When a person can't afford a house, what do they do? Buy an RV.
In February, Nick Vivion did that. The PR director had been renting the house in Palm Springs for the past three years. The landlord wanted $100,000 more for it than he had the previous year.
"It was such an enormous jump, and it just started to seem impractical in a lot of ways to buy a house in a lot of places." "That madness made me realize that rents were going to go up as boomers downsize, renters return, and professionals work remote."
He decided to try out the RV life in order to reduce his expenses and have more flexibility. He and his boyfriend purchased a fifth-wheel RV that can be attached to the back of a truck for about $80,000 with cash and a coin. He said they had to buy a truck that was nearly as expensive as the RV.
He called his RV his "condo on wheels" because it has a living room that can be used as an office, kitchen and dining area, and a bedroom. He said it felt like a small apartment. It's bigger than my first apartment in New York.
The new middle class.
In his new book, Parag Khanna wrote that trailer homes like RVs have become the ultimate symbol of American mobility. He believes that physical mobility can lead to economic and social mobility.
During the Pandemic, this type of small home has become bigger than ever, allowing owners to live a more nomadic lifestyle and presenting a more affordable solution to aspiring homeowners. He said that the youth are leading the way.
" Their instinct is that I'm not going to be stuck in place." I'm not going to take on more debt. "I don't need to own that home," he said.
Being nomadic and living in an RV is one of the only ways to be a middle class person in America today, according to Vivion. He said that it's the last place you can live that's affordable and has decent amenities.
Many of the RVers he and his partner had met are people who can't afford to buy a home but can afford to own an RV. He said that the middle class gets further compressed financially and that wealth concentrates at the top.
He said that if you don't overpaying for a house, you can save more for retirement and have more financial control.
A lifestyle of trade-offs.
In the past 10 months, he has traveled through five states. He's in Miami.
He said that the best part of a mobile lifestyle is the ability to be in nature. He said that he liked the fact that he could bring all his life with him.
RV life isn't that different from owning a house. Like any homeowner, Vivion has faced unexpected expenses, like paying $7,000 to repair an engine issue, plus additional costs for a hotel while the engine was being fixed.
He said that some of the costs might have been in normal life, but that they were also towing a big thing. It's going to cost money because there's so much moving stuff.
Logistical headaches, like being unable to park an RV anywhere you want, could add a layer of stress if you were stranded on the interstate and trying to figure out how to get the truck fixed and where to stay in the meantime.
He said that you have to be very resilient in that way. The inconsistencies can be draining.
RV life could be lonely, and he would sometimes crave a city rejuvenation. He said that you're cutting out a lot of what people want. They want to live in a city with the culture, the energy, the feeling of people and the potential. It's like that big push to be in a city is gone because we have careers everywhere.
They will be living in the RV for two years. He said that they learned so much about life on the road that they didn't want to just walk away.
He said that he didn't know how he was going to pay someone else. It's comforting to know that no matter what I have a place to stay, there's a freedom there.
