Hello everyone! I've been a lurker for the past few days, and decided this morning to sign in and introduce myself. My husband and I are just starting to begin the planning phase for a fulltiming lifestyle that is still several years away. I just got my first fulltiming books yesterday as a matter of fact! We have been camping, but don't have our RV yet. We are planning to purchase a fifth wheel for our adventures on the road...type yet to be determined. (We have two RV shows in our future in the next two months, but aren't going to be buying yet - although every time we look we feel a real urge to take the leap!) The fulltiming life is still down the road though - my husband can retire in 2018, so last night we set August 1, 2018 as our date to hit the road.  I am looking forward to the anticipation and excitement of planning and saving over the next several years, but do wish our "hit the road" date was a little closer! (One silver lining is that we plan to purchase our RV in 2015, so we will have three years of traveling during our vacations, so we won't be learning everything about the RV at the same time that we're starting our new life.)

Welcome to the forum.

Sounds like you have a plan. There's lot to learn, but you have the time and should be able to make your dreams come true.

Good Luck,

Jim

-- Edited by Jim01 on Thursday 10th of December 2009 06:29:28 AM

Sounds like you are where we are, researching and all. It can make your head spin! I know that when we go look at MH's at the dealer's showroom, we wish we could buy it right then and there. If I had a place to store it and live in it while we finish up to retirement, I think we would.

That is exactly how we feel too. We've gone to several shows already, and three dealerships "just to look"!! Everytime we get there, we find ourselves thinking about ways that we could purchase now....we have to exercise extreme self-control!! So far its worked!! LOL

Welcome to the best site on the net.Stay focused and you will be surprised how fast the time will go. We are here to help.

Welcome! Enjoy the planning - it can be a little scary but fun too. Lots of great folks here helping each other.

Thanks for the welcome all! I am enjoying the planning, although I wish our planning time was a little shorter! There is a lot to do though, and hopefully with a good seven years before we get to the crunch time we can do a lot of pitching as well as making good decisions on our vehicle and fifth wheel. Anyone else out there who has a long wait before they can hit the road??

We also had a seven year target. That was in 2000, target date of 2007. After a lot of research, timelines and Dreams, we hit our target, right on schedule. I have to add that finding Howard and Linda's blog put us into the correct time zone, so to speak. The books we were reading were pretty much outdated in many areas, but Howard keeps his information up to date, at least as best he can. Technology is of course the most changing, but I found his budget information extremely helpful in our planning process. Just enjoy the process and stay focused. And certainly ask questions in this forum. These people are very kind and gentle.

Thanks Tylersamma! Its good to know we aren't the only ones who have planned that far out. When I read Howard's daily journal posting every day, I just want to get right out there and start our journeys right now, but its just not possible - mainly because of the timing of my husband's retirement. So until then, we plan and DREAM and plan some more!! It helps that I've kind of broken the time into two sections in my mind - before RV and after - because we plan to purchase in late 2014 or early 2015. That doesn't seem like an extreme wait to me - definitely sounds better than 2017! LOL Then we will do some shorter trips of a few weeks or so, for the next couple of years until my husband can retire and we can really hit the road!!

Well I hope that you meet your goal. You have taken a step in the right direction by reading Howard and Linda's journal and now by joining this forum. You can learn a lot here and you wont find a friendlier place on the Web. Welcome and stay in touch with all your family as you count down to your Dream.

Welcome. All that research will really pay off. We started that about a year and a half ago and just bought our RV a couple weeks ago. We don't have quite as long a wait but all that planning will be worth it. This is such a great site to learn from.

Hi Janie, thanks for the welcome! Have you set a "hit the road" date? What kind of RV did you buy? I'm so excited for you! The time when we order/buy our RV is going to be so exciting - I have to enjoy everyone else's moments for the next 3-4 years!! LOL

This is definitely a great site to learn from, I am so glad I stumbled upon it. (I don't even remember how I found it now, a google search I think.) We have learned so much in just a few weeks.