Full time RVing can be expensive if you don’t watch your expenses. Traveling across the county, staying at nice campgrounds, eating at local restaurants and touring local attractions can quickly blow your budget. As we transition to retirement, managing our monthly expenses is extremely important to us. In this post, we share some tips we find that help us manage our largest expense – Campgrounds.

Your Biggest Expense

Campground Expense is the largest expenses a full time RVer has to pay. Monthly costs can easily exceed $1,500. Paying this much eats too much of our income and we prefer to spend our money on other things. Here are some ways you can reduce your campground fees.

1. Stay Monthly or Seasonally – Many campgrounds offer daily, weekly or monthly rates. Some even offer seasonal rates. For us, monthly rates reduce our nightly expense significantly and allows us to learn more about the area as well as forge new friendships. Another benefit of staying longer in a location is reducing fuel costs. By not moving around as much, we can save hundreds of dollars in diesel fuel over the course of the year!
   1. Example #1 – $75/night, $385/week and $825/month – $1,425 savings over the nightly rate)
   1. Example #2 – $64/night, $399/week and $1016/month – $904 savings over the nightly rate
   1. Example #3 – $34/night, $195/week, $350/month and $1,145 seasonally 7 months – $5,995 savings over the nightly rate
2. Escapee Coop Sites – Escapees has eleven coop locations where you buy into the coop as a leaseholder, pay a low annual maintenance fee and actively participate to maintain the campground in some way. The great thing about these coops is that you never loose money on your initial outlay. The outlays are low and are based on location. You do have to be an Escapees member and, if interested, can take a look at their each of their coops. Most do have a waiting list and the initial cost to become a leaseholder can run anywhere from $10k to $30k.
3. Escapees RV Parks – Escapees also has 8 RV parks where members can rent a spot for a night, a week or a month. At certain times of the year, dependent on the park’s location, the parks offer “Hangouts” where there are organized events where RVers mingle. For more information, look on Escapees website.
4. Workcamping – Most campgrounds (public and private) rely on workcampers to meet and greet campers, answer phones, maintain the campground, etc. In exchange, workcampers are typically given a campsite and in many cases, hourly pay. Couples are typically required to work around 20 hours each and Single RVers around 40 hours. Many times, work schedules allow that you have plenty of time off to explore the area. Typically, campgrounds hire for the season but many times you may find work for just a month or two. There are multiple ways to find work but Workamper.com is a great place to begin.
5. Boondocking – While we don’t dry camping frequently, we do look for opportunities for cost-free camping when traveling between point A and B. Boondocking at locations with large parking lots like Cabelas, Camping World, etc. have worked well for us. You will want to scout out the location first using Google Maps to make sure you know how to enter and exit. Additionally, memberships like Harvest Host can provide access to wineries, breweries, farms and small museums.

A note about Thousand Trails memberships. While we know these memberships are a popular way many RVers save money on campgrounds, we can’t recommend it. We initially researched purchasing a membership but for a couple reasons decided against it. You should do your own research to see if a Thousand Trails membership makes sense for you and your situation. It did not for us.

We hope you find our money-saving tips valuable and hope to see you on the road.