Why we decided to become full-time RVers
So what led us to take the plunge and leave our beloved 2,500 sq. ft. house and amazing neighbors and friends to travel in a 400 sq. ft. RV??
Well … A lot of things.
We’ve always loved traveling. Exploring new places and experiencing new things have been passions of ours since we met. Our kids share that love! With both of us working from home, we have the freedom of being our own bosses, making our own schedules and being able to work remotely!
Some of our former neighbors had bought a new house and decided to keep and rent out their house in our neighborhood, and when we found out how much rent they were getting for it, it got our wheels turning. Could WE charge that much rent for OUR house? What if WE rented our house for a while and experienced a different way of life for a while?!
We have two families we are friends with who are full time RVers. We have LOVED seeing all the fun pics and videos of their amazing adventures and travels. One family has 3 kids and the other has 2, so that showed us it’s definitely feasible with children! And not only feasible but an awesome opportunity. What an experience for kids to learn about U.S. geography and history FIRSTHAND— in person. They will get an opportunity to actually visit the places that most kids (including us growing up) only get to read about and view pictures of.
Leaving behind the hustle and bustle. All of our local commitments are GOOD things that we have enjoyed tremendously. Kid’s practices and games, church events, birthday parties, work events … but they can easily consume your entire week. Imagining a little break from regular life, and picturing our evenings relaxing in nature, visiting national parks and monuments, and exploring the entire country at our own pace started to look really enticing. We will enjoy coming back to our commitments again, because they are all good things that we enjoy, but hitting the Pause and Reset button is going to be good for us. Lastly, we realized it had been YEARS since we’ve been able to see a LOT of family and life-long friends on the West Coast. This trip will enable us to not only see them very soon, but also gives us the chance to meet a niece and nephew in CA that we’ve only seen pictures of.
These were the thoughts that led us to take steps
to see if this could become a reality.
Lauren is a BIG Time researcher, so she started researching everything she could about RV life. Following a lot of full timers on Instagram gave us a better picture of what life on the road is really like. We made a list of everything we’d need to figure out to make this happen.
First on the list was what do we do with our house? Our cars? All our STUFF?? Read about that HERE!
When looking at other families that were full time RVers, we loved seeing how they made such a small space so homey and how living smaller enabled them to live LARGER and experience so much!
3 reasons why We felt like our family was a good candidate
for this lifestyle.
We get along really well.
Aaron and I already share an office at home. We truly are best friends and really LIKE living and working closely together! I know this isn’t the case with all couples, but since we’re already used to spending a lot of time together in our home office, spending a lot of time in an RV together wouldn’t be that different (but let’s be real, just today we both did something that made the other one say … “THIS is why I need my own office”) .
Casen and Calista are pretty close in age (19 months apart) and have always been close. They love being together, and share a LOT of the same interests. Of course, they have moments where they pester one another, but for the most part, they love being together.
We’re a pretty low maintenance family.
We have never been the family that has the newest and nicest things. We get most of our clothing and furniture second hand… we don’t spend a lot of money in general. I got my cosmetology license in 2003 and do the whole family’s hair (including my own). We love being outdoors and aren’t scared of getting dirty. We try to live pretty simple lives, and feel like downsizing and getting rid of stuff we really don’t need will be very freeing.
All four of us absolutely love adventure.
All four of us really share the same adventurous spirits. We LOVE being outdoors. Hiking, biking, swimming, exploring, being tourists in new places… all of these things are some of our favorite things to do. Our family bucket list is going to have a lot more check marks on it after this year of adventure, and we couldn’t be more excited!