Why would anyone, making good money, living in a nice house, sell their stuff and move to an RV full time? We have no financial issues, our only debt is our mortgage, and our RV. That's it. No student loans, no car payments, no...whatever else people dive into and regret. So, why are we doing this?
A little history:
Allan and I have been together for 13 years, married for 12. In that 13 years, Allan's worked his way up from being a shop hand, to managing a company, while I stayed at home raising our two children. The American dream, right? What people don't tell you about the american dream, is the in-between. The sacrifice it takes to get there.
People don't mention that while Allan was a shop hand, we were living pay check to pay check, living off of macaroni and other cheap food, buying our clothes and whatever else, from Value Village, and Salvation Army, when we had extra money we might get something from Wal-Mart. That was the first two years of our marriage with two kids.
Allan was then promoted to apprentice as a picker operator. This was a huge step! He was learning how to run this:
This is actually one of the trucks Allan has operated.
So now, YAY! We have some money for once, can shop regularly at Wal-Mart, but I no longer had a husband. Oh we were still married, and still loved each other very much, but he was only home 3 or 4 days a month, and that's it. This went on for 8 years. Allan worked for various companies as a boom truck operator, and as far as work goes, it was good. It paid the bills, and he was in high demand. He never wanted for work our entire marriage. He was laid off once, and had another job that afternoon. We truly have been blessed in that regard. BUT. He wasn't home for those 8 years.
Then he got a job for a new company in our town called DFI. They were opening a new branch and needed some pile drivers and a ticketed, experienced, boom truck operator. Allan had never done piles in his life, but he fit the bill on the rest, and they hired him. He was running this bad boy:
Again, this is Allan's truck, with the 'leads' set up for pounding piles.
It was the same old, same old for a year and a half. Better money (I didn't need to shop at Wal-Mart!), Allan was never home still and then...DFI promoted him to field supervisor. He was no longer running the truck, he had a company vehicle, and was gone for 3-4 weeks at a time, and home for a day or two. I thought he had been gone a lot before, but this was ridiculous! He supervised jobs for 6 months and then he was offered a promotion again, to branch manager.
This was our dream come true! Allan would work monday to friday and be home evenings and weekends. He still had a company truck, in fact a much nicer company truck, and he was still making good money...although it was substantially less than he made as a supervisor, but he won't be gone anymore!
The catch? There's always a catch...
We would have to move 300km north west of where we were living. From where our friends and family are, from where both of us, and our kids, have grown up. That's huge. So huge, our daughter, 16 years old, flat out refused.
Now, our daughter, Samantha is not your typical teenaged girl. She's athletic, musical, artistic, and has always been that poster child for good children. For her to refuse anything asked of her, is huge. She is not a disrespectful or disobedient child in any way, so we listened when she said she was not, under any circumstances, moving. We did some hard thinking, a lot of praying, and consulted many people for advice, and we finally decided, she would stay with my mom and we would move. She only had one year of high school left, and to pull her out and make her change schools at this point would be detrimental. Besides, like I had said, she's a good kid. I'm not worried at all about leaving her with my mom.
Sam at the provincial track meet for javelin in June.
Allan accepted the position and moved up to an apartment that DFI owns in December of 2011. He comes home every other weekend, so we see him 4 days a month, unless we go and visit him, which we do. It's still not easy, and I still don't have my husband home all the time.
In April of 2012 we put our house up for sale. We were warned it might be difficult to sell, but we didn't realize just how hard. We had bought our house just before...months before...the economy crashed. We are still within our 5 year amortization, so we are going to be penalized for early payout....so, long story short - to walk away with nothing...our house is still priced too high. I know ours isn't the only story like this, and we are blessed in that we can afford our house. There are so many people who did the same thing and then lost their jobs, and couldn't sell their homes. My heart truly breaks for them.
So...now what? Well, this is where it gets fun. We want to be with Allan, but we can't sell our house. We are left with two choices, stay in our house, or move and rent our house out. Well, we will move, but we can't afford two mortgages (who can really?), and I'm terrified of being in this same position of not being able to sell again. So..we rent?
Left: Gunner, 1 year old charcoal lab; Right: Manny, 6 year old mini dachshund.
We have two dogs though, and it is terribly hard to find anyone who will allow you to rent with pets. I don't want to lose my dogs, and looking at the rent in our new area...it's the same as having another mortgage, which we've already established that we can't afford. Now what?
This is actually the previous year's model. Ours will have a second door that leads to a washroom.
I stumbled across a site that had full-time RVers on it. People who lived all the time in an RV, by choice, and were happy. This is brilliant! Rent for a small 2 bedroom apartment is $1200/month. Payments on a nice RV...less than $500. That's the average car payment here!! Best of all...we own it, and we can take it with us when we come back to visit family. We don't have to stay with people or get hotels and worry about what to do with our dogs. If everyone decides we don't like where we are...we can leave. That same day if we want.
So...that's what fuelled the decision. There are many other factors, and many more consultations, prayers, and figuring that went into it...but that's it in a nutshell. We found a four season campground with full hookups, and a coded gate to get in and out. It's small (only 12 stalls), has showers and laundry facilities, a common area with video games and foose-ball. It's close to town too..16km or roughly 8 miles from town. Not too shabby.
So...in theory we have it all figured out. In practice? I'm not sure. We are just going to trust in God, and do the best we can, same as we always have. So far, so good.
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