Wednesday, November 19, 2014

Don't Blow It All At Once

Here's the skinny on buying a motor home.

If you have twenty thousand to spend, don't. The additional costs add up until you wonder when the "hidden costs" will end.

As a beginner RV owner, I'm learning things I never thought existed, besides the obvious things like outfitting the rig. Gone are the days you live with one spoon, one pint pot, one cup, a pepsi can stove.
You are allowed to own a regular cotton towel. Even two.
You can have pillows. With an s. More than one. I have eight at present. My daughter gave me three of them, so I'm guilty of buying five.

There's a closet for dress boots. I'm talking the kind that have heels and zip up the side.
You'll want real soap, some shampoo, pajamas.
Wow, its like owning a HOME.

Wait. This is a motor HOME. I get it now. We drive the home.

Ok, the list of things associated with motors first.

Insurance. Full coverage so if/when you take your rig on the road and crash it or someone else, you're covered. I got the full year coverage. Because I've been with my company so long and have an excellent driving record, very doable, in fact, full coverage on this 34 foot rig cost less than twice what liability cost on the Geo. Yeah.

Then, tags. Idaho does calendar year tags and prorated for the 6 weeks of this year remaining. The fact my rig is older made the tags less expensive than a full blown luxury model. Cha-ching. Frugality wins again.

There were taxes paid at the dealership. I've heard you get around that by buying in Montana. Nope. Pay your state taxes and suck it up.
Next, a docking free. I guess that's all about the feds keeping track who owns this sort of thing.
Then, transfer of title. Not bad, only 14 bucks.

I decided on Triple A. Why not? If I needed this baby towed for whatever reason, or locked myself out of the one door, I'd have help. Thanks AAA, nice to know my back is covered.

By only spending a portion of my available budget, these costs have not sent me into bankruptcy yet. Yet. Fingers crossed. Job seeking in full swing.

Stay tuned for the list of HOME related expenses.





2 comments:

  1. If you have not already you might take a look at http://www.technomadia.com/rving/ They have been on the road a number of years and have learned some good stuff and there blog is entertaining. They also helped set up http://www.rvillage.com/ which is a social site for the young rv set. Generally full timers.

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  2. Thanks for the links, eriko, the Young RV set, which are full timers? interesting, usually you find its the older folks that are full timers.

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