Your Guide to Everything with a Motor
Recreational Vehicles (RVs)
Deciding On The Purchase Of A Motor Home
Mar 30th
Word Count:
455
Summary:
The purchase of a motor home isn’t to be taken lightly. There are several different types of “motor homes” on the market and each one is different in size, features and price.
The best known type of motor home is the recreational vehicle. This is known as a Type A motor home. The roomiest of motor homes, the largest and therefore the most expensive. Motor homes come in sizes up to 45 feet. They come with all the luxurious amenities you could imagine. Some have washer and …
Keywords:
The purchase of a motor home isn’t to be taken lightly. There are several different types of “motor homes” on the market and each one is different in size, features and price.
The best known type of motor home is the recreational vehicle. This is known as a Type A motor home. The roomiest of motor homes, the largest and therefore the most expensive. Motor homes come in sizes up to 45 feet. They come with all the luxurious amenities you could imagine. Some have washer and dryer, hardwood floors, granite counter tops, luxury leather furniture, plasma TV’s with satellite, custom stained glass and some even have large garden tub/showers. They range between $85,000 used and $400,000 for a new motor home. They generally get between 5 and 8 miles per gallon. Some of the newer larger models get around 5 miles per gallon. These sleep up to six people.
A Type B motor home category includes van campers and travel trailers. The van campers generally range from 18 feet to 22 feet in length and can comfortable sleep four. A fully contained van camper can have a shower, toilet, kitchen, TV, couches and beds. The beds are closer together affording less privacy. Most only have enough head room to allow for full standing in the center of the vehicle. Much smaller than the Type A motor homes they have less storage area. The van campers range in price between $43,000 and $70,000.
Travel trailers come in sizes 16 feet to 38 feet. The range in price from $6,000. for a used trailer upwards to $45,000 for a new travel trailer. You can generally find a fairly wide range of amenities in travel trailers. The larger the size the more you can sleep and the more likely you will be to have a private bedroom area.
A lot of travelers like the fact that they can park their trailer in a trailer park and take their vehicle touring the area. It does however take lots of practice learning how to properly drive with a travel trailer hitched to the back of your SUV.
Talk with friends and family who already own motor homes. One of the first things to do is to decide what type of traveling you and your family are most likely to do. Do you plan to spend one week vacationing in one spot? A travel trailer might be for you. Do you plan to visit a different spot each day, overnighting in different areas? Then a recreational vehicle might be for you. However, if the price of gas and the thought of filling up a 100 gallon gas tank on a vehicle that gets 5 to 8 miles per gallon isn’t for you, you may want to re-think the choice of a recreational vehicle.
Camping In A RV For Fun And Pleasure
Mar 25th
Word Count:
513
Summary:
Camping for most people means a tent and sleeping on a mat on the ground. If that doesn’t really appeal to you, then camping in an RV is what you need. It is the ultimate camping adventure.
RV’s come in many sizes and shapes. They start with campers that fit in the back of a pickup truck. These can have full kitchens, beds, a shower and toilet in them.
Next there are van conversions called Class B motorhomes that are basically a cargo van converted into a camping vehi…
Keywords:
camping,travel,trailers,motor homes,camp sites,camping gear,campsite reservations,hiking
Camping for most people means a tent and sleeping on a mat on the ground. If that doesn’t really appeal to you, then camping in an RV is what you need. It is the ultimate camping adventure.
RV’s come in many sizes and shapes. They start with campers that fit in the back of a pickup truck. These can have full kitchens, beds, a shower and toilet in them.
Next there are van conversions called Class B motorhomes that are basically a cargo van converted into a camping vehicle. These can have a raised roof for more head room. They also contain the same amenities as the truck camper.
Next up is the Class C motorhome. The front end looks like a pickup truck, but the similarity ends there. There is a sleeper extension over the cab and the back end looks like any motorhome you are probably familiar with. Basically a cargo box with windows, but much prettier. The Class C has all the amenities of home. A kitchen, bathroom, bedroom and living room. You could live in a Class C.
The next step us is the Class A motorhome. This is roomiest of all motorized RVs. These motorhomes are like a mini one bedroom apartment. They are fully self contained. From the queen sized bed to the dinette that seats four people you find luxury. A refrigerator and stove are complimented by a microwave oven. You might even have an ice maker capable of making over 20 pounds of ice a day. Party ready!
If that weren’t enough choices, there are still the trailers. First is the travel trailer you can pull behind a larger sedan or SUV. Then the 5th wheel trailer that hooks into the back of a pickup truck. Both of these trailers are equally as luxuriant as the best motorhome. An advantage is they cost a lot less.
You can buy new or used. Whichever way you choose, you should do a lot of research on the internet first. Learn all you can about RVing. There are RV forums that you can find by doing a search in your favorite search engine.
When you decide that an RV might be for you, attend an RV show or two. There are major RV shows at fairgrounds and stadiums where many dealers and vendors are selling every type of RV there is. There are also local RV shows usually put on by one or two dealers to show and sell some of their inventory.
If you really are not sure you would like to spend $40,000 or $250,000 on a hobby you are not sure you would like, buy a used RV. You can get into RVing in a 34 foot used Class A motorhome for under $10,000.
The older and larger the motorhome the less fuel efficient it will be. You may get 5 to 7 miles per gallon on many older motorhomes. 7-9 mpg is realistic for mid 1990′s motorhomes and up to 12 miles a gallon on new ones.
Camping in an RV is a fun adventure awaiting you and your family.
Buying an RV – Take some Advice
Mar 19th
Word Count:
825
Summary:
A look at what you need to think about before you buy an RV.
Keywords:
RV, RV’s, RVer’s, Recreational Vehicles, Vacation, RV rental, RV vacation, RV hire, buying an RV
I fancy buying an RV darling. Ok Honey, go out and get one and we can spend all our vacation time in it and have great fun. Wrong, very wrong. Do not buy an RV if this is how you are thinking. Your RV will just be a waste of money.
Buying an RV is an important decision and something the whole family needs to be involved in. An RV is also an investment, an investment in time and cost but you will not see a profit on an RV, well not in financial terms but it can have a huge payback in terms of satisfaction and enjoyment but if you just rush out and buy an RV without giving it a lot of thought then it could be, at best, an expensive waste of money, and an RV can be, at worst, a marriage breaker. I know as I have seen it happen.
When we were trading up to a larger and newer RV, my sister in law from Atlanta decided she was going to buy our old RV. The trouble was it was her idea and not a joint family decision. She had been on vacation with us a few times and liked the lifestyle, thought it would be great for her daughter to spend more time in the countryside but she never really considered if her husband wanted an RV. He was the type who would choose a sports car to drive without thinking of where his daughter was going to sit. He liked speed, acceleration and easy maneuvering, not something you tend to find with an RV. It lasted a few years with him being unhappy with all his vacations in the RV, he bumped into a few trucks and did some damage to the RV, (which I had to repair), and was just generally unhappy with the whole idea of having a vacation in an RV. It got to the stage of seriously damaging their marriage. What went wrong? Well my sister-in-law did not sit down and really think about an RVers lifestyle.
Think about it, RVs can be small, they can be cramped compared to your house, RVs can be hard to drive and you can end up spending all your vacation just driving around. What she should have done is to rent an RV first to try things out. This way she could easily have seen if owning an RV was going to work.
So what do you look for when renting an RV.? Well I would think the most important is where it is at. Pick the area you would like to vacation in and they look for somewhere to rent one from. Think about how you are going to get there. Driving allows you to take more things with you than flying, so if you are flying then you may need to make sure that you rent an RV which comes fully equipped as some do not have things such as kitchen utensils in them or towels and so on, although many companies will supply these but sometimes they come at a price.
What about the size of your RV from small to large. I suppose this depends on what you want to achieve. If you are a family then you need a larger RV and so on. Just make sure that everything you need is available but remember this may mean extra rental cost. Do you want to tow a car behind your RV.? Some companies will let you, some will not and if you are in a hire car, does the hire company allow it to be towed behind an RV. Is the RV you want to rent capable of towing a large car or only a small car? These questions could go on but the best people to answer them are the RV rental company you are dealing with. They are the RV experts so ask them.
I could go on with information like this but it is just commonsense. Think about where you are going to vacation in your RV, think about how to get there, think about your RV in terms of size, think about the equipment you need for your RV, think about pets in the RV if you have a pet and think about who to rent your RV from. Get several quotes from RV rental companies and then compare them and read the fine detail to see what you get for the price and what extra you need to spend.
Once you have done all this pick a suitable RV to rent and a suitable company to rent your RV from and then just do it. Once you have tried renting an RV you will then have a much better idea if being an RV owner is for you and can then make the commitment to buy an RV Good luck and just enjoy it. I do.
