Before we went full time, we watched every RV budget video we could find and still had no real idea what this life would cost us. Everyone's numbers were different, everyone's travel style was different, and half the videos left out the categories that hurt. So this is our contribution to the genre: every dollar from January through June, our first six months on the road, with the embarrassing lines left in.
What the six months looked like
Numbers without context lie, so here's ours. We started in Michigan, ran south to Florida for the winter, and worked our way back north. That's over 3,000 miles of towing the Brinkley 3515. About three of the six months we were stationary, and we mixed paid campgrounds with a good stretch of boondocking. Both of us work full time from the rig, which shapes the budget in both directions: we need reliable internet everywhere, and we can't chase cheap spots that would wreck a workday.
If your style is different (faster travel, no remote work, more boondocking), your numbers will be too. That's the whole reason we're showing the breakdown instead of one monthly total.
The automotive category hurts
The truck is the biggest surprise for most people who run these numbers, and it was for us. Diesel for 3,000-plus miles of towing adds up fast, and that's before maintenance on a truck that works hard for a living. When people ask what RV life costs, they usually mean campgrounds. They should mean fuel.
The RV categories
Campground fees came in lower than they could have, because of those three stationary months and the boondocking stretches. Monthly rates and free nights on public land are the two biggest levers we've found for controlling this line. Propane, tanks, and the small maintenance items that a first year of ownership generates filled out the rest. Internet is its own line for us since working from the road makes it non-negotiable, and we pay for redundancy on purpose.
The categories that shocked us
Groceries on the road cost more than groceries in a house. You shop at whatever store is near, you rarely catch sales, and a small RV fridge means more frequent trips. Then there's the honest part of the video: entertainment. We were in Florida for months, theme parks exist, and we went. Restaurants happened more than they should have. We're not sorry about most of it, this is supposed to be a life and not an endurance test, but seeing the line item in black and white was a moment.
What we'd do differently
The video ends with our real reflections: where we think we can cut without making life worse, and where we've decided the spending is the point. More boondocking is the obvious move now that our solar setup can carry us. Slower travel cuts fuel, which is the biggest lever of all. The grocery line improves with planning. The theme park line improves with willpower we may or may not have.
If you're planning to go full time, take our breakdown as one data point from one working couple with one particular travel style, not a target. But it's a real data point, which is more than we had when we started. Tell us in the comments whether we overspent or whether this looks about right; people's reactions to the entertainment line have been genuinely entertaining.
The full category-by-category breakdown with the actual numbers is in the video on YouTube. We also send a short weekly newsletter about where we are and what broke this week. The signup form is on our newsletter page.