I am stuck in the DC/NoVA area for the next several years.
The traditional living arrangements kind of sicken me, for several reasons:

The real estate is nuts - both buy and rent, you can't touch anything for under $2K/month and $500K houses become $800K houses in the last 3 years, the value is just not there.  PLUS there is no certainty these prices will hold/will expand indefinitely. I have enough for a downpayment but have no interest in being a credit slave for the next 30 years, potentially in a down market, to buy shyt I don't need in the first place,  it sickens me as a lifestyle, the whole suburbia thing. That said, I am still married to the area, rural Arkansas /Idaho / TX / etc. is just not an option.

I bought an old  bus to convert (to installed bed, desk, electric, etc.) but it broke down. The problem got compounded by the fact that I got  full custody of a minor child. He could potentially embrace an out of the box lifestyle but his mother, upon learning of the situation, might file in courts again to restart the custody fight and would probably win if the custody evaluator saw the living conditions - a 10 year old bus with some adhoc shyt thrown in. They are not open-minded to say the least.  Plus conversions are a lot more complex/expensive than I thought so I will sell it.

Now I am looking at renting this place in suburbia for $2K - given it's an utter waste of money - so  the the thought has crossed my mind, what if I bought a couple of acres not too far from here (I can do so without banks/debt) and then got a luxury coach (RV) to put on the premises, one of these 100K deals, new. I know it's also a waste of money given how fast they depreciate, but 2K/month is basically 100K wasted over 5 years with nothing to show for it at the end of it, so it's a waste either way but a 5-year loan  would generate me a 5-year old RV at the end of of it that I could actually use to move around. RV being new/shiny/classy, ex is unlikely to file, I think. Rich old men live in these things (thought I am not neither old nor rich).
I am completely frustrated with the stuation here.  Moving is not really an option.

If this was just me, I would probably convert a Uhaul truck into a stealthy camper and park at my workplace or such, I have seen some classy youtube videos.  But  it's not just me so it doesn't cut it.

Having a child, changes everything.  The information you posted is somewhat confusing.  It’s a partially WFH job I assume?

I got one of these hybrid positions, 3 days remote, 2 on site, I can theoretically shift the days a bit but some days have just to be in the office, which prevents me from moving far and away and do fully remote IT work. Lots of IT people do that, there is zero point in being in the office and they move to rural TX, buy their 10 acres and I keep renting like an idiot, mainly because of the custody thing.

Even if I had a fully remote gig, I still couldn't move anywhere because of the custody situation. I got full and get to pick where I live in the metro area. Which is actually  a huge improvement versus where I was years ago (ex got to pick everything). My posterity will no longer be a minor child in a few short years so it will change a lot.

How about buying the property outright(sounds like you were going to anyway) have a metal structure w/ concrete floor built large enough to hold a travel trailer/ RV? Ideally would need electrical hook ups. Buy lightly used traveler trailer w/ pull outs whatever you want/ need. When done sell trailer and "improved property w/ structure.

Personally I think you  should look for a different job, no matter what.  Or are you military?  I have no idea what the current situation on military housing might be in some  locations.

Buy a fixer upper on some land out in Orange/Culpeper/Spotsylvania  County.  

my posterity is almost 17 and he said the next time the court thing happens he will emancipate himself and / or testify in court that he wants to be with me. So the chances of her doing anything are pretty slim, plus she is bankrupt anyway, unless I do something as wild as start living in a tent in the woods with him.

even these seem to be 300K.  The farthest I can go is Culpeper.   I put 150K upper limit in Zillow and did not see a single hit within 2-hour driving range. The nearest which begin to pop up like 300 sq ft cabin in Front Royal area and further down.

All the beautiful land is equally far and none that I can find with electric, not a surprise. In DC area they measure land in sq ft, absurd. Probably because stating it in sq feet  looks a lot better than 0.15 acres.

I am not

the job is not going to address the custody situation.. I have to be in the same metro area, we are already 2 hours apart and she is complaining about that.

hookups are the thing. I need some condemned structure where I can get electric and hookups from it.

Then there is the county zoning thing, I can probably alter this bus I have enough to live in it for the same price I would dump into renting, or just buy some running RV  and park it there. I need a few acres.

It's not the trailer / RV / bus that's the issue, that's the simple part - the issue is where to park it.  it's where one can put it and have electric hookups. It's seems to be hard to find.

gonna go on a limb here and assume you are thousands of miles away from NoVA.

You can probably find something cheaper if it is a real fixer upper.  Or find a couple trailers on land and rent one out.  

150k is a pretty low limit - that was about my limit in 1991 when I was making 33k a year and interest rates were 9%.

Ya,guess "starting from scratch" would be cost prohibitive,with a bunch of permits to aquire®s to follow.

I made it very clear I do not want to buy anything involving credit and banking. Then there is the subject line. Suggesting to buy something misses the point entirely. I have some cash but I am not going into deep for the aforementioned reasons, I am looking for value and there is no value whatsoever in what I see around me.

I could leverage 20% down and go into red for 30 years and end up paying a lot more interest-wise than for the principal, but why?

that is pretty much the case. What makes it complicated is I want to stay in the Uber-expensive NoVA.  I want the least bad option here. They have zoned out of trailer parks/mobile homes/etc.  as anyone who lives here knows that. This isn't remotely Kansas, Toto. Looking for inexpensive trailer parks and land here makes as much sense as going to rural Nebraska and looking for opera there. It's incongruent and I am fully aware my request is incongruent with the general vibe here but it is what it is. There is some quasy-rural stuff here not very far away, even at these prices.  The people who want to embrace some less than standard lifestyle are all 3 hours away in places like Orange and West Virginia.

I am not signing to be a debt-slave for 30 years. That wasn't so bad when the RE kept going up for decades but what if it suddenly reverses? And even if I do, I want it be just land, with electric and water and that seems to be unobtanium, and when you do find it, it's 3 hours away in West Virginia, and if I am going to move to WV I might as well move anywhere 2000 miles away.

if I could find 3 acres with a wrecked house on it/trailer, I would be perfectly happy to place my bus there. $2,000 per month on renting is such a waste. And I am running out of time.

Get a decent RV, and start networking to find places that need an onsite presence for security. As in many places, there will be quite a few landowners and property owners out there that seasonal, or out of area all the time.

Real estate is usually a pretty good investment to make with borrowed money.  That said if you can swing a 150k cash purchase you could buy a piece of land and live in a shed.  2ac + lots go for well under that - buy a large shed and live in that - may have to stay a bit under the radar if you have a kid.

I really don't think living in an RV out in the country would be bad for a kid as long as it was a safe area.  You might look at the park trailer models.  They're about 100K and they are very nice little houses.  I've hauled several of these:  Keystone Residence models .  They're pretty barebones but would do the trick.

I know a guy who would rent out storage lockers in Fairfax and live in them.  

He had plenty of money also - just had a scarcity mentality.

This probably not ideal with having a kid with you but

I spent 4 months in the late 80's with my Dad in a hotel, 9 months in a hotel around 10 years ago and 2 years in  around 2005.  These hotels were NOT chains, and were pretty dumpy but had a minifridge, a microwave, and I bought a cheap coffee pot.  I kept a cooler full of ice from the hotel (free ice) for beer and water.  Also you will have no utility bills, free cable and internet.  

The trick is to talk to the manager and get a better rate and let them know this is a long term arrangement. They would rather fill an empty room and make some money then not make any money. You wont have maid service, but maybe once a week.

The down side is you will most likely be put in a section of the hotel with illegal alien's, and one time I am pretty sure a women was a hooker.

Good luck!

Edited to add school buses around me will let children off at hotels.

"Living in a shed"  can quickly attract the codes people  unless in some backwoods hick area.   And getting power to a place with no evident buildings can also  be a problem with out  some sort of permit.

But on that same line, if you can find a  more  country / rural area  not far from work,  maybe you could make a deal with a friendly  country family.  Rent  a space,  pay them rent,  I actually did that  here  in  the N end of Idaho when I was younger.

Have you considered renting a room or basement apartment/in-law suite in a house instead of renting a whole house or apartment for yourself?  I was single when I bought my house in northern VA and I rented out two of the four bedrooms.

It appears the OP is unable to do what he wants but is still determined to try…..or maybe just complaining…not sure.

Big mistake IMO.

If you can’t do what you want due to finances, make more money. Can’t make more money? Revise down your expectations/wants.

You are dealt the hand you have, not the one you want. Make the best of it and work with what you have. Or, just keep complaining.  Make things happen.

You shoulda said he was 17.    Buy land and live in an RV.    Put him to work building a cabin.

When I lived in Annapolis, I rented an apt, but my single friends in VA all had roommates.

I can't find anything like that within 45 mins of work and I am not commuting over an hour as that would defeat the purpose, again. Seems all the good stuff is 1.5 hours away. Lots measured in acres, not sq feet.

that entails buying a heavy duty truck to move it. I've had an Airstream, it was nice.  They need a heavy duty F350 and such.

I am thinking about an RV this time, self-contained driving rig. something compact, not a 40' model but a smaller one.

that's the whole problem with NoVA

There is nothing close to where the action is, you have to move to Front Royal area or such, over an hour away given traffic and gas bills will be enormous.

Rent in trailer parks is nuts. The ideal situation as I see it is to buy 2-3 acres and put whatever on it.  But with crazy RE prices, it's hard to find, I don't see anything at all at the moment and the things I do see (150K or less) is 2 hours away. There is stuff pretty close too but it's measured in sq feet and not acres and I think the NoVA vibe would send code people to check things out, after neighbors complain. That's less likely the closer to WV or South you get it. The whole problem is NoVA is the wrong place to do it.

I have been doing that forever

They used to be $700 / month 15 years ago
But risen in price in tandem with everything else.
Now, an average walk out basement is $2,000 per month.  You can buy (finance) a really nice RV for that. Except at the end of the RV financing, you have an RV and with leasing, you don't.

45 min commute is pretty limiting in NoVa - it used to take me about 1.5 hour to go from just west of Fairfax City to Union Station area (drive to VRE station and then taking the train).

If it was you alone you could probably stealth camp in a van but I think that would be very difficult with a teen.

Not sure where you work but there was a trailer park by the Fairfax Walmart - the guy I knew who stayed in storage lockers bought a trailer there for like 20K circa 2015 - looks like current rent for a space is $1155 a month.

This is going to come across as harsh.  I'll apologize in advance.  

OP....your posts sound like this (I am paraphrasing):  "I want to do this but can't afford to".  People respond with "Move somewhere you can afford to".  You respond with "I can't/don't want to etc".  People offer suggestions on how to afford what you want and your response is "You don't understand, I can't afford it here in NoVA".  

If you are trying to convince me you can't afford what you want where you are, well I believe you. I also believe you are looking for the "needle in the haystack".  What you want most likely does not exist (in NoVA....it DOES exist outside that area).  So, at this point it appears to me you only have two options if you want change.....wait till your child is an adult and move where you CAN afford what you are looking for in the area you currently are willing to live in.  Maybe the child will come with you....maybe he won't.  Or, you can work harder and make more money so you CAN afford what you are looking for.  If both of those options aren't viable, then you will have to continue doing things the way you have been and just accept you'll never get to live the lifestyle you want to.  

Don't know how we can help you at this point.  

I wish you well and hope you are able to find what and where you are looking for.  Life involves lots of compromise.

A friend of mine bought 60+ acres out in the middle of nowhere.  He started with a large camper/RV.   After his first year, he could not take living in it anymore.  He had the amish build a steel pole building/garage and walled in one corner for a living space/bathroom/bedroom.  He said it was better than living in the RV.  His main issue was emptying the black water tank.  He would pee outside, guessing poop too, he took few showers, etc to reduce the load of the black water tank.  He had to weekly transfer it to another container and drag it to an unused part of the property and dump it.  The amish put in a septic system with the pole building.  

People take sewage for granted until you are hauling it up a hill to dump.

It's a pity that you're faced with such a situation. Maybe if you equip your place of residence well and invite your wife to see it, she won't make a problem?

If I had acreage, I'd put Minialiste House on it.  Structural Insulated Panels, and two air/heat exchangers.

I used to full time in a RV.  It was kind of fun but overall not a money saving technique at all and I think cost more than just renting a room somewhere and kind of a PITA. I had an Airstream and a F350 to pull it with. Plus a daily driver. Moving was a major pain. Had to move the travel trailer, then come back and get the daily driver. Imagine a move from Boston to DC. (That's why I wonder if an RV with a toad /small DD is a smarter approach). Campgrounds in general are not viable, I don't know what they cost now but a decade ago they were approaching $1000 / month for a tiny space about 40' long with neighbors 12' away and about zero privacy so the above figure sounds about right.  I mean $1200/month  -that's a nice payment on a piece of land with 100 times more privacy.

there are so few campgrounds in DC area and the ones that are there are exhorbitantly expensive, I looked into them all a decago ago, it only got worse. Cherry Hill Park for example is so expensive it doesn't even have a monthly rate. I think compounded weekly rate would add up to thousands per month, which defeats the whole point. And you still end up in a RV sandwiches in between other RVs. That might be OK for a July 4th weekend but not a year after year full timing experience.



Maybe I should put 100K down and finance another 100K for 10-15 years with an absurd low monthly payment and maybe that will get maybe a few acres in NoVA. 200K buys between 1 and 5 acres, depending on how far it is.  But the value is just not there.  And none of the lots are cultivated. I could buy 5 times more acreage if I moved 2-3 hours from DC. There, prices rapidly drop as soon as you are out of  the commuting range. But I can't, because I am tied to the area in more ways than one.  And with any piece of land, I would still need a lot of work and expense to get septic, water and electric. Or just say screw it to these conveniences and just camp out in a bus/RV. It can certainly be done. Shower at work or in a gym.  I think code enforcement will eventually catch on. Nosy neighbors complaining. Why is there a bus / RV / modded Uhaul truck on that guy's property? It is not a sustainable situation long-term. Unless one is in Idaho or rural Arkansas or such.


I get the feeling the local powers as well as on the federal level make every effort to make this place as expensive as possible from every angle. No matter how much you make, it's not keeping up with the rising cost of living.  It seems the least painful solution is to buy some land and try to do something with it.  Maybe just camp out on it until slowly put in all the utils in it. I need a county which is not going to attack me over  RV living on own land. Counties like that seem to be 3 hours away, south and west of me. I don't think my son would be against living in a nice shiny RV. Or maybe rent 5 acres and put the rig on them. The choice seems to be damned if you do and damned if you don't. Either waste money on rent or waste on some RV which is a PITA and a depreciating asset.

https://minimalistehouses.com/tiny-house-on-wheels/noyer-xl

Triple-axle 34' Airstream

Interesting. Seems similar to a travel trailer, except more oriented towards full time living.  I full-timed for 2 years in a large Airstream similar to the one above.
 Learned a lot. It was cool. The aluminum skin has some appeal. I had an acute problem with storage. They are really light duty and cannot carry a lot of weight.  I think an RV can carry more and has substantially more storage. Travel trailers like Airstream are very light on storage. I had so much stuff that ended up storing stuff in the microwave and the gas  oven.  Airstreams look cool but not so great for a full timing platform, Firth Wheels seem a lot more promising.

If I got something like this, where would I put it? That's the key question.
I could buy this without financing at all. Or something even better, with an Arctic package.
I could get my son to buy the idea of this, he wanted to join .mil at one point and he does realize .mil people can sleep in tents in much more brutal conditions.
My ex seems to become more irrelevant by the minute because even if she did open a new court case against me for living in the woods in an RV, my son would likely veto it and all her efforts would go nowhere. And even if she did gain full custody it would only be for 6 months or such.

38' Fifth wheel montana

That is correct you will need something similar to an F350 (which is what I have) but I thought you were buying land. If so have it delivered to your land and keep it there. If you want to move around a lot then you will need a driveway. I don't know anything about them.

I would never buy a 2014 travel trailer, you have to rebuild the whole damn thing.



If you go to their yt channel you can watch the build process for what they do.  It's not some piece of crap that going to fall apart in a few years.  

All systems are accessible and easily repairable, if you have the skills.

A pole barn with space for a shower/bath/kitchen may work for the ex.  Best of luck.        

The concept looks neat, but lots of  "concerns": They are in Canada, charge for delivery, just the delivery itself will run $3500 to here and what about support logistics, if, things go south in any way?  There is no used market at all, meaning one has to buy new and then face steep depreciation, such as from 150K to probably 100K in the first 3 years, like any Fifth Wheel/RV. A 20-year $15K Airstream makes a lot more sense from the value standpoint.  It has depreciated all it can and can easily be resold.  Not practical in any way.

Buy the land and build a pole barn and live in it the RV is good to. Utilities and zoning could be a problem see if you can camp on your property.

OP, you are talking yourself In and out of multiple solutions.  The fact is that NOVA is one of the most expensive places to live in the US.  You'll have to move out of the area to live like you want to live on the budget you have.  You don't have to stay there, move three hours north to Harrisburg PA and live three times better for the same amount of money.  Or go four hours west to WVA and do better.  

Here's the solution: move to WVA, someplace like Martinsburg, buy 5 or 10 acres, build a steel barn and live in a cheap RV while construction is ongoing.  Go to the office on Monday morning, stay in a motel nearby, work Tuesday, then go home.  Keep it up until you go full remote or retire.  There are folks in NE PA who work in NYC with a 2.5 to 3hr commute each way!  Buy a cheap older Corolla or Civic to get you back and forth from WV to work, and enjoy the big city salary and much cheaper rural lifestyle...

There is always a way!  Altho I suspect you'll find fault with this idea too.   I can't tell if you are looking for solutions or just want to bitch.  .02..

I don't know how long it's been since you've driven around this area but the I-81 corridor from Front Royal, VA to Hagerstown, MD is basically a DC suburb now.  Farms are being sold off and Ryan/Lennar homes are going up.  It looks like Loudoun Co 20 years ago.