Did you pay cash for your RV, so no payments on it for you? Or did you finance it but already pay it off? Congratulations! Feels good, eh?
Or are you making payments?
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Purchased our class A diesel pusher new in 2004 and financed it with 1% interest loan. Seven years to go but my husband is 78 and ready to give it up. We’re full timers and I would like to continue but he wants to settle. Will need to find someone willing to pay at least balance to stay out of the hole
Paid cash in 2015 a month before I retired for a 32′ Jayco. We average 1 week per month use.
Had intended to buy a diesel pusher but the lack of quality at the price point made the decision for us this year.
Instead bought a “Snowbird” house in a Del Webb retirement village in Florida 2 bed 2 1/2 ba with a saltwater pool on the 8th Fairway Gulf Side & paid cash for that.
Can’t get the wife to unload the primary residence since it would mean not being close enough to run the kids lives with her interference.
Paid cash for our 2016 5th wheel, which we live in full time. Sorry kids and grandkids, no inheritance, we spend your money on ourselves. Work 3 jobs like we did.
PS: as far as storage, one option is an RV garage on your home, which is the way most of the homes here in our area of Utah are built. Keeps the sun off and you can plug in and use for whatever you want.
FYI, I’ve not seen any indication that with the proposed income tax changes, interest on mortgages (or second homes) is not going to be deductible. State and local taxes yes. Both tax plans I’ve looked at dont seem to have that change. I’m not sure that would fly or be popular. Obviously that would impact finance vs buy outright. As one person already mentioned, the newer (and more expensive) the RV, the more likely to be financed.
We dreamed of a Prevost,
Then settled for a Paid For.
Been there, done that. How would you truly enjoy anything that you may not truly need, while making monthly payments on it?
Paid cash for 2016 Airstream.
Enjoyed a full year of comfort in it.
$125,000 Cdn.
Selling it now, as wife has said “Enough.”.
(After more than ten years of RVING. )
Age has caught up with us. DRAT!????
We just bought our first trailer. (28’) Only used it twice so far with a trip to the coast coming up. We did it all wrong. Should have rented first but here we are at 67 and 80 starting this new adventure. Husband doesn’t do much of the driving so we hope to get as much out of it over the next few years before age really catches up with us!
Couldn’t afford to pay cash. Left the money in my Roth IRA holding dividend paying stocks. Dividends at 4.5% versus 3.99 on the MH loan, not counting the stocks appreciating in value.
By the way, when shopping for a MH loan, if your credit is good, ask your bank to match the lowest interest you can find on the internet. Mine did.
Of further interest, especially from those who paid cash would be: how much did you pay and/or how old was the RV?
My 2016 Airstream, (30′ flying Cloud) was $125,000 Cdn.
Currently one year old, going on two.
Jon,
We bought our 5th wheel brand new in 2012 for $15000.00 Paid cash as we were on SS and can’t afford any payments..even using our RV takes planing and budget manipulation.
We are 77 and 69 and will not stop RVing. Love it and go crazy when we are sitting home
Instead of being in Quartzite to Grand Teton, etc.
When we purchased our 2014 Travel Trailer, we only put half down because the payment would only be $175 per month and the interest was tax deductible. Now that the interest may no longer be a deduction, we’ll probably pay the rest off. We’ll have to see what happens…….
We bought our 2011 Wind River outright. Wonderful trailer built strong and tight. Lived in it last summer workamping in Michigan with no problems.
Started with a run out 1958 bus and built mine from the ground. Now , a lot of years later, a very reliable RV with all the latest toys. Guess we really made payments over the years by purchasing things as we constructed it!
We have a 20 yr loan and less than a year in but have talked about paying it off so we won’t have a payment. We still are paying for our house too. The combined mortgage interest helps at tax time when all the rest of the deductions are added in. We usually deduct more than the proposed standard deduction increase .
Maybe I should modify my previous comment – we will have RV payment as long as we continue RVing, or until the second home interest tax deduction is no longer available, or we stop any business use of the RV, or some combination thereof. We don’t have car or house payments.
Actually, I don’t know how long is left on our loan – i figure we will have RV payments for as long as we continue RVing. They are built in to our budget.
Paid cash for our first 2 Class A’s. Now paying on a 20 year loan for our high end 2015 diesel pusher. Cashed in my stocks for an annuity for a monthly check that pays for the loan. And we use it.
I think Bob’s comment on RV storage lots is ‘right-on’. I’d say more money is spent on RV storage rental than on camp sites.
First came the big storage locker businesses where you rent a ‘garage’ to store the stuff you bought but have no room in your house or apartment for. Then more recently, the big boom is in RV storage lots. Everyone rushing out to get in on the RV boom and factoring in the cost of storing their new toy because they have no room to store it at their house (or apartment). I wish I had the money to buy and create an RV storage lot near me. I’d just sit back and collect the rental money. Get in front of the ‘movement’ and let it overtake me . . .
Bought ours, a 2001 CrossRoads 32ft travel trailer, about a year and a half ago from the original owners and they babied this trailer. They made us an offer and we wrote them a check the next day.
Could pay for it but taking that much money out of my IRA makes me pay a lot of tax. Cheaper to pay 5% interest and keep compounding interest tax free in my IRA.
Friday’s discussion about crowding is right on target. We are currently in central California, staying at a park for another month before heading for other states. Yes, there are times it is very difficult to get into a park, but we generally are flexible and manage. Early this summer we had a very difficult time finding places in central Oregon and southern Washington State. Crowding has caused an increase in prices, even in very run down parks. We are full timers, and still rent a storage room near where we used to live, and there is a huge collection of RVs in storage there, many that rarely are taken out for weekend camping. That’s where a lot of RV owners dollars are spent instead of at campgrounds. Your experience living in Southern California is similar to mine, where we moved from New York to Torrance in the early 50’s and we were surrounded by dairies, not as nice as orange groves, but it still had a rural feel. It wasn’t many years later that all the cows were gone and they were replaced by subdivisions and shopping centers. Keep up the good work