We are Ron & Joan from the Jacksonville, FL area. We've been "camping" since the '60's in all sorts of rigs from tents to popups to travel trailers and motorhomes and currently have a Itasca Sunova 34A. The fulltime bug has bitten each of us and will hopefully happen in the next year or two.
This year's goal is to get rid of all the excess "stuff" in the house we don't absolutely need. Every time we come back from an RV trip, having had everything we need in the motorhome we wonder why we have all of this other stuff that has filled up the house!
Hope to get to know a bunch of you - maybe at this year's or next year's RV-Dreams.com rally.
Jim01 said
07:16 PM Jan 3, 2011
Welcome to the forum.
Sounds like you've already got a lot of experience so once you get rid of all that "excess stuff", you should be well on your way to full-timing.
If you have any questions, be sure to ask.
Jim
Roz said
08:32 PM Jan 3, 2011
Greetings, Ron & Joan!
We, too, live in JAX. Welcome to the family. We also have an Itasca. You will enjoy it here!
Charles
janni said
09:46 PM Jan 3, 2011
Hello and Welcome to a great group!
Wildrose Acres said
07:24 AM Jan 4, 2011
Welcome to the group! We're David and Jo Ann. We are on a countdown to retirement when we will go fulltime. We recently purchased an MPG by Heartland. We love to camp but the tent got too tiring, so the MPG is a step up. I agee about the stuff. that is our mission right now - get rid of stuff.
Ivey said
07:56 AM Jan 4, 2011
Welcome to the forum Ron and Joan. Keep us posted on your progress as you purge. Any questions you ask give us all a chance to learn so ask away or share what you know.
Vicky
jagco said
08:42 AM Jan 4, 2011
Welcome aboard Ron and Joan!! Good luck on getting rid of the excess "stuff" as time goes by. It's truly amazing the things we can collect that are really of no value to us (at least in my case).
There are lots of friendly people here to help you along your way.
Jeff
RVRon said
11:00 AM Jan 4, 2011
Thanks for the warm welcomes everyone!
We face 2 challenges before the full-timing fun can begin. The first, getting rid of all of the "stuff" as I've mentioned is right now task #1. We've decided to categorize things in one of 3 ways: 1) Throw it away 2) Sell it 3) Donate or give it away. Storage is not an option!! It really is a daunting task and a bit heartwrenching too. What to do with the precious creations of children and grandchildren? Then there's the bins and bins of photos taken over the years. The list goes on and on. I'll bet lots of folks don't even consider the fulltime RV life because the simply can't bear to part with everything.
Challenge #2 is getting rid of property. We have 2 houses to sell and obviously it's a really bad time to need to liquidate real estate with all of the foreclosures bringing the market down. Fortunately we're not upside down on either house but neither will bring the profits we planned a couple of years ago. Not so bad if you're selling one house and buying another - it kind of evens out. Bad for folks like us that just want to take the money and run away!
I'm sure both of these issues have been discussed in the forum so hopefully we'll find some guidance to help us over the obstacles.
Camper_Boy said
11:16 AM Jan 4, 2011
Hi Ron,
We are also in the process of purging "stuff" and waiting for the house to sell -- although we are doing our waiting in snowy Michigan, rather than sunny Florida!
Good Luck to you! You will find lots of good information on this site. We'll be at this year's RV Dreams rally -- maybe we'll see you there!
Ckerr said
04:54 PM Jan 4, 2011
Welcome Ron, Joan and of course, Callie!
We're in the process of getting rid of STUFF! Johnny's working in Arkansas so I'm in charge of emptying the house in Austin and getting it leased. You're right... getting rid of the stuff is challenging.
There are lots of pointers here and if you figure any great ways to get it done, please let me know!
Looking forward to seeing you on the road.
RVRon said
08:39 PM Jan 4, 2011
Camper_Boy wrote:
Good Luck to you! You will find lots of good information on this site. We'll be at this year's RV Dreams rally -- maybe we'll see you there!
We WILL see you there! We just signed up for the rally tonight and can't wait to meet you guys and everyone else!
Woohoo!!!
-- Edited by RVRon on Tuesday 4th of January 2011 08:41:36 PM
Ivey said
01:10 PM Jan 5, 2011
It sounds like there are going to be a lot of Dreamers at that rally. Can't wait to meet all of you.
Sherry said
04:58 PM Jan 5, 2011
Glad you are coming to the Rally. It's a GREAT place to meet folks of like mind. We'll be in site 432. Be sure to stop by.
My goal this year is to put names with faces and forum IDs and then remember them all.
Ivey said
09:24 PM Jan 5, 2011
If you figure out how to do that Sherry please share the method. I know I will never remember. We are in 169 (had to be near a dog walk for the furkids).
RVRon said
08:48 AM Jan 6, 2011
Thanks for the welcome Sherry. I am admittedly NOT good with remembering faces either but I'll give it my best try!
Penny and Paul said
09:07 AM Jan 6, 2011
Welcome Ron and Joan! We, too, are in the process of purging. What a collection of stuff (read junk) we've accumulated over the years! We will be at site 429, and look forward to meeting you and all the others is April! Penny
bonnie and clyde said
04:03 PM Jan 6, 2011
Hi Ron and Joan, We moved from the big house house to the small house and got rid of a lot of stuff. Now we have lived in the small house 10 years and have a lot of stuff. For 24 years I have carried around about 7 cases of baseball cards waiting for them to pay for my retirement. With my wife's help, I am finally selling them for a fraction of my cost and feeling FREE of them. I will be moving them no more. It is interesting how a shift in attitude plays a big part in get free of stuff. We are making a lot of reuse it and non-profits very happy as we take loads of stuff to them, which makes us happy. Bonnie and Clyde
This year's goal is to get rid of all the excess "stuff" in the house we don't absolutely need. Every time we come back from an RV trip, having had everything we need in the motorhome we wonder why we have all of this other stuff that has filled up the house!
Hope to get to know a bunch of you - maybe at this year's or next year's RV-Dreams.com rally.
Sounds like you've already got a lot of experience so once you get rid of all that "excess stuff", you should be well on your way to full-timing.
If you have any questions, be sure to ask.
Jim
We, too, live in JAX. Welcome to the family. We also have an Itasca. You will enjoy it here!
Charles
We face 2 challenges before the full-timing fun can begin. The first, getting rid of all of the "stuff" as I've mentioned is right now task #1. We've decided to categorize things in one of 3 ways: 1) Throw it away 2) Sell it 3) Donate or give it away. Storage is not an option!! It really is a daunting task and a bit heartwrenching too. What to do with the precious creations of children and grandchildren? Then there's the bins and bins of photos taken over the years. The list goes on and on. I'll bet lots of folks don't even consider the fulltime RV life because the simply can't bear to part with everything.
Challenge #2 is getting rid of property. We have 2 houses to sell and obviously it's a really bad time to need to liquidate real estate with all of the foreclosures bringing the market down. Fortunately we're not upside down on either house but neither will bring the profits we planned a couple of years ago. Not so bad if you're selling one house and buying another - it kind of evens out. Bad for folks like us that just want to take the money and run away!
I'm sure both of these issues have been discussed in the forum so hopefully we'll find some guidance to help us over the obstacles.
We are also in the process of purging "stuff" and waiting for the house to sell -- although we are doing our waiting in snowy Michigan, rather than sunny Florida!
Good Luck to you! You will find lots of good information on this site. We'll be at this year's RV Dreams rally -- maybe we'll see you there!
Woohoo!!!
-- Edited by RVRon on Tuesday 4th of January 2011 08:41:36 PM
My goal this year is to put names with faces and forum IDs and then remember them all.
We moved from the big house house to the small house and got rid of a lot of stuff. Now we have lived in the small house 10 years and have a lot of stuff. For 24 years I have carried around about 7 cases of baseball cards waiting for them to pay for my retirement. With my wife's help, I am finally selling them for a fraction of my cost and feeling FREE of them. I will be moving them no more. It is interesting how a shift in attitude plays a big part in get free of stuff. We are making a lot of reuse it and non-profits very happy as we take loads of stuff to them, which makes us happy.
Bonnie and Clyde