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Old 06-28-2005, 01:04 AM   #1
syplace
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After Fulltiming?

There isn't a thing in this house I really want to keep (except a few pictures) When we downsized 4 kids took what they wanted. So I am ready to go. But the problem is hubby ... he wants a "home" to come home to.. So, my question is...What are your plans for when you will no longer be on the road? In other words what happens when we get too old for the freedom lifestyle? Hate to think of the future, but the question will be put to us sooner or later.

My idea at the present is to have two Montanas. One in Texas for the winter and the other here in Wis. for the summers. About 6 mo. in each place. Will use our daughter's address as "home base".

If it isn't too painful, would like to hear what others have planned for or are thinking of doing.
 
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Old 06-28-2005, 03:35 AM   #2
stiles watson
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The future is so unpredicable and the only guarantee we have about health is that it will, at some point, deteriorate. In light of this reality, each of us carries a significant life insurance policy to jump start the other at the point when one of us leaves.

If we get tired of it all, we will just go buy or build a house in a location that suits us -- perhaps some place we visited and liked. A second option is to park the Monty and live out our days in it. We are in the process of constructing a "home site". This includes a 20' x 40' roofed concrete pad, water, 50 amp electricity, and a 500 gallon ceptic tank.

Escapee Club has a recovery center in Livingston, TX, called Escapees Care. Day care is provided for as long as it is needed for the sick or injured person until 24 hour services are needed or the camper has recovered sufficiently to move on. The cost including daily meals for both persons is reasonable.

The concept of "home" is individual. My paradigm is one that believes that home is where I am. It is not tied to things or geography. Maybe I am a true nomad or have some sort of gypsy heritage. I know this thinking will not suffice for everyone. It's just the way my slice was cut.
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Old 06-28-2005, 04:19 AM   #3
richfaa
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Whatever you feel Ok with is good for you. We are not nomads, we do not want to live out our life in a camper, we do not want to bounce around the country from place to place staying here and there for days, weeks, months then moving on. To many of you that is "the life" to us it does not sound like fun at all. We will be "on the road" as much as we wish to be and we will have home /place to come back to.Yes we will get old and time will take its toll we have been through all of that with our parents and one day we will have to sell this home and downsize to a condo or whatever and we may have a winter home in Fla/Arz/Texas..but we will have a 'Home" a place were there are family, friends, memories, familiar places and things.
We are all different with different wants, needs, outlook on life and in this great country we have the choice and freedom to do what ever we want.We have the greatest respect for those who can pull up stakes and go.This country would not be what is is today if we did not have folks like you in the past.In fact my grandparents gave up all they had and traveled from a far away foreign country to find a better life here..strong folks as you are..so follow your dreams..where ever they may take you.
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Old 06-28-2005, 06:59 AM   #4
Glenn and Lorraine
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We haven't given it much thought. As a couple we plan on living in the Monty as long as possible. To some degree we may cut back on the traveling portion but as long as I have the ability to get this rig around there is no way we plan on ever settling down in one location year around.

I do know, if anything happens to me, Lorraine plans on living in Florida near her family. In all probability she would sell the Monty and TV and buy a small unit in one of the many 55+ communities. I have not given a whole lot of thought to what I will do if she goes before me. Probably keep the rig and winter in Florida and summer in Penna.

To answer the question "what happens when we get too old for the freedom lifestyle?" Well, I guess we'll worry about that when it happens. Right now we are more concerned about how much more the price of diesel is going to go up rather than old age. My father worried about OLD age, he passed away at age 69. Like me, my mother didn't let it bother her and she lived to be 95.

There is one thing I try not to do and that is worry about things we have no control over. Death, taxes, old age and waste water tank sensors are beyond our control and so as my mentor Alfred E. Newman so eloquently put it... "What, me worry?"
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Old 06-28-2005, 08:14 AM   #5
Montana_2779
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We kinda figure that, assuming we ever leave the fulltime life, we'll get a condo somewhere. When we first decided to fulltime, we knew immediately that keeping our house (with pool) would not be a good decision. Too much maintenance to just leave for weeks or months at a time, and we don't like the idea of renters (too many horror stories from our landlord friends). Gotta admit, not doing any yard work is kinda spoiling me. I don't see us returning to a house on property at any point.....BUT, good point, everyone! You never know what's coming around the bend!
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Old 06-28-2005, 12:45 PM   #6
Montana_1280
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Just do it for as long as you can and then do something else. You can spend a life worrying or spend a life living. It is good to plan to a certain extent, but my plans always seem to change somehow. It all works out. I tend to sweat the small stuff too much so I am preaching to myself too. Remember-don’t sweat the small stuff. Truth is its all small stuff.
We gave away, sold and otherwise left all stick house stuff behind. Don’t regret it for a moment.
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Old 06-28-2005, 03:08 PM   #7
syplace
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Thank you for all your responses. I see the light Will print this out for hubby. I am an organizer and yes do tend to sweat the small stuff, and like to plan ahead. Now if I could just convince him!
Again, thank you. This forum is GREAT
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Old 06-28-2005, 03:12 PM   #8
Bill Hill
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We've thought about this too. I said in an earlier post that we will probably never "fulltime", but that we would "long time". We are buying a manufactured home in Prescott AZ when we retire in a little over 1-1/2 years. It's in a sub-division, so the land will be ours too. We'll have enough equity in our townhouse in L.A. to buy what we want outright and not have a mortgage. This way, we can travel for as long as we like, come home for a while, and go out again. When we get to the point that we can no longer travel with the rig, we'll have a place to stay that will be comfortable, accessible, and the town has plenty of healthcare facilities, as well as cultural activities for us.
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Old 06-28-2005, 03:33 PM   #9
Glenn and Lorraine
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Quote:
quote:Originally posted by syplace

Thank you for all your responses. I see the light Will print this out for hubby. I am an organizer and yes do tend to sweat the small stuff, and like to plan ahead. Now if I could just convince him!
Again, thank you. This forum is GREAT

Don't sweat the "small stuff", more often than not it will take care of itself and if not it was just some "small stuff". Nothing earth shattering. Save the sweat for the big stuff and those HOT, HUMID days when the AC won't work.(But that AC thing is a subject for another thread)

Planning ahead is fine but don't put them in stone. Be flexible. With few exceptions, we rarely travel with reservations. There are too many attractions or events down the road that you were unaware of and may have to pass up because you are committed to some reservation. The few exceptions are holiday weekends or special events such as an MOC rally.
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Old 06-28-2005, 06:05 PM   #10
Parrothead
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Marianne
I posed this same question a few month ago. While some responses you received are the same, you might try doing a search on the archives as you might find some different answers. It really varies. We still have not decided what we want to do when we grow up!
Happy trails.......................
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Old 06-29-2005, 03:27 PM   #11
sreigle
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Our plan is that when either of us says it's time to settle someplace, we'll get a stick home of some sort, meaning condo or house, that is maintenance free. That would allow us to take trips for a month or two at a time, like many of you do. We will settle near at least one of our children, probably whichever still has our grandchildren living with them.

My aunt and uncle fulltimed for roughly six years, until health forced them to stop. They started out keeping their stick home and trying fulltiming. At six months they decided to continue fulltiming and sold the stick home. They could just as easily have decided to keep the house, either empty or rent it out.

So, if one of you would like to fulltime and the other wants to keep the roots, then maybe a compromise is to keep the house but actually fulltime for some period of time (3 months, 6 months, you decide). At the end of the period if either of you wants to go back to the stick home and do trips from there, then that's what you do. If both of you decide to continue fulltiming, then decide to keep the house or sell. Just a suggestion of one way to find out if you like fulltiming and allowing a way to go back to the house. As has already been said, fulltiming is just one of many good lifestyles. Just like trucks, they're all good so choose the one that works best for you. Hmmm, that even suggests a test drive, doesn't it?
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Old 06-29-2005, 05:39 PM   #12
Montana_3841
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We have only just begun our adventure. We still work and will still have a home base but soon our house will be on the market and we have some land that we are planning to put a cover for our Monty, storage, office space and then build a retirement house. Children and grandchildren call us home, but fulltiming for 2 to 3 weeks a month will be our life for a while yet and we are planning to save our money after selling our home and going fulltime "fulltime" until we can pay for a home on the East Texas range.

We are excited and have enjoyed our 2005 3400RL Monty and a new 2005 3500 Silver Dodge Ram. We are beautiful running down the road and I have always wanted to do this and we decided to try it before we retire. We are bound by our work and where we can travel now, but one day we will go where we want to. We love our Monty especially when we think that we used to spend all the time in hotels, motels, wherever tells. Don't remind me of that life....

Love it, love it and can't wait to go out again...and until then we enjoy our family.
By the way we have only had our rig for about 6 weeks.

Lee and Beverly Goodson
Tyler, TX
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Old 06-29-2005, 05:47 PM   #13
Montana_139
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Yes, we've thought about it, and we're kicking around a few possibilities: buying two park model trailers in RV resorts, one for the winter, one for the summer months; buying a park model for the winter, and keeping Monty for the summer to travel in or leave up north somewhere; or buying a stick home in a moderate climate (and keeping Monty, or not). Or we may just get an annual space in a park such as Rincon West in Tucson, where we spent last winter, build a shed and/or "Arizona Room" on it, and return there once a year.

We have no kids, and we knew we did not want to spend the rest of our lives in northern Illinois, so for us getting rid of the house was a no-brainer... We figured if we didn't like the gypsy lifestyle, at worst we'd have to spend a few months in the RV until we found a home and settled again. Now we're coming up on two years of fulltiming, and have no intentions of stopping any time soon. But while we're travelling, we always check out the local real estate market, and wonder if we would like to live in an area we're visiting. We're really liking where we are now, and the prices are right, too!

KK
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Old 06-30-2005, 04:25 PM   #14
jrgwdenner
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Welcome to the forum, Lee and Beverly. Your plans sounds great and you already live in a beautiful part of the country. East Texas is beautiful.
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Old 07-04-2005, 06:02 AM   #15
sreigle
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Welcome, Lee and Beverly! Sounds like you have yours all figured out and are enjoying it. Congrats on the Montana, too!

KK, sounds like you folks are geting things figured out, too. Someday we'll be looking at making some decisions, too. As I said in the earlier post, we made decisions regarding how to know when we're ready to change our lifestyle but we won't make too many decisions on exactly what happens then until we get closer to that time. For us, that's a ways down the road and so many things can change. All our kids are in the Kansas City area now. I'm kinda hoping one of them goes somewhere warm in the winter and another goes somewhere cool in the summer and the other stays here where Spring and Fall are nice!
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