By Julie Chickery
Traveling by RV is a great way to see the country and it has many advantages. You can cook your own meals, sleep in your own bed, and use your own bathroom no matter where you are. You can save money, but it is important to note that traveling with an RV might be more expensive than you think. Many families purchasing an RV for vacations only consider the cost of the RV itself, and not the other expenses that go along with RV ownership.
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RV ownership expenses
Obviously, the purchase price of your RV is the first thing you think about. But have you considered insurance, extended warranties, and property tax as part of RV ownership expenses? These are all decisions that are typically made before you drive your new RV away from the dealership. Hopefully, they are expenses you have researched before you even go look at RVs. Did you know you can often save money by customizing a warranty from Wholesale Warranties rather than purchasing one at the dealership? You can also save on insurance by shopping around.Â
Another part of ownership that eager RV shoppers may not consider is storage. Do you have an HOA that doesn’t allow RV parking in your neighborhood? If so, you’ll want to find out how much storage runs in your area. When we bought our first RV, we didn’t do this until after the fact. We were shocked to learn the going rate was $150 per month for outside storage in Northern Virginia. In many places, it’s even higher. Â
RV gear and gadgets
Your RV will likely come with a power cord and maybe even a sewer hose, but there is a lot of other gear you need as an RV owner. Some of the critical safety items – like a tire pressure monitoring system, and electrical management systems, and an RV GPS – are not inexpensive. As a matter of fact, you could easily spend a few hundred to several thousand dollars on RV gear right off the bat.Â
Campgrounds
You’ve purchased an RV, bought all the gear, and are ready to hit the road. Where will you stay? For most travelers, a campground is the answer. That leads us to the next question: How much do campgrounds cost? Well, it depends. There are many different types of campgrounds and associated fees. The least I’ve paid is $12 per night with a 50% off disabled veterans discount, and the most I’ve paid is more than $100 at Disney World’s campground. Watch my video below to learn more about this.
Fuel
Okay, now you’ve picked the campground, so the next big item is fuel. Whether your RV (or tow vehicle) runs on gas or diesel, one thing is universal: You won’t get great gas mileage. To give you an idea, our diesel truck gets about 11 miles per gallon towing. Our best friend’s gas motorhome gets about 8 miles per gallon. Now figure out the cost of fuel per gallon along the journey using the GasBuddy app and you’ll have a rough estimate of how much you can plan to spend on this RV ownership expense.Â
Budget RV ownership expenses appropriately
The key to getting the most enjoyment out of your RV is to budget appropriately. Know the costs associated with RV ownership and travel before you buy an RV. Making an informed decision will allow you to choose the RV that you can afford not only to own, but to take out on vacations.Â
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Save on your RV-lifestyle expenses
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My wife and I took a 5100 mile auto trip to visit relatives, with hotels, meals etc. over a one month period. the total cost for the whole trip was just past $5800. A year later we took the same trip with our diesel pickup and fifth wheel, did the normal eating, sleeping etc. in our RV and were gone a bit over six weeks. Total cost doing the same basic things on the trip, came to $4320. We decided then that it was no car trips. We will stick with the RV travel and see so much more. Now it’s two years later and except for the rise in all prices I don’t foresee any benefit to taking cars.
Very interesting information. Thanks, Gene. And happy RVing for many years to come! 😀 –Diane
Yes gas prices were and still are abnormally high, but they’ve dropped significantly in most parts of the country. Currently in our part of Wisconsin regular unleaded is $3.67. As summer wanes and seasonal demand declines, prices should drop at least a bit more.
The only time I worried about fuel mileage was when I hadn’t seen a gas station open in only 70 miles and my low fuel light came on. At 9.3 mpg I knew I had 27 miles before walking. Luckily 3 miles later an open station appeared, that’s how I determined I had a 3 gal reserve when the low fuel light came on. Lol
We are not campers we are RVers and we do this to see the country , we’ve been to all 50 states (Hawaii, not with RV) and 3 Canadian provinces.We would have done the central Canadian provinces this past summer if Canada had been open. Hopefully will get to Maritime provinces this summer. Price is not the priority but we do love ACOE, NPs and SPs and have used Sun manufactured parks, most have been very nice, clean and friendly. When we go south for the winter we take advantage of monthly rates.
One chuckles when reading a post on here or Rvtravel’s other social media sites about the horrid fuel mileage their big dually towing monster pick up gets. Complaining about Rving and fuel consumption is a mute point. My gas hog Class C, V10 pulling the lightest Jeep with a standard transmission at best will pull in 10 miles per gallon at my slow poke speed of 60ish.
It’s unfortunate that gas has gone back up so much, since back in mid-january.
It’s almost funny if not that just over one year later, “unfortunate” doesn’t seem to fit the price of fuel these days. That trip calculated out now costs easily double what it did in April 2021.
Yet we still RV for the joy of travel.
Corporate greed at its finest, from the same companies which received the largest tax giveaway ever in 2016. How is that working for you?
Ron, I sure hope you have that worn out political statement (surprised they keep letting you post it) some place where you can simply cut and paste it multiple times a day so you don’t spend time retyping it.
Interesting video. We stay at a lot of different campgrounds also. My favorite are any campground with a pull through space as I hate backing in and will pay more for a pull through space if available. We go camping for enjoyment so price doesn’t matter but location does. When traveling to get from point A to point B we will use Elks or Harvest Hosts.
We don’t go RVing because it is cost-effective. We go because we want to travel and see the country without staying in hotels and eating in restaurants.
Exactly right, Richard. We do it because it’s fun, and we see stuff we’d never see if we just drove from hotel to hotel. We just love doing it!