OUR 2015 TIFFIN PHAETON 36GH - We finally closed the deal.

 It was a Long Road but we finally closed the deal on the RV. We purchased from Lazy Days RV in Tampa Florida. This is our 3rd RV and we did a mountain of research and found the one that we feel is fitting us very well. 

Next thing we needed - Our Tow Vehicle

 We are towing a 2021 Chevy Tahoe, High Country. I know what you will say. "That is a HUGE Vehicle to tow." but we want the space to be able to take what we need and travel in style, including having the space we need to take others with us. Here are the Details of our Setup. 

1. Avail Blue Ox Tow Bar (10,000lb) rated Tow Bar. 

2. Blue Ox Base Plate specifically for our 2021 Chevy Tahoe.

3. Demco Air Force One Air Brake System. 

4. 10,000lb 2" drop/raise hitch extender. 

These components were all professionally installed on both our RV and our Tahoe. 

Our Vehicles. 

1. 2021 Chevy Tahoe High Country - GVWR 7500lbs,  Curb Weight is 6039lbs. This means that as long as I do not have a major load in my Tahoe, which we typically will have no passengers, possibly a full tank of gas (22gals @8lbs per gallon 176lbs) other fluids we estimate our load in the Tahoe to be about 500lbs to be safe, so 6539lbs to be safe)

2. 2015 Tiffin Phaeton - Tow Capacity of 10,000lbs. Which means we are well within the tow capacity of the RV and in a safe range of the towing components. 

We should be good to tow and be safe doing it. 

The first thing we upgraded, IMMEDIATELY in a Used RV - The Mattress

 If you bought new then you may be OK. but most RVs mattresses are not that comfortable. If you are buying a Used RV, you may want to replace the mattress right away. We replaced ours even before we finished delivery and inspection. It is one thing to be in a very nice rig and everything is beautiful and looks inviting, and then you get ready to go to bed and it is the most uncomfortable mattress and you wake up and have to go somewhere to get a new mattress or mattress topper. 

Make the choice, change it out and you will be thankful you did. 

Research, Research, and more Research

 The main thing we have found is that it is imperative to do your due diligence to ensure you have as much information as you can get to make the right decisions. Here are some of the things we are considering. 

1. Is it even something that is doable? 

2. What will we miss? (Family, Friends, Stability, a house)

3. Can we afford it?

4. Work, ongoing finance?

5. Size of RV.

6. Affordability of RV.

7. What will we take with us?

8. What to do with our vehicles?

9. What to do with the things we want to Keep?

Right now we are in the stages of "decluttering" going through our house and seeing what we have, seeing those things that we have had in drawers and been storing because someday we will lose weight, or someday we may want to have it. 

We then are making the decision to Sell, Donate or Give away those things we feel are not things we need to keep, or we want to spend money monthly to store. 

Then our vehicles, We have 4 Vehicles. Which of them do we keep and which do we sell? We have a motorcycle, a Golf Cart, and a Boat. Do we sell all of these?

The other thing we are in the middle of is Selling the Motorcycle. I tried to go to Harley-Davidson and as much as they say "we want to buy your motorcycle" they really want to buy it for pennies on the dollar, the exact same model, year and more miles are listed at about $10-$15K higher, so yes they do want to buy your motorcycle for as cheap as possible. Your best bet is to sell it outright. 

We rented a Storage unit to keep the things we want to keep. Our plan is to keep things, and then if we think at some point we need it then we will write it down and then when back in town we will get it out of storage. But we plan to do a 6 month assessment of the things we have in storage to see what else we didn't miss and may be able to get rid of. 

We have been researching RV's and this has been the hardest part. We started by just looking and liking certain models and then we found so many and all the floorplans kinda became similar so we decided to make a NEED, WANT, and DON'T WANT list. This allowed us to really target the things we should focus on when looking. 

NEED are things we have to have. 

WANT are things that if they have or do not have it is not mandatory. If they have it then that is a PLUS.

DON'T WANT are things we would consider a no go for our new home. 

I will publish this list soon but they are specific to what we want and your list may be different. 

Lastly get our house ready to be sold. making sure everything is in order and decluttered and ready to be on the market. 

Qur hope is that we have almost everything in line and answers to our many questions before our house sells. but if it sells right away, then we may be scrambling a little. 

until then it is Research Research Research.

Is it something that is doable? (FULL TIME RVing)

 So, over the past month we have travelled to Flagler beach and Key West on a Trip that was very fun, costly and exhausting. However we love travelling and the places we went were places we had wanted to go for a while. 

We started the planning for this trip the first of the year and for Memorial Day we had a Reserved Spot at Beverly Beach Camptown. A place that is located RIGHT on the Atlantic Ocean just North of Flagler Beach and about 30 miles south of St. Augustine. St. Augustine is by far one of our favorite cities in Florida and I highly recommend it. 

Then after we stayed there we left and headed Straight to Key West, actually Stock Island but its close enough to be confused by non-locals. We stayed at Boyd's Campground.

 Each of these places were on the water and very pricey for a 7 night stay averaged about $183/night. Expensive but while we were there we found that we may have cheaper options and were able to look around and plan for next time. But back to this story. It is about the two of us in our 50's are travelling around Florida.

Here is how it started, when we met later in life we had 3 dogs, we tent camped and loved it, actually both of us have always loved camping, as I was in the Military and was kind of a professional camper (however austere the conditions may have been). My Wife grew up the daughter of a Park Ranger, who lived in multiple Florida State Parks. So it has been a calling for many years and as you get older....you see how life can trap you into mortgages, collecting things and the need to put down roots.

This is great for growing up, however now we are both empty nesters and we have come to a point where the Grand Kids are older and love to camp with us and we have decided it might be time to think about going full time. 

We have a very nice cottage type Florida Home, on the water, our boat on a Boat lift and we enjoy boating and doing the other things that our neighborhood has to offer. we also frequently travel as we have a Travel Trailer and it is used regularly. Our next two Trips are to Sebring, Florida (Highlands Hammock State park) and then to Florida Caverns State Park in Northern Florida. 

However because of our last trip we were missing the location we left down in Key West and got the bug to maybe move there. So we started looking at property. This was not necessarily a HUGE Shock but the prices are just outside of our budget and of course we have a lot of constraints and it makes for even a harder time to find something. 

With that information in hand, since we are in Florida already we also decided to look at houses near us, and again the prices are so high that it is again not that great of an option to get into a huge mortgage for 30 years on something that we wouldn't be able to retire on. 

So we decided to explore our options and so we contacted our Realtor and decided to get a rough estimate on what our house would go for with the market being so good. We are currently waiting on the information from her, and once we have that we may be able to think about a House or the other option we have is going FULL TIME RVing.