Was looking into getting a camper to live in. I see some pretty spacious ones available on marketplace for dirt cheap. I'm talking like 36ft for sometimes 6 or 7k with them saying no leaks and working ac and everything. What I'm wondering is why are they so cheap and what should I look for when looking to buy one, don't want to just buy one and find out it has a major mold problem.
>>2870061I'm in the same position as you. One of the things I've seen is to get on the roof and check all the seals and gaskets. They are notorious for breaking apart due to the sunlight and normal vibrations from travel. It's an easy fix though, but it could be a good start for checking for water damage.
>>2870073good idea. You know if any specific brands are better or worse? My dad's telling me to go for an airstream or something since it has a metal frame which makes sense. I just see a lot of ones like pic rel that are much more spacious for the money and figure only need it a few years so I figure can't be that big a difference
Cheap campers always have problems. Leaks, mold, and electrical issues are common.Airstream is excellent and expensive.Jasco is cheap and less expensive.Ideal DIY scenario: Old airstream with fixable problems.
>>2870078The airstreams are nice, but they are very tiny and overpriced and more of a luxury brand now. The only good thing about them is that they hold their value pretty well if you ever decide to resell or trade up. You're paying mostly for the brand name.You can get a 38-40ft 5th wheel for about half or the same price as the luxury ones that are about $200-$300k from brands like Forest River or Keystone. Forest River is a conglomerate of rv brands, they usually acquire and keep the names as the line. I am personally looking into the Forest River-Cedar Creek, RiverStone, and Sabre lines, about the same size of luxury Redwoods for 60-100k.Find the layout you like from Forest River and then type in the words "problem" and "forum" and you will usually find multiple threads of the most common problems with said RVs and you can eliminate them from your list that way.I recommend making an Instagram account and following a few RV pages, that way you can get a condensed 1-2 minute tour of RV's, and if you find something you like, you can then search the extended tour on Youtube.Just don't get duped into paying $200k prices for an RV you can get for 60k from Forest River. You'd be surprised what you can find for less than 100k. Even the thin corrugated ones are pretty big for the price. Just baby the fuck out the RV that way you can maintain it's resell value. If you're handy, you could probably install solar or some other shit to boost the value of it when you resell.
Grand design or bego. Source-I'm an rv wigger
>>2870061That sounds like a fair price for a decent camper. The reason they're so cheap is usually just people getting sick of them taking up so much space when they rarely use them. The cheap price doesn't mean they're cursed or anything, just a pain in the ass to store if you aren't using it regularly. You'll know if it has a mold problem by going inside and smelling around. I'm working on a little 14ft 70's single axle caravan at the moment where I'm building a new pop-top roof for it which seemed a bit daunting at first but has been a lot of fun. Obvious spots that were leaking slightly (aside from the old pop top) were the 45yo rubber seals around all the windows and the side door that had gone crispy, but new coolroom door seals and window trim came to about $60 for 20 meters on ebay. Also check the gaskets around the rooftop AC if you have one, because my boss had his ~10yo caravan completely destroyed by mold from water that dripped in over a year long period of being parked and not used>>2870078Airstreams are beautiful things but incredibly heavy and have a huge hipster-tax, plus you'll be hard pressed trying to find one second hand that hasn't been turned into a food cart alreadyPic related isn't mine but it's the closest I can find. Basically just an early 70's braked trailer with a sedan axle and pine frame clad with aluminium. All up it weighs about 900kg and I can push it around the backyard by hand while working on it. Caravans are pretty cool hey. It's like a hard shell tent with a kitchen and toilet and gaming pc
>>2870599Do these trailers hold up to road travel?
>>2870061They can depreciate a lot and maybe some people want to get rid of them, but also could be a scam.Important things to check, the frame, make sure it's not rusted. Check the roof seals, make sure there are no leaks or water damage inside. Generally they are built cheap and you should expect to have to replace shower valves, faucets, or other maintenance as part of ownership.>>2870079retard
Oh cool, you made the same thread again, with the same picture. Ads are ads. You can write anything. Rv, perfect condition no mice no leaks 5k. See, I just did it right there. You'd definitely write no leaks if you just had a leak repaired.This is a crapshoot. It may be good, they may be looking for a fool with some money. Was bertha 300 lbs and did she crack the shower pan? Rvs, especially cheap ones, sometimes have pretty light duty stuff Buyer beware, see you next week, next thread.
>>2870061Claims adjuster here, these trailers are all made like shit. Forest River makes 99% of them and they're cheap stick build with SIP outers and some caulking/moulding to close everything off. 3-4 years before you start seeing water entry at best.They literally rattle and shake themselves apart. If you park them outside all year they weather even faster, sun, rain, or snow. If it's a choice between this and being homeless, go for this I suppose. But you'll be homeless or living with horrible mold and infestation within a few years if you think these are a long-term solution. Look for:>fresh caulking (means something wore out and possibly leaked>bowed window frames>deflection in the floor or weird sounds (it will sound like you're stepping on tiny ice crystals if water got between the subfloor and main floor)>loose plumbing fittings>non-functioning electrical (test all the plugs and lights, make sure all switches work and figure out your power supply (i.e. shore power, battery, solar?)>check the undercarriage THOROUGHLY (these things are not pest-proofed at all and it takes nothing for vermin to crawl inside and make nests)>mismatched materials inside (good indicator of water damage and some repairs previously done)The appliances they use are all fairly run of the mill, Dometic makes most of the fridges and they're of reasonable quality. Number one piece of advice: AVOID a trailer with pop-outs/tip-outs. These leak like motherfuckers, the seals are never good, they are a major source for earwigs and ants to get inside, and the tracks jam/bind easily if a tiny bit of debris gets inside of them which can cause major damage to the tip out itself or your floors inside. My advice would be to not buy one of these. If you must live in a trailer, get something higher-end that's got a fibreglass shell, like a Casita or Oliver. They will hold their value too, whereas the big fancy typical trailers will only ever cost you money and headaches.
>>2872801>Do these trailers hold up to road travel?Hell yes, which is why there's still so many of them around. Most are just a pine frame with aluminum cladding bolted to a braked steel trailer. It might sound flimsy but wood can flex and take bumps better than newer ones. Mine is almost 50 years old and had all kinds of remnants from previous owners that took it around the country multiple times
>>2873765>which is why there's still so many of them aroundThe majority sit in yards after their elderly owner figures out hotels are better so they can be good sources of axles and frames for those poor enough to skin one. (Everyone should scrap at least one RV or trailer so they never want to again.)Fun trick, run a log chain through a window to your truck or tractor and you can pull them apart quickly.
>>2874287I agree. I've made trailers out of 3.One I gutted was used as storage by a cobbler. Filled with all kinds of weird pads and oils and shit. Cobbler retired. Mice filled it for years. Cobbler died.Family got rid of the camper.Damn that one was nasty.
>>2870061Are you looking to be living on the move or you trying to find a cheap place to live?
>>2870061i dont care what anyone else is saying in this threaddo NOT live in a rv for any amount of time if you dont plan on inspecting the roof and sides and (god forbid) slideout seals for any amount of failure probably at least once a week. also clean it while youre at it so you can spot failing sealant. if kept well, pre 2010ish model years are the ones you want. from what ive seen, the older the unit is, the better built it is. this is offset by the fact that 95/100 old units are completely sacked out bc their owners use it for a trip to a campsite or disney world once or twice and leave them to rot in a storage lot for 10 years.if you unfortunately feel the need to buy (finance) a new unit, the manufacturer warranty for sealant is 90 days. if your roof gets rotted due to sealant after 90 days, they arent covering it. this is not covered under the """INDUSTRYS BEST""" structural warranty that every manufacturer displays so proudly. also pretty much everything inside and out is cheap and chinese. electronics will fail and trim pieces will fall off. and im p sure electrical isnt covered under the 3 year warranty.moral of the story: rvs either leak or theyre going to leak and theyre made by mexicans. t. rv repair technician seriously put 7k towards a down payment on a house
>>2873177this is probably the dumbest post I've read about trailers.
>>2875529>once a weekholy shit /diy/ is full of retards
>>2870061i've lived in these a couple timesfirst one was probably worth $2k in 2012, got two years out of it and moved into a house with college buds and left it in the yard where it proceeded to get a water intrusion, but I still sold for $1kdad had on of those nice ones in the pick with popouts and for 5 years, he probably paid $20k for it in 2017ish. I stayed in it for a year. He then sold it for like 9k$ cause he was tired of dealing with it, but it was in perfect conditionfrankly even if you only get a single year with no resell value, for 10k$ you're paying less than rent for the year nowadaysbut you'll surely get more out of it than that
>>2875568thank you for not elaborating :)
>>2870061>What I'm wondering is why are they so cheapBecause boomers are dying off, so there's going to be a surplus of them in the coming decade. The neighborhood I grew up in is all retired boomers now, and every other house has OPs pick parked in the driveway or on the side of the house. These RVs haven't been moved or used in years so they're in pristine condition.
>>2875634It's once every 6 months at most. Nobody has ever said you need to check roof seals weekly. Also check before the wet season starts.>>2875658It's a shame how much society makes RVs useless despite their utility. Like the legal distinction between a 'mobile home park' and 'rv park'
>>2875805have fun with your leaky roof bc you cant be assed to look at it on the regular
>>2875810You're retarded please stop telling people to check a RV roof weekly. Your pic hasn't been serviced in years.
seems kind of cucked to park your rv and rent a lot of land monthly
>>2870599You've got me thinkin anon. I've been considering this for years but I always feared what kinds of physical curses might reside in a half-century old travel trailer. But I mean shit, if it's basically a garden shed with metal siding? I could probably just drill out the rivets and reconstruct the whole thing; replace some or all of the frame members and clean along the way. Put in some silverboard and maybe find some castoff cedar closet planking...
>>2870061look at the roof for patches.walk the floor for soft spots and if you can, use a wood moisture probe on the floor. look in all the storage areas at the raw wood for water stains
just put up a RV cover canopy and park the RV under it. Just elastomeric the entire roof once a year
>>2870599>>2876455>I could probably just drill out the rivets and reconstruct the whole thingIt's even easier than that. Most of these 1970-80ish caravans are sealed with wood screws through aluminum "J rails" along the edges which you can still easily buy from RV stores or online. Pic is of a pretty ugly style and bad spot for a join, but you get the picture
