jacuzzi! Well I was told to find a resort with a jacuzzi ... we
have to review all the different types of RV places
out there so let's try to find one of those routes hey you gotta sell it gotta
sell it you did a very good job. Alright, so moving on .....today I came across the
GoRVing website - is as you know a big marketing brand for RVing industry
to get out there and they had an article called The Four steps to Afford the RV
Lifestyle. I was wondering if you thought it would be fun where we could
go through some of these and then...yeah definitely, definitely
especially now that we've been on the road for a little bit we'll see what
they're saying and see if how well we rank or if we agree or disagree. Well
that was what I was thinking if we both had the same perceptions of where we're
at or how well we did, so the....... this was coming from Michele from the Finance
and Lifestyle blog, Making Sense of Cents... okay... they had approached her and asked
her if people should know ...who is "they"? Um, GoRVing...ok gotcha
okay GoRVing approached this blog to write this article
because a lot of people are wondering "is it possible"? hmm So she came up with four....
She said the first thing is be realistic about your budget ....so when we were first
starting and when this harebrained idea popped into our heads ....yeah, so here's my
deal with that right off the bat being realistic about your budget you really
even though we watched a lot of youtubers and we report on it as well,
everybody lives a little bit differently everybody has a little bit different
circumstances I think it's really hard to be realistic about your your budget... I
think this is more of the budget of the RV ...okay so yeah I
mean definitely there are different decisions I remember you and I went
through a bunch of decisions, are we going to buy an older RV for cash...
are we going to buy an older Class A, B or C for cash... are we going to
finance one.... are we going to finance a cheaper one ...are we going to buy a more
expensive one .....you and I went through a bunch of different scenarios
before we finally settled on our Little Guy Max.... we had
even thought rebuilds.... yup rebuilds! There was this one truck that
could be converted over ...I remember you even went down and test drove it ..
they used it for trade shows and they put clothes in it and it was like a
traveling office... exactly, we went through the gamut. We looked at
schoolies, retrofitting a busm we looked at everything! And really, we had bounced
back and forth multiple times.. A,B, or C travel trailers, build our
own, A, B or C travel trailers, build our own A, B or C travel trailer or build our own.......
and it was almost weekly we had decided what it was we wanted ....and that
was it and then it would change! Really I think what it came down to ,for us, we had
to..... because we fell in love with a lot.... we really did, but really we had to
look at what our budget was - for that - and what could we really do so that we could
still be sustainable while we got started you know... kind of started yeah, and
then also the type of room we needed and how we needed it.....and I think really,
when it came down to our decision on the Little Guy Max ....because it was a little
bit higher than what we had originally decided to do but it came down to value.
I mean because some we could have gotten into a $17,000 unit...
bigger than this.. but the quality just didn't seem like it was
there. We have hardwood here, we have such great detailing and
all this stuff, plus the way we felt.... we asked ourselves a lot of times
you know this isn't just a weekend deal here we are going to be in this thing
24/7. We would also be heavy, hard users but also we factored in we
were not experienced RVers so I think one of the biggest factors that
came into play was.... let's start off simple, so we looked for quality & we looked
for simple, and then we looked for something that was within a price range
that we knew we could afford. Some of them...... I look at some of
these plans when you go through where they break it down for a 20 year loan or
15 year loan and you don't know if you'll be in it for that long... one of the
things that we've noticed around campgrounds is that as soon as you
get one RV you're already shopping for the next....that's true! I'm happy
right now, but it's definitely something you have
to put a lot of thought into because everything will trickle down from there.
So I think we did..... we picked what, to us.......versus what we needed,
what we liked ,value-based and what we could afford, this fit that all those
measures, so I think we did well in that category and I would agree with that you
definitely have to be able to.... you don't want to jump into something
that you can't afford later on down the road..... well, and I think the biggest thing
and what do you feel about this..... you have to think of what your life will be like once you are on the road
think of that before you pick your RV
don't do it the other way around. It's so tough knowing though, I mean you
have this this this idea, this perception of what it is and then reality hits you
it's so different, I mean I don't care how many videos you
watch, how many people you talk to, that the perception is always
different than the reality. when I was watching these youtube videos my
idea of living on the road was..... I don't know... like a vacation, it felt
like a vacation, everyday, and it really isn't.......and I think
one of the .....where I'm getting at is there's a lot of work to do what we do
so had I realized... if I had in my mind I was thinking there's a
lot more work I might have looked at something, maybe, that provided us a
little bit better way to work .... but I mean I overall, very happy with
this unit, it fits us. So number two.... is to create a monthly travel budget. So that's
where you were at the beginning ...that is -
really, we did not do very well with that at the beginning. Well, it's
it's a known phenomena, I guess, you know first off it was in the holidays so we
knew we wanted to go see ....worst time ever to start.... probably! You don't want to do it in
the holidays because you are traveling... we went to Tennessee to see family aand went
to Florida to see family and now we're heading back Southwest, but the
other thing too is when you get into this you're excited - rightly so - it's an
amazing lifestyle and you want to get out, you want to start doing what you've been
seeing people to do and what you've been reading about people doing ....and it's
difficult not to try to live like you're on vacation. We are just
now, I think four months in, getting over that feeling of wanting to be here,
wanting to go there, I think we had a good realization there was just .....we
would be in places like Florida or Louisiana
and we're like "oh we've got to do that, we've got to do this, oh we've got to go here"
and we just didn't have enough time and then it just hit us..... look, this isn't.. this
isn't one and done, we're going to be back here again, we're going be
living this lifestyle for a while, so you don't have to try to get everything done.
It's very easy to say that in reality.. it's very difficult to do that in the
beginning and it's going to take a while once you get on the road to to buckle
down and make your travel budget and stick with that if you plan
for that. And as you said, we're about four months in I think now it's just
starting to slow down a little bit - that excitement. But budget for..... I would
say at least the first three months ....so real quick, you said something that I
didn't want people to kind of to be misleading.. it is still ....every day is
exciting, what we're doing, but that excitement to 'have to' get here we 'have
to' go there... that excitement...it goes away. It took about four months for us.
Anyways, we don't feel that compulsion to have to do every
tourist attraction and get to a different place...
you know how before I kept saying how I'm itchin... want to go, I wanna go, that was because I
wanted to see stuff, I wanted to experience all this stuff and
now we're slowing down a little bit, just so that we can experience more, but what's
interesting and I'm finding we are more drawn to kind of the non-major touristy
things now....when you sit down and you talk to the locals and you have a
little bit of time to spend in an area you get to find all these cute little
nuggets like you just said you drove into town this morning just past the
freeway where most people just kind of pop in there and then go and continue on
when there's this cute little Main
Street area with all these different things that we get to explore......
exactly, and really here's the thing that I was missing .....in my mind I
gotta go, gotta go, gotta go, gotta see, gotta see...... it got
well when you're going you really don't see a lot and you you can't
slow down to see. The fact that we spent a week in City of Rocks, we
really got to look around City of Rocks State Park, we really got to look around
Silver City we really got to look around Deming you know and if we were just
coming and going we would have never experienced all that stuff so I think
once your mind realizes that hey when I slow down I actually get to see more yes
you know so and that's where we are right now well and at the beginning we
also had that comfort level with staying at the higher priced campgrounds yeah
and we didn't know a lot and we didn't use our comfort zone as well as eating
out we weren't used to cooking in here full time yeah so getting used to that
so now four months in we are able to now plan our travels but with a budget
because we know how we are living yeah you make a great point there too and
that's something to plan ahead of time to when it says travel plan your travel
budget you know you have these ideas we're gonna go boondock all the time at
least we had this idea we're gonna moon dock we're gonna stay here we're gonna
do that well once you get on the road it might not fit your comfort style there's
so many things going on at once you may have to ease into that so allow for that
allow for the fact that hey even though I have written down on my
first month I am gonna boondock 27 days it may not you may not like that you
know right it may you may be uncomfortable with that you know and so
just allow for movement and for growth you know we take we've been taking baby
steps baby steps so I would think at the beginning you have a much bigger budget
and yeah I think it's smart when you come into that exactly have a big budget
in the beginning or a larger budget in the beginning and slowly shave that down
and if you don't use it that's great because then you can spread it out later
on yeah but have it there just in case yeah
especially if you're a newbie RV or you know if you've been doing a lot of
weekend warrior warrior ring yeah I don't even know if that's a word but you
know you may not have some of these concerns that we had you know but just
something to think about okay so moving on number three find ways to save so
this built on to that because now that you are used to your travel your 3-4
months and you know how you travel you know how you live yeah I think that's
when you can really reassess what things you can or cannot cut back on and here's
here's the thing too you know and we've said this before we are not trying to
save every single penny that we can yeah we we don't want to live extravagantly
but then again we're not that's not our mission to see how how much money or how
you know less money we can live on but yeah I mean when you can save definitely
save you know even the small things you know like I mentioned it in our day and
the life thing where we keep the extra packets of condiments that's nothing you
know but everything together kind of like that Elan must thing that I was
talking about the totality of all these small things build up well it just made
me think when we first started we kind of we're trying to think where we can
cut back on everything and you with your the deodorant yeah
Russ thought he could just buy the like the really cheap deodorant and save
money and was it a spray one at first yeah I don't remember it's just you know
he went away from we're not talking like dollar store no name
you know stuff but I went away from stuff that I normally used you know and
it just I didn't like it you know I think I went through three different
brands and three different types of deodorant that I didn't even use and
ended up thrown away so I end up spending more money cuz I went right I
went right back to what I was used to so you keep the things that make you happy
partying comfortable if you go into this lifestyle where you choose to do it like
we have where it's something you want to do you keep the things that are
important to you but you can cut back on the things that really don't matter yeah
I think things like that I mean here's the big money sabers stop going out to
eat you know man we had one month where we were like
eleven hundred and thirty five dollars and we knocked it down to six hundred
and nine you know the following month so that's a great way to save money those
are things that yeah you may want you may crave but man I could think of a
hundred things that that you know four hundred dollars would do you know better
than having a cheeseburger or something you know and if I want a cheeseburger
just go buy it I'll buy the ingredients and we'll make it so yeah there are
definitely ways to save money and you know this food is probably one
of the more important ones to look at because you want to have money to go out
and do the things you don't want to say oh I'm not gonna go visit this
attraction because it costs $15 you know you you rather I'd rather cut out
fast-food Starbucks for two days but there are definitely ways that you can
curb your expenses so that it helps keep you within whatever budget that you've
designed very true and then number four is earn have a plan to earn money on the
road yeah you and I can both earn on the road you know I have
arrangement with my with the company I work with you know and and and but there
are so many different ways you can earn money you can earn money off of YouTube
you can earn money off of doing well they have the sugar beet harvest they
have the Amazon locations that a lot of people work for there's different camp
hosting jobs that you can take I mean I think we could do a whole blog I think
we should there's also up work where if you have a skill maybe you're good at
administration you know maybe you can type 100 words I mean I know is that is
that is that a thing can people type 100 words a minute okay yeah I don't know
I'm not an administrative person you know maybe you have graphics abilities
you know maybe you can do Photoshop you know video editing there are so many
opportunities there's up work there's fibre there's so many different ways to
make money there's a lot of boards to like escapees has work work boards yeah
but if you have a skill or something that you're willing to do there are ways
to be creative to write and I think right now is probably the best time for
somebody that's curious about this lifestyle to kind of take that leap
because so many people can work remotely yeah you know for example in Russ's
situation it just took him talking to his an important to his employer and
working out an arrangement you never know unless you ask yeah
exactly so yeah I think we definitely should do a complete vlog on different
ways to make money on the road now these are things you know we may not be doing
any of them or all of them you know but I think it's a great information and it
would be neat for us to check that out alright guys well that is it for now
if you have any tips any questions any concerns send them to us there's
multiple ways to get a hold of us hold of us at the road to be room calm either
through our contact page or click the orange tab on the right side of any of
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these vlogs they want to catch our podcast
it's lunchtime yeah so you can catch our podcast free podcasts on speaker or
iTunes definitely guys this is what Kerry was talking about our vlog section
it's us talking about different subjects throughout the RV community throughout
the RV world throughout what's going on with us if you want to see some of our
areas that we're going to what we're seeing what we're doing check out our
faces and places playlist we put a video out every Saturday which we go on scene
and you can see that kind of stuff but don't disregard these because there's a
lot of information here that never makes it to those videos then we also have two
opportunities where we get to talk to you live that's Friday night at 8:00
p.m. Eastern and again Sunday at 1:00 p.m. Eastern both of those are on
YouTube and then Fridays we have kind of our wildcard video you know we put a
video out it could be a tour video it could be tips or how to camp are cooking
with Kerry I know we've got several of those scheduled that we just need to
shoot but there's a lot of good stuff out there feel free to check it out
binge on it I think we've got over a hundred videos now if you have any
questions about today's topic if you're thinking about going full-time we'd love
to hear from you but also anybody else that's watching that is even just a
part-timer and you have questions for us please reach out to us we would love to
hear from you

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Vlog Episode 077 4 Steps to Afford the RV Lifestyle

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