In this article we’ll share our expenses for the top three categories of campgrounds, fuel, and entertainment over an entire year of full-time RV travel. We’ll share the average monthly cost of each category and explain what occurred in the high and low months as well.

One question we hear often is, “Can you full-time RV for less than $1,500 a month?” The answer to that is maybe. I say maybe because it really depends on what your full-time travel dream is. If you want to stay at full hook up campgrounds or RV resorts, not likely. If you want to travel a lot of miles, that is going to be difficult as well.

The thing about budgets is that they are very personal. It all comes down to your wants and needs. In this article, we’ll share our expenses based on our preferences. The hope is that they simply provide food for though and help you create your own budget.

Campgrounds

Except for 2 short dry camping stints, we stayed exclusively in full hook-up (water, 50 amp electric, and sewer) campgrounds. We read reviews and try to find campgrounds or RV resorts that have good WiFi (to save on our hotspots), heated pools, and fitness rooms. 

This year we stayed in 18 different campgrounds: 11 Private, 5 Military, 1 Corps of Engineer (COE), and 1 Country Fairgrounds. We post reviews of all our stays on our YouTube channel. We also prefer to travel slowly and take advantage of monthly rates when we can. 

• Total Campground Expenses: $9,139.13
• Average Monthly Cost: $762
• Highest Monthly Cost: $1500
• This was at Fort Belvoir, VA in the Washington DC metropolitan area. While it was an expensive campground for us, it was worth it to attend our oldest son and daughter-in-law’s wedding! You can see our review of the campground here.
• Lowest Monthly Cost: $495 We spent the month of July at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, FL. You can see our review of the campground here.
• For those who don’t have the option to stay at military campgrounds, we’d like to give you an idea of the cost of campgrounds that anyone can enjoy. Our least expensive was a COE campground. They are federally managed by the Army Corps of Engineers and open to the public. We paid $13 per night at Gunter Hill Campground. On the high end of the spectrum, we stayed at the Tucson Lazy Days KOA for the entire month of December. We paid $821 for the month including our metered electricity.  

Fuel

We pull a 30’ Fifth Wheel with our Chevy 3500 HD Truck. We typically stay in place 4-6 weeks before moving which helps keep costs down, but the truck is also our only vehicle for local drives. 

• Total Diesel Expenses: $6,038.28
• Average Monthly Cost: $503
• Highest Monthly Cost: $848 This was in June when we drove from Texas to Virginia for our son’s wedding. 
• Lowest Monthly Cost: $301 This was in April. We were in San Antonio where two of our sons live. We didn’t travel much outside of the area and they often came and picked us up when we went places in the local area.

We also spent $298.28 on propane over the year. We stayed at full hook-up campgrounds in warm climates most of the year and predominantly used propane for cooking (stove top and oven) on a daily basis. A few of the summer months we didn’t have to refill our propane at all. The weather was unseasonably cold in Tucson this winter, so in December we paid $67.66 for propane to run the heater every night. 

Finally, we paid $228.54 for gas for our generator during the year. Normally we only run the generator 1-2 hours per month according to the regular maintenance schedule. However, we had to run it all day every day for a few weeks in May when we were dry camping during an unseasonably hot spring in Texas. 

Entertainment

Entertainment costs include things like museums, movies, parking, etc. Our total entertainment expenses were: $2,663.64. 

• Average Monthly Cost: $222
• Highest Monthly Cost: $695
• Lowest Monthly Cost: $62

Our highest month was in September. We were having work done on the RV and stayed in a resort in Orlando. While there we went to Disney and several other expensive tourist attractions. Our lowest month was in February. We spent some time at the beach in Florida and with the State Parks pass parked for free. Then we traveled to Texas for a conference, so we didn’t have too much additional time for entertainment. 

Total Expenses

Is this the full list of all full-time RV travel expenses? Not for us. There’s maintenance, insurance, internet hot spots, and more.

That is the real catch to full-time RV travel, there are so many other expenses that you don’t hear about from connectivity to maintenance and a million things in between.

It is possible to have a more frugal budget. For example, you can dry camp, travel less miles, find numerous discounts, and employ a multitude of money saving techniques. We share many of them in Full-Time RV Finance and help you develop a realistic budget that you can live with.

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We spent all of 2018 traveling the United States in our Fifth Wheel RV. We hope you enjoy this month-by-month review of our travels with links to all the campgrounds we enjoyed.

January – Cocoa Beach, Florida

We stayed at the campground on Patrick Air Force Base for all of Nov, Dec & Jan. Donovan, Richie, and Agata came to visit while we were there. We spent a lot of time at the beach and Julie & the kids also enjoyed Disney and Universal Studios.

 

February – Rainbow Springs & Pensacola Florida

We were blown away by the crystal clear waters of Rainbow Springs! In Pensacola, we were able to stay at a Navy base campground right on the bay, the Blue Angel Naval Recreation Area.

 

March – Fredericksburg, Texas

We attended a conference for RV entrepreneurs and Julie presented a blogging workshop with her business partners. We stayed the whole month and enjoyed our time in the Texas Hill Country. We highly recommend the Texas Wine Country Jellystone campground.

 

April – San Antonio, Texas

Justin & his girlfriend, Kayla moved into a new apartment with Donovan in San Antonio.  So of course, we visited San Antonio twice this year. The first visit was in April and the Texas Bluebonnets were in bloom! When visiting the area, we always stay at the Alsatian RV Resort in Castroville, just west of town.

 

May – Wellington, Texas

We went to a tiny little town in Texas to be filmed for a documentary (more on this in Oct).

 

June – Alexandria, Virginia

We drove for days after the movie filming to get to Virginia for our oldest son’s wedding and to be able to spend time with all the family that came in! We are so happy to Agata in our family!

The wedding was amazing and we got to celebrate with so many loved ones. While in the northern Virginia and DC area, we stayed at our favorite military campground: Fort Belvoir Travel Camp.

 

July – Cookeville, Tennessee

We stopped in Cookeville to visit Julie’s parents and discovered a lot of wonderful hiking spots. That is Julie on the ledge of one of the many waterfalls in the area. We loved staying at the Crossville KOA.

 

August – Tampa, Florida

Back to Tampa to get some work done on the RV and visit Sean’s parents. We spent time at two different campgrounds in the area: MacDill Air Force Base FamCamp and Lazy Days RV Resort.

 

September – Montgomery, Alabama & Hot Springs, Arkansas

We made our way back to Texas at a more leisurely pace and stopped for a week at each of these locations. While in Montgomery, we loved our first Corps of Engineer Campground, Gunter Hill. Next we stayed three nights at Downtown Riverside RV Park in Little Rock, Arkansas. Then we were absolutely blown away Catherine’s Landing, a true RV Resort in Hot Springs, Arkansas.

 

October – Oklahoma City, Oklahoma & Wellington, Texas

If you’ve never been to the Oklahoma City Memorial at the site of the federal building bombing, we highly recommend you go. It is very moving. We stayed at the Oklahoma City East KOA just outside of the city. It was a nice quiet place to rest a bit before heading back to Wellington for the premiere of the documentary film, RV Nomads: The Movie. It was very cool to see ourselves on the big screen. Don’t worry, we didn’t let the 2 minutes of fame go to our heads.

 

November – San Antonio, Texas

Back to San Antonio to visit Donovan, Justin, and Kayla for Thanksgiving!

 

December – Lajitas, Texas (Big Bend National Park) & Tucson, Arizona

By far our favorite location of the year was Lajitas, Texas. It is nestled between Big Bend Ranch State Park and Big Bend National Park. Both parks have amazing scenery and a wide range of hiking opportunities. While there we stayed at Maverick Ranch RV Park.

 

We stopped for one night at the Las Cruces KOA in New Mexico on our way  Tucson, Arizona to finish out the year. The Tucson Lazy Days KOA is a an amazing resort!

RV-less Travel

We also traveled a few places without the RV including Chicago, IL; Manteca, CA; Des Moines, IA; Niagara Falls, NY; and Springfield, VA. This year we have slept in 13 different states, 18 campgrounds and 5 hotels.

What’s next?

We’re currently planning to spend most of 2019 in the west: Arizona, California, Nevada, and Utah. We’ll also be flying to 5 RV shows. Most importantly, we hope to visit more family and friends along the way!

We wrote a blog post in January about how we were able to pay off $91,000 last year while living full-time in our RV. We are happy to be on our way to debt freedom because, as Dave Ramsey says, “the borrower is slave to the lender.” It took us several years to see this and with us both in our late 40s, we feel the pressure to work quickly to pay off our debts so we can feel comfortable about retiring. This is our updated financial accountability report for September and October 2018.

We write this monthly blog post about our finances from the previous month. Mostly for our own accountability and also for encouragement to others on the same journey as us. I think the main point I want to make first is that we are not bragging by blogging about this. In fact, we are ashamed of the debt we accumulated and find it embarrassing to admit. We are sharing our story to keep ourselves accountable and hope that it may help someone else.

Debt

We are continuing our journey to becoming debt free and have $38,746 to go. Over September and October, we were able to pay off $6,952 of our remaining debt. This brings our grand total paid to $125,142 since we started tracking last year! All of this remaining debt is our Heartland Cyclone. This keeps us on track to have it paid off by April as long as the everyone’s evil relative “Murphy” stays out of our lives.

Net Worth

October ended with our net worth down $6,892 from August at $210,681. This was mostly due to the recent drop off of the stock market. All of our investment accounts are down for this period. We did not expect the continued increase in stocks month over month to last forever. Decreases are part of the game, which is why you have to be in it for the long-term. Our investments are still up for the year. We see it as part of the normal cycle of the markets.

Here is the breakdown of our net worth.

Assets	$249,426
Liabilities	$38,746
Net Worth	$210,681

Notable Expenses

We did not have any huge unexpected expenses. It was mostly a lot of little things that added up. We had to travel from Florida to Wellington, TX for the Nomad Fest and the premiere of the RV Nomads movie. It was a great event and we met a lot of people, but we spent just over $1,000 in fuel for the trip. Also, on the trip we had two flat tires. These were tires that we just replaced last year, so it was unexpected and disappointing. It cost us another $500 to get them replaced.

Also, after 4 years, Sean had his first accident with the RV. He was not focused on his mirrors and managed to get the fifth wheel stuck in a ditch on the way from Wellington to San Antonio.

Luckily, the only thing that needed repair was one Level-Up jack and the hydraulic lines associated with it. This was close to $600 in parts and Sean is doing the labor himself.

Notable Income

Our primary revenue streams include military pensions for both of us. In addition Sean is still working part-time as a research consultant.

Our side hustle, Chickery’s Travels, continues to grow. Our book sales have been increasing and we have obtained contracts to provide seminars at 5 GS Events RV shows next year. This is very exciting since we both enjoy speaking and teaching. The pay is not bad either! Finally, both of us have entered into new partnerships to continue to expand our offerings. We are hopeful that this forward momentum will significantly increase our business income next year.

We are definitely learning that creating a business from nothing is not easy. We spend so many more hours building it than we ever did working regular jobs or even during our time in the military. We are just starting to see some rewards after more than a year of hard effort. It is tough not to get discouraged, but we continue to look forward and hope for continue rewards growth.

Our Roadmap

The main thing that has helped us in keeping a budget. We use YNAB (You Need A Budget) for our monthly budgeting along with the Every Dollar app to track our daily purchases. Seeing where the money goes is definitely eye-opening and when you assign it at the beginning of the month, staying within the budget is much easier.

We’ve created monthly budget worksheets that you can download free here to help you itemize and track your income expenses. Click here to see our itemized full-time RV budget. 

Future Plans and Projections

We write these monthly accountability reports to make sure we stay on track with our goals. It has really made a difference in our purchases over the past months. I find myself thinking about publishing this post when making a purchase. Do I really want to show a decrease in net worth for this thing? Do we really want have to publish that we made poor decisions? This blog really helps!

Although this is the first month showing a decrease in our overall net worth, we feel it was expected at some point since the stock market cannot rise every month forever. Our spending, however, continues to be on track and we hope this inspires others to join us on a debt free journey.

Thanks for reading this month and please follow along every month to see how the debt free journey is progressing.

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