How to Live Simply in a 39 Foot RV

Got this post from Unclut​terer​.Com, shared by Louise Hornor who lives full­time in an RV. The RV (or Recre­ational Vehi­cle) is not a known means of trans­porta­tion here in the philip­pines. But if you’ve seen the 2006 Robin Williams movie RV, then you have an idea what it is. Imag­ine your­self in a bus con­verted into a home. Imag­ine the com­forts of a nor­mal home you would have to give up, the things you can no longer bring with you, and the orga­ni­za­tion that it would take. Imag­ine liv­ing in a bus like this:

Now imag­ine liv­ing there full time.

That is what Louise and Sean Hornor have been doing since August 2004. They live in “Odyssey”, a 40 ft Neo­Plan bus shown below. I think the prin­ci­ples of liv­ing in an enclosed space is some­thing we could learn from even if we do not live in an RV.

Here is Louise Hornor’s article:

My hus­band and I live full-time on the road in a 39 foot tour bus that has been con­verted into an RV. While this is con­sid­ered fairly large by RV stan­dards, it is a very small home, espe­cially con­sid­er­ing that we share it with one dog, two cats, and four trop­i­cal fish.

Keep­ing things unclut­tered is vital for sev­eral rea­sons. First, we travel almost every day. Loose items sim­ply can­not be lying around in a mov­ing vehi­cle. At best, they will become a big mess as they slide and shift. At worst, they can become deadly pro­jec­tiles in an accident.

Sec­ondly, clut­ter can become over­whelm­ing in such a small space. Our bed­room is 9 ft x 8 ft and our kitchen even tinier. Any­thing left on the coun­ters or floor makes it seem even smaller. Travel is dusty, too, and it is much eas­ier to clean a smooth, empty sur­face. The good news is that 300 square feet doesn’t take long to clean.

One way we have reduced clut­ter is by going elec­tronic. Bills are paid online through a ser­vice. Paper bills are received at their facil­ity, scanned, and emailed to me. We pay our taxes elec­tron­i­cally. All our bank­ing is done over the inter­net. We keep in touch with friends and fam­ily through email, our blog, Twit­ter, and phone calls. News, weather, and enter­tain­ment arrive via the web. We take dig­i­tal pho­tos and even con­duct meet­ings using on-line con­fer­enc­ing software.

What paper we have left, such as pet vac­ci­na­tion cer­tifi­cates, vehi­cle registration/maintenance receipts, pass­ports and mar­riage license, eas­ily fits in a sin­gle file drawer.

Because we are on-line often, we each have our own lap­top com­puter. They take up much less space than a desk­top unit with a mon­i­tor, and are much eas­ier to stow for travel.

We chose a clean, light, sim­ple inte­rior design for our bus to help reduce visual clut­ter. The plain maple cab­i­nets used in every room have no knobs. The hard­ware that shows is all the same brushed stain­less steel. All the win­dow blinds are cream col­ored and very sim­ple. Fur­ni­ture is solid col­ors and pat­terns are lim­ited to muted tones on the bed­spread and throw pillows.

Items used often, such as the TV remote, read­ing glasses and cam­era, are stored in attrac­tive wicker bas­kets or leather boxes. These neutrally-colored stor­age con­tain­ers keep small items cor­ralled and blend nicely with the coun­ter­tops. They also make it sim­ple for every­thing to have a place to be put away quickly before hit­ting the road.

The most impor­tant way we reduce clut­ter, how­ever, is sim­ply by hav­ing less stuff. Some­times less means fewer. For instance, we gave away at least half of our cloth­ing to pre­pare for RV life. What is left exactly fills the drawer and closet space we have. A strict “one in/one out” rule, which makes it easy to resist buy­ing new clothes. More than 90 per­cent of our books were left behind. Place set­tings for four and a hand­ful of knives and kitchen uten­sils suit us just fine.

By look­ing for items with mul­ti­ple uses, we can often get by with less. Our mix­ing bowls dou­ble as serv­ing bowls, a fold­ing stool is used as a footrest, small padded trays are used both for din­ing and to hold the lap­top com­put­ers, and bungee cords are used for every­thing. Wash­able microfiber tow­els when damp can clean floors, coun­ters, ceil­ing, and shower; and when dry can dust, absorb leaks and spills, and pad break­able items.

Some­times, less means smaller. We use two small scoot­ers as our alter­na­tive trans­porta­tion. They are light, fun and get fan­tas­tic fuel mileage. When pos­si­ble, we look for items that col­lapse for stor­age. We have a col­lapsi­ble lad­der, laun­dry cart, exer­cise mat, pet car­ri­ers, and patio fur­ni­ture. All were cho­sen to fit the small stor­ages spaces we have avail­able. Doesn’t fit? We don’t own it.

And some­times, less means none. We don’t own a car, but when we need one (about once a year), we either bor­row or rent. In fact, we choose to rent a num­ber of bulky, sel­dom used items such as skis, bicy­cles and golf clubs. We visit laun­dro­mats all over the coun­try and don’t need a washer and dryer.

None of these declut­ter­ing tech­niques seem like sac­ri­fices to us. For our life of travel, less is def­i­nitely more. The reward has been free­dom, sim­plic­ity, and hap­pi­ness, and that’s an arti­cle for another day!

1) Pock­et­Mod
2) Tax Sav­ing Tips
3) Unclut­ter­ing Your Laundry