Change of Plans

We bought a camper just before Covid started, planning to take some trips over the summer. Then Covid hit and we stayed pretty close to home. As we got into 2021, Shawna needed to have a series of foot surgeries, which kept her off her feet for several months recovering. While she was down and recovering, we hung out and watched movies, shows and other videos on Youtube as we couldn’t do many outdoor activities. We watched several different Youtube channels about people traveling in their RV’s. As we watched them, we started thinking about taking some longer trips in the RV, so we could get out west and see some of the many interesting sites that are out there. While there are a lot of beautiful places on the east coast of the US, most of it has a similar feel. To get some real variety, we need to get out west. And it takes time to get out there.

Early this year, 2024, we decided we would take a one month trip in October and go to Utah. We could drive a few days, then Shawna could work for a week and then drive a few more days to get to Utah. We would then have 2 weeks to explore the area and reverse the process to get back to NC, all within a month. After watching some of the travel videos, we thought that one day we might like to close the house up and go travel for 6 months at a time to explore some new areas and take our time doing it. Most of the time when we travel, we rush around quite a bit trying to see as much as possible. We have limited time and don’t know if we’ll ever make it to that area, so we want to see everything we can. With the RV and more time, we could go slowly and spend more time in one location. A more relaxed pace sounds like it would be very enjoyable while still seeing everything we want to. But this trip to Utah would be a bit rushed in getting out there and back.

So, we started planning our Utah trip and had it mostly planned out and had started making reservations where we wanted to be. Another line of thinking that was going on around the same time was wondering how much our home was worth in the escalating housing market. At times, we had discussed having a realtor come out and give us an idea of what the value was. In the spring we did have a couple of them come out and visit our home. We love our house, the land and the amazing view we have but that much money was a significant amount of profit for us. As others have mulled over this idea of selling the rub comes in when you need to buy a replacement. You can’t sell high and buy low at the same time. Unless you want to move from your area to find a cheaper market, which we don’t. What we could do is sell, park the cash, go travel for a few years and figure it out later. With a bit of luck, the nest egg will grow and we’ll end up with more options. The most obvious is to buy some land and build another home while doing a lot of the work ourselves to save on costs.

At this point we’ve lived in this home for 10 years. It’s the longest I’ve ever lived in the same house. We figured that we would be here for a few decades. Probably until the upkeep of it became too much for us. We decided we really couldn’t just close up the house and leave for months at a time. It would be stressful wondering if everything was fine with it and how much work would be needed when we got back. We made a change of plans. We decided to sell and hit the road. It took just over a week to get a buyer and we had our closing about a month later. Everything went smoothly with the sale and the new owner was thrilled with her little home with the awesome view. We got rid of lots of stuff. Sold some and donated much more. Then we put some things into a small enclosed trailer for safekeeping. We made some modifications to the camper to work best for us. We loaded up the things we would need for this trip and moved into it with our two dogs and a cat. Let’s see where this new adventure takes us.