After residing on the highway for 3 years, we’ve discovered rather a lot. We’ve discovered a lot about this life-style, ourselves, our relationship, and residing on the highway. We get requested questions like, “What’s your favourite or least favourite half about vanlife?” It’s not all the time fast or straightforward to reply this. People who find themselves on this nomadic life-style are on the lookout for knowledge so they are going to have fewer complaints of their very own (hopefully) and keep away from remorse. At the very least that was true for us after we had been in our analysis section. We hated these “What I Hate About Vanlife” YouTube movies however we watched them anyway as a result of we didn’t need that to be how we felt.
Now, after 3 years of residing on the highway, we are able to empathize with most of the complaints we heard about this life-style. However, we additionally roll our eyes at a number of the criticisms we see or hear as a result of they are often simply remedied with correct planning (learn extra about that in our earlier weblog). It’s important to determine what’s necessary to you and your personal life and determine what’s finest to incorporate in your house. Create an area that’s particular to your wants and if it seems that it’s not, make some adjustments. Discover precedence in your happiness and put it above all else. We’d prefer to share with you a number of the execs and cons of residing full-time in a van whereas touring. And in the event you roll your eyes at a few of them—that’s okay!
PROS
Journey
We benefit from the freedom that this life-style can provide. We will select to remain someplace for as little or so long as we’d like. If there’s one thing we wish to drive in direction of—we are able to do this. If there’s one thing we wish to drive away from—we are able to do this too. We’re additionally not tied to a strict route. As a substitute, we now have a basic sense of which state we wish to head to relying on the time of yr after which it’s “select your personal journey” from level A to level B. We get to see new landscapes in areas we’ve by no means been earlier than. It by no means will get previous and it’s all the time thrilling. I’m consistently looking “sights” in my Google Maps to see what we must always cease and see alongside our route. We not have the dreaded work commute – backwards and forwards, losing cash and gasoline on the identical previous highway. We spend more cash after we journey lengthy distances however then save on gasoline after we keep put in a single space.
Climate
We attempt our greatest to coordinate the locations we journey to with the climate. For instance, we select to be in areas like California or Arizona for winter so we are able to skip the snow. We are sometimes in Colorado or Oregon for summer time and do our greatest to keep away from the intense humidity. Each different yr we’ve headed to the east coast for Fall to go to with household throughout supreme temperatures and leaf-peeping.
Household
We now have household unfold out throughout the U.S. in California, Texas, Tennessee, and New York. If we nonetheless labored common 9-5 jobs with solely two weeks of trip, it could be nearly not possible to go to any of our household. We’re in a position to go to all of them and make our rotations extra simply due to our life-style and selection of labor.
As we journey round we’re consistently assembly new mates who’re additionally touring. We meet new individuals as we see them parked locations—there’s a mutual understanding of “if the door is open, come say hiya”! We additionally meet up with web mates we’ve been speaking to on Instagram. We’ll submit in our bio the place we at present are after which the place we plan on going subsequent. That is helpful for not solely assembly up with mates however for locating work. We assist others with their van builds and are in a position to attain extra individuals as we maintain touring round. There are a lot of methods to satisfy others or keep related with present mates throughout the neighborhood. We use an app known as Sekr which tells you who’s inside a certain quantity of miles. We additionally make the most of the iPhone “Discover My Location” service and share it with different mates who’ve an iPhone. This fashion we are able to meet up once more as we go about our travels. One among our favourite issues about assembly mates on the highway is getting to satisfy up once more with them in a distinct state and reconnect like no time has handed in any respect.
Affordability
The stress of paying payments is rather a lot much less whereas residing this life-style. In fact, there’ll all the time be payments of some sort. We now have a van cost and that’s our “hire” however it’s a lot lower than we’d pay wherever else. We don’t have a utility invoice for energy since we use photo voltaic panels and drive to cost our home batteries. We do have a fairly low cost gasoline invoice and that’s our propane refill. Taking a hire cost out of the equation makes an enormous distinction in how a lot it’s essential to work and the way a lot cash it’s essential to make every month. This takes lots of stress away from us and creates extra happiness general. We’re in a position to flip the common 5 days of labor and a couple of days of play to five days of play and a couple of days of labor every week.
High quality Time
Rising our happiness individually and collectively as a pair was made attainable after we converted to vanlife. Not solely are we working much less and have discovered extra time for the issues we take pleasure in, however we spend much more time collectively. We used to solely see one another and our pets for a handful of hours within the evenings and on the weekends. More often than not we wouldn’t see our pets on the weekends both if we selected to go someplace to do one thing. Now, we take our pets together with us in all places we go and we make it work. We get to navigate our lives collectively facet by facet throughout every day and we get to work collectively to make a residing.
CONS
Friendships
The downfall of all the time being on the transfer is holding onto regular friendships and constructing extra recollections collectively. We really feel like we do fairly good with spending high quality time as we are able to get it with our mates, however we all know if we lived in a single spot we may have extra of that. On the flip facet, our good friend circle is fairly massive because it reaches throughout the states and we could get to see individuals we wouldn’t in any other case see. It’s a toss-up.
GYM—One factor we actually miss about being stationary is having a gymnasium membership the place we noticed lots of our mates. Quite a lot of nomads are members of Planet Health as a result of it’s low cost, it’s widespread throughout the states and so they can make the most of their scorching showers. For us, we don’t desire a common gymnasium membership. We wish a membership to a climbing gymnasium. There aren’t any giant chains of climbing gyms you can be a member of and discover throughout the states as you journey. With climbing, it’s necessary to have consistency to maintain energy and to see any development. We miss our routine not just for staying robust however climbing each night with the identical mates and the camaraderie. Climbing is extra enjoyable with different individuals (it’s why we love bouldering) and it’s much more enjoyable with individuals you already know.
Work
This life-style is much less worrying compared to our lives earlier than with common jobs working for another person full time. However, I nonetheless discover myself a bit burdened between jobs. I concern we gained’t discover one other shopper that aligns nicely with the placement we’re in or wish to be. I get anxious we gained’t discover one other particular person or in a position to afford our providers. It has all the time someway labored itself out with minimal effort on our half to share the place we’re or the place we’re going. We’ve additionally been very fortunate with the shoppers who’ve discovered us. They’ve all turn out to be mates and have been a blast to hang around with whereas working with them. Discovering work on the highway or discovering distant work, is a large matter for nomads. That is one thing essential to have discovered earlier than transferring into your van full-time to journey. An alternative choice is to reside in your van whereas parked on the town and nonetheless work an everyday job. You’ll get monetary savings on gasoline by not commuting and also you’ll save by not having a hire cost. We did this for six months and had been ready to save cash to make use of in direction of residing on the highway for over a yr.
You’ll have a little bit of a battle determining the place to ship your mail. There are specific belongings you’ll want a everlasting deal with for resembling automobile insurance coverage, medical insurance, banking, driver’s license, and so on. We now have our everlasting mailing deal with set as much as be despatched to a member of the family’s home. Then we ask them to ship us photographs of issues that look necessary. If we’d like the merchandise, we ask our relations to ahead it to us wherever we’re. This forwarding deal with has been a good friend we’re visiting, a distinct member of the family, a short lived mailbox, or a neighborhood submit workplace. These choices have labored for any items which are despatched to us as nicely. For ordering packages from Amazon or different companies we now have used a mixture of these choices or different choices resembling Amazon locker or UPS retailer. This takes some determining beforehand and double checking the deal with is right and never mechanically going to be despatched to your everlasting deal with by default.
One useful factor to know is that if the shipper is sending you mail USPS from the submit workplace, they will deal with it to you with an deal with of “basic supply” with the zip code to whichever location is near you. They may maintain the mail for you for a sure period of time and permit choose up throughout particular days and time frames. They won’t notify you of a package deal being delivered so you’ll have to test or have a monitoring quantity to search out out for your self. We now have achieved this at UPS shops as nicely, however known as forward to that location to verify we may ship one thing there for choose up.
Mechanic
One of many greatest fears whereas residing on the highway is having your car break down. Discovering a reliable mechanic when you journey will be extraordinarily difficult. Sometimes, you don’t search for this service till you desperately want it. You gained’t be seeing the identical particular person and constructing that relationship. You may not have the ability to get in immediately or really feel comfy explaining simply that you simply reside in your rig and can’t be with out it for an prolonged period of time. It will be smart to make a behavior of researching locations and saving them as you journey to reference again to if wanted. You’re ready so as to add these into the app we talked about earlier, Sekr, refer again to them as wanted, or see ones that others have added.
Requirements
Discovering wanted requirements is all the time a little bit of a problem, however will hopefully get simpler over time via crowdsourcing and using nomad apps. Since we reside full-time in our van and have a restricted quantity of house and sources, many issues should be replenished very often. As an illustration, we have to discover issues resembling a big dumpster for our waste. Most are locked otherwise you really feel such as you’re breaking the regulation by placing something into one. We have to discover a spigot shut sufficient to park close to to refill our water tank with a hose. This has been the trickiest factor but. One way or the other we’ve all the time discovered a approach. The longer you’re on the highway, the extra courageous you get to pirate a spigot or just ask to make use of one. You possibly can ask locations resembling gasoline stations or oil change retailers if you should use their spigot to refill your water jug. Oftentimes, they are saying sure. If we haven’t discovered a spigot particularly, we’ve used a jug or bathe bag in a purchasing cart and made a number of journeys out and in of a grocery retailer for a paid water refill station. One other factor we’re looking out for once in a while is a propane fill station. We don’t have a BBQ exchange-size tank. We now have an under-mount tank that we have to have manually refilled by a technician. We will normally discover this at a particular retailer that sells it, resembling a gasoline station, U-Haul, or Tractor Provide.
Ultimate Ideas
These are the professionals and cons that come to thoughts in our final three years residing in a van full time. For others, there could also be kind of relying on their construct and life-style. Though worrying at instances, none of those cons are deal breakers. We love the best way we reside and each effort is well worth the reward. We’ve created a house inside a van that’s all our personal. We’ve included all our favourite issues and held onto hobbies we take pleasure in. Residing this life has allowed us to journey the U.S. full-time. We’ve even created a enterprise that enables us to make an earnings whereas having the liberty to maneuver round as a lot or as little as we really feel like at any given second. We hope we helped you with some perception and issues to consider when planning your personal construct and contemplating residing this life-style full-time. Prioritize your happiness and create an area that’s all your personal, or permit it to create it for you alongside the best way.
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