last seasons living expenses

The view from my window at Storrie Lake state Park New Mexico

.My fourth year of full timing has started as of October 23 and looking back on the previous three years, it's been a great time. I know living in an RV full time is not for everyone, but for those that do love to travel, enjoy new experiences, or are just bored sitting around the house watching the news every night. Living in an RV with a minimum of possessions and being able to hitch up and go anytime you feel like it, whether you want a new view,  a change of weather, or the freedom to live wherever you would like, be it mountains, desert, or the seashore, it's all available if you live in an RV.

I gathered together my spreadsheets from last year, and here is a list of my expenses with absolutely none of the accuracy that you would expect from even the world's worst bookkeeper. My method of keeping up with my expenses are lackadaisical, my mathematical abilities are elementary, my dedication to this endeavor is severely lacking, and my laziness is legendary. Therefore you should keep my lack of qualifications in mind when applying my expense information to anything you may want to do.

CAMPING – $1227 – that sure sounds like a lot considering how much I boondock. But I paid for camping 43 days last season and my season is from October 23, to October 23 the following year. So that works out to roughly $28 a day for paid camping. camping In RV parks is far cheaper than that by the week or the month, but I usually don't stay long enough to take advantage of those reduced prices.

TRUCK – $2366 – For the first four or five months of the season I counted fuel as a truck expense along with insurance and repairs and things such as that. But then I changed and made a FUEL column which lowered the future truck expense drastically.

GROCERY'S – $2893 – no wonder I weigh so much! if I used that money to buy a gym membership instead of food I would be far healthier

EAT OUT – $167 – this was the bad flu season last winter and I had no desire to sit around restaurants with people coughing on me.

TRAILER – $2724 – a big part of that was a new inverter for the Arctic Fox. And then there was the new wireless cameras, don't get me started on the new wireless cameras.

FUEL – $1011 – like I mentioned before the fuel expense is rolled into the truck expense earlier on so this number doesn't mean much.

MISCELLANEOUS – $462 – I have no idea what any of that was for.

PERSONAL – $4448 – a lot of this is when I went on a binge of buying camping gear for my minivacations, hey I'm old and I want to be comfortable.

HOBBY'S – $10,874 – most of that was a new motorcycle.

UTILITIES – $3663 – I can't believe that a storage room, a phone bill, and propane, adds up to that much every year. But far and away the most of that is my unlimited Verizon phone service.
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TOTAL EXPENSES – $29,835 – there again a big chunk of this was the little 2018 Beta 250, a decent quality inverter for the trailer and an incredible amount of camping gear for my minivacations.

If you say it slowly that sounds like a lot of money to spend for one guy living alone in a trailer, but bear in mind I don't really have a budget I just live in a way that I find comfortable.

But I've learned enough now after three years of full timing, that if times get tough I can easily cut one third of that expense and hardly feel it, and probably half of it if I really needed to tighten my belt. Not that my belt can get any tighter at my current weight and stage of muscular development.

Oh yeah, here's another couple of figures that might be interesting to someone. This last season I put about 8,500 miles on the truck, and about 5,900 miles on the Arctic Fox. And oddly enough that's way fewer miles than I used to put on them before I became a "Traveling man" .

                                   theboondork

this is one of my neighbors at the Park. This rig looks really difficult to put up and take down again. And it seems to have all the disadvantages of a tent and all the disadvantages of a trailer, without the advantages of either. But that's the beauty of the RV lifestyle we all travel the way we like, with what we can afford, and there's no right or wrong way to do it.

There's only four of us staying at the Park so there's plenty of room to stretch out.