For many RVer's rent is a big expense. Boondocker's, of course, get free or super-cheap rent depending on where they boondock. Rent is a big ticket item in our budget, although not the biggest. The cost of our medical insurance is almost double our rent budget...but that is best left for another posting.
We don't track our every cost for the purposes of my blog. There are bloggers galore that will give you the details on every penny spent....and they do a great job of it and it is a great service to those considering an RV lifestyle. I just thought I'd share the details regarding how much we had spent on this current trip over the past few months. Tumwater to Tumwater, so to speak.
Thursday was a good day for sitting indoors. We received off-and-on rain showers courtesy of Mother Nature. Bruce put pencil to paper and utilized the calculator to get me the information I was seeking. While he did that I began the job of sorting some photos for Zoey's scrapbook album I'm making for her.
We budget $500.00 per month for our RV rent budget. Some months may be way under that figure so we just "bank" that money in our rent account and keep it for a time when we need that extra for someplace special. (i.e. San Francisco or Los Angeles area where rents can be $250 per week in some parks)
According to our travel itinerary we will have been gone for 100 nights this time. Unless something strange happens we will be back to our homebase in Tumwater on the 101st day. So what were our rent expenses this time? I'm going to eliminate our 2 weeks at Walt Disney World because that space rent there is out of sight and we do not spend that kind of money anyplace else. So, I will deduct those 14 days at WDW and that leaves 86 days to account for. Our time at WDW was paid for out of a special "vacation fund" we had just for that space of time.
Total cost of rent expense for the 86 days: $1,332.38
Daily average cost: $15.49
Breakdown:
Walmart "camping" or casino "camping" = 5 days
Parks found in Trailer Life Directory, etc. = 49 days
Membership campgrounds in our program = 32 days
We had declared a specific itinerary for this journey because we wanted to travel on Hwy. 50 from Virginia to Nevada/California border. In doing this, we saw that we would have only a few opportunities to stay at free or cheap membership parks. So, that upped our rent expense because we could not utilize as many "free" full hook-up parks as we would have liked. That happens sometimes because we want to go where we want and not only to where the "free" parks are.
When we get back to Tumwater we plan to return to our same old broken down park. It is NOT the Taj Mahal but it works nicely because it is so close to our kids and the things we do there. Our monthly rent is $405.00 per month with 50 am electric. No metered electric at this point anyway. That amount of $405.00 is still under our budgeted figure. We will be going down to Pismo Coast Village RV Resort (California) in September for about 7 weeks and we get free rent there.....so we can bank a bit more in the budget during that time.
Our expenses as fulltime RVer's are not that different from when we owned a sticks-n-bricks home. We paid site rent at the 55+ park we lived in even though we owned the actual home on the property. That rent was a little bit over $500.00 per month. The amount we paid in utilities for electric, gas, and water just goes for propane and satellite TV service now. Our medical insurance premiums are the same. Our food budget is the same. Our fuel budget is a lot bigger, since we have to account for diesel. We no longer have the $100.00 per month in RV storage fees. Cell phone service costs the same (we did not have a land line at our home). Cable TV was covered in our rent. Our RV/car insurance is a little bit more because we got covered with a fulltime RV insurance policy. We no longer have to pay any homeowner/fire insurance. We spend the same amount on restaurants and miscellaneous items like clothing, hair cuts, etc. Our monthly expenses for Annie the Schnauzer are the same now as they would be no matter where we lived.
So you get the picture with our budget. It isn't a full accounting of every penny we spend, just an overview of how our budget compares to that of 2 years ago. We aren't high-living folks and we try to save when and where we can. This was an expensive year since we've had 2 cross country trips within 12 months. So, the next 12 to 15 months we plan on many "free parks" and less miles driven. This will make savings in the rent and the fuel budgets.
If you have any questions, feel free to ask. The comment box is wide open for everyone.
Annie enjoyed her rainy day of rest, too. Heck, she enjoys resting on rainy days, sunny days, and snowy days. She doesn't mind any of it. She has no money worries!
Until next time......so long for now!
8 comments:
Thanks for the information on campground expenses. It helps in making future plans.
Margie thanks for sharing. I know it will be expensive..but this past year has taught us to do without sooo much stuff and how to eat cheap!!
I know God is pre-paring us for even leaner times!
hugs..Cindy and Walker
Margie,
Isn't there a fee for your membership parks? That surely must be considered rent. I'd be interested to know those costs.
Also, how horrible was the rent at Disney?
Interesting post. :)
Since starting to fulltime 2/1/10 I do keep track of "almost" every cent. It has been a very expensive 5 months- most of it my fault. I thought I had examined everything but made a severe error in "domiciling" in Texas.
We found insurances of fiver and truck to be prohibitive. We also paid a lot to register them and joined a mail service. We changed "domiciles" to South Dakota and will realize major savings down the road. However, the costs of going to Texas THEN fuel to SD and registering vehicles in Texas for what amounted to 2 months, is money lost.
Then the accident and $500 deductible. Even though the costs of housing was cheaper for the months in Louisiana, the cost of food was substantial. As we stayed with Len's Mom during days, we provided meals for our relief most nights. Also, they had a Crawfish boil and our costs for that day alone was over $400.
We are trusting our expenses will lessen now. However, we need new tires on truck. Current ones almost 12 months old with 22k miles. Little tread left. Sears is helping us put in claim to Goodyear. We hope they will do right by us.
We will see what lies ahead money wise. Can only get better, right?
Interesting info, Margie, thanks for posting. It was kind of funny to see Bruce using a pencil and paper to figure out the budget. I haven't seen anyone doing that for a while.
That's valuable information that you posted, Margie. During this economic lean time, we all need to be aware of costs. There are always ways to spend a little less, but some bills have to be paid no matter what. You posted good, practical information!
Judy and Emma: Thanks for your question re: membership CG costs. I'll post info on that for tomorrow since you've asked.
Rick: We've used the same budget format since the early 80's so I guess "why change now?" is the thinking here. :)
Margie,
Thanks for the information about budgets. One always wonder how they are doing with the budget they set up and it is good to compare thoughts about budget.
Glad your trip went according to plan.
Take care and be safe.
Mike & Gerri
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