RV Shenanigans! Podcast from Millers in Motion
The RV Shenanigans podcast is your go-to audio adventure for all things RV travel! Hosted by Ryan & Lauren Miller of Millers in Motion, this podcast dives into the ups, downs, and downright hilarious moments of life on the road. From navigating epic road trips and campsite mishaps to discussing RV gear, maintenance tips, and travel inspiration, RV Shenanigans brings a mix of expert advice and laugh-out-loud stories. Whether you’re a seasoned RVer or just dreaming of hitting the road, this podcast delivers relatable tales, helpful tips, and plenty of good vibes to fuel your wanderlust. Tune in, buckle up, and get ready to keep the wheels rolling and the adventures coming!
RV Shenanigans! Podcast from Millers in Motion
Selling Our Beloved RV: Embracing Change and New Adventures Ahead
We explore our decision to sell our RV and transition from full-time travel to establishing a home base. The episode delves into the selling process, negotiations, market strategies, and reflects on our journey of RV life.
• Discussing the emotional reasons behind selling the RV
• Highlighting the importance of market research and listing strategies
• Sharing insights on negotiating and transparent communication with buyers
• Emphasizing timeline management and market fluctuations
• Reflecting on the cherished memories of RV life and future transitions
Boy, do we have some changes and my better half slash a voice is returning to the podcast. It's been a hot minute for her, so let's get into it. Welcome back, I'm Ryan.
Speaker 2:I'm Lauren, and this is the RV shenanigans podcast.
Speaker 1:Shenanigans. If you notice, we haven't said that word in a while.
Speaker 2:I'm happy to have it back. That was my idea.
Speaker 1:We toyed with some ideas and they didn't work out, so we're just going back to what we know works, and that is the shenanigans, because we're good at that. So we'll welcome back. Hi, how are you?
Speaker 2:I'm here. It's early in the morning for us Well kind of.
Speaker 1:We're just not as caffeinated as we normally would be. Whether or not it's early is debatable. So we have a lot of updates and this is going to be coming on the full YouTube channel thing here in about. Well, at the time of recording about three-ish weeks, and so we figured we'd put it here first. I'm sure it'll be out on social media and this is being recorded right before we get ready to leave for the united rally. So if you're coming to that, you probably know even before this, so you want to hit them with our first big change the first big change is um.
Speaker 2:We're homeless again by choice.
Speaker 1:By choice is the important part there by choice. Yes, we sold the valor we did, and we're going to get into a whole lot of selling the valor here in a little bit, um, but just know that for the time being, we did decide to sell it. No, it's not because something was wrong with it or anything else. We absolutely love that rv, and literally months ago, we just finished it. In our eyes I'm using air quotes that you can't see, but yeah. So with that though, why did we sell the valor?
Speaker 2:oh, that that was a question for me, not for them.
Speaker 1:Huh that was for you.
Speaker 2:Okay, because they can't respond to this moment sometimes it's that rhetorical where it's like, yeah, you guys answer, dream up your own answers.
Speaker 1:I guess your cue is when I picked up my coffee to take a drink, wasn't it?
Speaker 2:Didn't know if you were just spacing things out. I don't know.
Speaker 1:We're going to do long, dramatic pauses on this podcast in the reboot.
Speaker 2:For you to think about the answers to these questions before we answer them ourselves. Okay, so we sold the Valor because we would like to actually get something that's smaller and a little bit more nimble, and maybe even something that I could drive.
Speaker 1:Oh, praise God.
Speaker 2:Easy over there, easy breezy. So yes, that was. One of the goals is that we did want to be a little bit more nimble and smaller, but also because we're going to find something to settle down in, like a house type, so we can kind of come back to a home base a little bit more than we had been.
Speaker 1:So even I think, a bigger deal, at least to us, more than even selling the Valor, because in our full-time RV life we had two RVs. We had our Solitude 390RK. That was a, we thought, a great choice at the beginning.
Speaker 2:And I still stick to that. I think it was it met the goals we set.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for like three to five months it met those goals Great.
Speaker 2:This is a learning opportunity.
Speaker 1:And then we switched to our Alliance Valor 44V14, which was a new floor plan at the time for him. We absolutely love that. We still love that rig. We're still going to be very involved in the Facebook group, mainly because we created it, but it is just that time. I think you refer to them as seasons of life.
Speaker 2:That is correct and we just determined that that living full time in the RV, that season was kind of coming to a close to us and that we would enjoy having a home to come back to. But we still love the RV life and wanted to keep that a big part of our travels.
Speaker 1:Well, and I think so, a big part of our travels. Well, and I think so a big reason for us. Because I don't I don't necessarily feel like I have to justify why we're doing it, but I like to give people a little bit of insight to why.
Speaker 2:If that makes sense Well, if you don't, they may come into their own conclusions and we don't want anything out there. That's not true.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we hated RV life.
Speaker 1:No, that's not the case. That's absolutely not the case. We loved it actually so much that we're making sure to go back with not only another RV, but I will say it will be another Alliance RV, because we loved our Valor so much and so. But with that, you know, it's with that change of season and time for us, our families, specifically my parents are getting a little older, so we want to be around North Texas a little bit more. And then, a big reason for me, something that I noticed, and this is a trap I think a lot of full-time rv families can maybe accidentally get themselves into.
Speaker 1:And that's, you know, because I worked from the rig and you could work from the rig, we would go somewhere and work would just magically follow you. So you're not really taking Again the air quotes that nobody can see. And so, yes, it's great that all of our stuff would go Like if we went to a horse show, we went to like Tennessee or Florida for the gazillionth time or any of those types of things, but also we didn't feel like we were traditionally camping anymore.
Speaker 2:Right, and that's a double-edged sword, because we were able to go a lot of places without necessarily missing out on work. You know you're like, oh, I have so many vacation days, well, or you know, I had to meet so much productivity and that didn't apply in the same manner. So we were able to travel more, but we weren't really vacationing.
Speaker 1:Well, and because we still wanted to get back to North Texas for horses and parents and family stuff and everything that kind of kept on pulling us back, we ended up doing these as you're very aware if you watch the YouTube channel ridiculous drive days to where they're. I mean, I don't know that we minus the trip to Florida the first day. I don't know that we had a drive day less than eight hours ever.
Speaker 2:Right, they're usually closer to 12.
Speaker 1:Without an arrival. Sorry, I guess I should preface that by normally. We did that like a long drive day so that we had a shorter drive day coming in, so we get set up and have a little bit of energy to kind of move on that day, but yeah, but yeah. So all of those things being said, we would like to, when we actually get the RV out to go on a trip. We want it to be that. We want it to be a trip. We want it to be a little bit more enjoyable when we got out there. Not that we didn't enjoy it before, just degrees of enjoyment.
Speaker 2:I guess Maybe relaxing.
Speaker 1:Right, well, and to know that, like when the RV comes out, it can be something fun, right.
Speaker 2:Exactly A hundred percent fun, not you know like when we went to.
Speaker 1:I'm going to use Tennessee as an example because I think that's the spot we went to. I'm going to use Tennessee as an example because I think that's the spot we went and played the most away from the RV. But at the end of the day we still came back and still had to clean our house and to do laundry. And I'm not saying that that's not a thing when you RV anyway, but when you look at it as those everyday tasks and now my desk is down, so I might as well get a little bit of work done while I'm sitting here waiting on something to happen and next thing, you know you've been down for four and a half hours that kind of stuff and not sitting outside, not, you know, getting a campfire going, all of those things kind of compiled no-transcript.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I had to stay back at work and go to the clinic for a couple of things which we fully expected. That's not unforeseen.
Speaker 1:Let's say or the dogs.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:If we got invited to go do something where I couldn't, I'd be gone for like 12 to 15 hours a day. That's not fair to our dogs to take them and not be able to get them outside.
Speaker 2:All that stuff Right, but that did leave you taking our house and left me and the dogs trying to scramble to find somewhere to go. Luckily enough, our parents are here in the DFW area, but my mom has dogs that don't really get along with our dogs, so that was never an option on the table along with our dogs. So that was never an option on the table. So it was either hotel or crash with Ryan's parents, which, at the end of the day, I felt intrusive, and that started to get a little old. It was wonderful for them to welcome us, but by the way, felt intrusive.
Speaker 1:We love my parents so much because they pretty much gave us their upstairs for the foreseeable future, until we can get the new RV slash house thing squared away.
Speaker 1:So yes with all that being said, we don't want to go down the woe is us path a little too far. So just know that there is a change in the works on the RV side. But before we dive into it, we're going to take a quick break because when we come back, we're going to talk about how, why, the process of selling RV, just in case you need to sell an RV. So stick with us for just one second.
Speaker 1:Hey, we're back look at that and for us, the magic of seconds later. Um so, selling your rv. So obviously, like we talked about earlier, we just sold our alliance Alliance Valor 44 V14. We've sold an RV previously. That was our grand design, solitude 390 RK. But we want to talk a little bit about the how we knew it was time to sell it, which we kind of did with the solid, with the Valor. I mean, we can briefly touch on the Solitude, the other one, the other one, but then kind of what, once you make that decision to sell it, what that process actually and legitimately looks like from a realistic perspective. Because I feel like our RVs were a little unique in that they had been reasonably upgraded. Now the Valor had been really upgraded.
Speaker 1:So what? When we decided to sell the RV, what was the first thing that entered your mind that you needed to get done?
Speaker 2:Honestly, to me it was kind of like writing a description and taking photos to convey the value of the. Rv Because we had both of these are very nice rigs and we had updated and mod and all kinds of stuff. And so we wanted to be able to convey that, and I know that at that point for us it was a niche buyer, but trying to grab that person to show them what was unique about our rig versus the 7,000 that are on the market.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and obviously we're saying that it was a niche buyer because both systems had a solar system on it. The first one was a pretty good sized solar system. The Valor was ridiculously sized. I mean, do whatever whenever, however, you want kind of a system. And so from that we knew between the independent suspension, the disc brakes, the solar upgrades, all the little stuff which there's so much, I don't even know where to start on that. But we knew that that person wasn't going to be just the average RV buyer because they don't understand the value in the independent suspension, disc brakes, solar, all of those things. And so I mean it wasn't necessarily without getting in the dollars. It was priced accordingly, I guess, is the best way to say that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I agree that we went to links to research the market and the value of the things that we had done and just the temperature of the market in general in order to price them accordingly. We weren't looking for somebody to come in and steal it, necessarily, but we weren't looking to overprice it.
Speaker 1:And I think it's important to note too that if you're listening to this and you go I didn't know you were selling your rig it's because we don't actually put it on the Miller's in Motion social media stuff. We may share it on our personal pages, which I'm never on, you're on yours a little bit more than I am, but still not a ton. Um, we've never felt like. We feel like the rv in its own right should sell itself, versus kind of relying on a viewership or followership to sell it for us. If that makes any sense and I don't I've just always felt weird about putting it on the Miller's in Motion page to sell it. I don't know why. 100% besides.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I get what you're saying.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you get what I'm putting down, so we never did that. Now, that being said, there are plenty of options out there. As far as trying to get it listed, I'm going to say the most basic would be Facebook marketplace. Because it's free, you can put it on there. I will tell you from somebody that sold a handful of things like golf clubs and random stuff on Facebook marketplace hard pass.
Speaker 2:And so I actually did list the solitude in Facebook marketplace.
Speaker 1:Oh, I didn't remember that, and that was a terrible experience. So now I need to know why. Because you dealt with it, I really didn't on that Facebook marketplace side.
Speaker 2:Because, from what I found, the buyer that we were looking for for a high-end niche rig was not in Facebook marketplace.
Speaker 1:That's about the nicest way I think you could have put that.
Speaker 2:It sure was. There are tire kickers and there are people with no experience or frame of reference that have a lot of opinions about what you've done and they're very willing to share them, and I started a lot of conversations that had to be shut down because they weren't in a positive direction.
Speaker 1:Well, and I think, too that, like. So we're going to talk a little bit about like RV, specific websites where you can list things, and I think that there's a prerequisite to people that go to those that they're actually legitimately looking for an RV, whereas on Facebook marketplace, if you happen to Facebook, like a truck for sale I accidentally did that at one point, accidentally did that at one point, and I'm still getting ads for like, use trucks to use RVs, all of that stuff, because Meta is trying to force things down my throat that I necessarily don't want to see anymore well, and ultimately I.
Speaker 2:so it was the grand design solitude that I'd listed, and I also listed it in grand designs for sale and you know, big RVs for sale, these different groups that were in Facebook, and I had a very similar experience that the buyer was not in those groups. Those are just what do they call them Keyboard jockeys.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I was going to ask so did you? When you listed it in those group specifics, did you list the marketplace ad or did you list the other ad that we did, which we'll talk about in a second?
Speaker 2:I did the other oh okay.
Speaker 1:So that's why I was curious if it would.
Speaker 2:So facebook as a whole was just kind of a hot mess oh, it was, and I, when we listed the valor, I did not go down that road one bit no, in fact, we only listed it one place now we shared it excuse me, we shared it on our social media once or twice again.
Speaker 1:Not our miller's in motion page, but we actually shared it on our social media once or twice Again. Not our Miller's in Motion page, but we actually shared it on our personal page. I think we mentioned that we were selling it, just so that it wasn't like shock and awe on Miller's in Motion.
Speaker 2:Right, and I don't even know that I shared it on my personal.
Speaker 1:Oh, I just assumed you did I did not. Never mind, we didn't do any of that. So, with that being said, we did choose to list it on rv trader. So if you are unaware, if you're in the rv space and you're unaware what rv on the there I don't know why I just got a little like transylvania accent there his coffee has your blood.
Speaker 2:His coffee hasn't kicked in.
Speaker 1:Y'all are gonna have to be kind um, but we did choose to list it. On rv trader we did use one of their higher end options because you can list. They got different tiers, apparently more than even I knew. They used to only have like two or three and now they like four. So we did what we thought was the top of the line, which apparently was one below where you could list. I think you had 40 pictures, description, all of that stuff, and then on top of that you message. When people message you, it goes all through RV trader. So there's a little. Not everybody gets your cell phone number and personal Facebook profile, which is kind of nice because you inherently do get tire kickers as well there, but it's a lot less. Now you're probably not going to get as many leads that you're going to get on Facebook, but I do feel like that you got better leads.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. I couldn't agree more.
Speaker 1:Like I think there was only one person that mentioned messaged us that, um, they had a random question and they saw it was us and so they asked a question through the sales ad. For some weird reason, everybody else that communicated with us was legitimately looking at the rig. Now, some people they were just asking like if it was still for sale and they had a couple of questions on some upgrades, but they hadn't quite seen a 44 in real life, so they were going to an RV show. Then it turned out that they didn't necessarily care for something about it, but they made a decision on what rig is right for them and it didn't include the 44 anymore. I think they went with more of a non-toy hauler option. I think is what it came down to. So, um, do you remember how much the ad was on rv trader off the top of your head?
Speaker 1:it's a couple hundred dollars yeah, I was guessing two to 250.
Speaker 2:I think it may have been more than that. I think it may have been more than that. I think it may have been three or four hundred. Oh OK, but in my opinion it's worth it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, I feel like the qualified leads you're going to get, and even us, like we had more responses to the solitude, but it wasn't as high of a priced coach either. The upgrades we had done while there were many of them, there was more on the Valor, and not only were there more on the Valor, valor, we went about 15 steps further on the upgrades we actually did. So like again, the solar system is the prime example of it was just bigger, better, badder, all of those things. So, um, I would recommend rv trader I do too the one thing.
Speaker 1:You know, if I was going to give anybody a tip when listing you know I tried to treat it kind of like a YouTube video that we made a thumbnail for it.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's true.
Speaker 1:And I did that because everybody lists their RV the same way picture of the outside, picture of a few of the sides, and then you start going into more detailed or macro pictures of the inside, things that are going on in the rig. That kind of stuff highlight the features essentially.
Speaker 2:Also, when we listed the solitude, I did something similar. I didn't do a thumbnail, but instead of the, the first picture being of the outside of the rig, like everybody else, it was actually, I think, of our battery bank and our system set up.
Speaker 1:So I like the thumbnail thing because again, I mean, I've again I've kind of studied that and you know what youtube likes and doesn't like and what catches people's eye, and so I was able to put a picture of the outside of the rig. But I was also able to put big, bright words that said Alliance, valor 44, v14. And then it said for sale. But it also could highlight the independent suspension and the solar system and all those things. So you know, try to think outside the box, especially if you're not in the content creation land, you know. Just know that there's a reason why we do everything we do and if you're looking to sell your rig, at the end of the day you're just promoting it. So anything you can do to help promote it or get people's eyes on your rig versus a dealership's or somebody else's is a step you got on anybody else.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's what I was going to say is that oftentimes this wasn't quite the case. With the Valor, there were several new ones for sale. There weren't very many used ones, but with the Grand Design there were a lot of new and used, and so we had to find a way for our rig to stand out from all the others that are for sale.
Speaker 1:Do we want to talk about the 800 pound girl in the room that we sold our rig right before all this fun Grand Design stuff?
Speaker 2:Okay, so you don't get control over timing.
Speaker 1:No you don't. And we had already made the decision to sell our Solitude at that point. And this was what, a year prior to the I don't even know what to call it framey thingies I don't want to say the words. Yeah, no, we don't want. Obviously, we sold it before any of that. We had our fun experience with Grand Design's customer service and for us that was between that and some of the like. It just wasn't working for us. The layout and some other things. That was our kind of nail in the coffin for Grand Design as a whole.
Speaker 2:But I'm going to say this so that it's on the record. We had our frame tested.
Speaker 1:Oh, many times.
Speaker 2:And it was not part of the framey things going on.
Speaker 1:At least at the time we sold it, it wasn't and it was tested twice two different professionals.
Speaker 1:Oh, it was. So, yes, professionally tested. I did it a lot more than that once I learned what it actually was and how to do it, because it really isn't that hard. You just have to be willing to put it on your truck. So, um, anyway, so we decide to put the rig up for sale. It's sitting on rv trader. At that point I know you said you the solitude, you shared it in some facebook groups. Um, the valor, we really didn't share it. I think I shared it in the 44 group oh yeah, you did because there's we.
Speaker 1:We started a specific since the 44 v14 was the biggest RV Alliance had ever made and so inherently it was going to have some quirks because it was, I think, two or three feet longer than the next closest toy hauler. Also it had a different kind of a couch. There was a lot of different things that were part of the 44 that aren't in other toy haulers. Now they've kind of come back and things that are in the 44 are now also in other toy haulers on the Alliance line, but at the time there wasn't. So we wanted a place for 44 owners to just kind of figure out if that makes sense.
Speaker 1:So I did list it there because there were also people in there that had said they're looking for a used one. Right, the 44 was unique in that front because there were a handful of used. There was one or two used ones out there ever, ever, when we put ours on the market. Yeah, we had an early model because we kind of worked out with Alliance. We ended up getting one of not the first one off the line oh no, first batch near the end of said batch. But with that being said, it was interesting because it made it difficult to price it.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's true.
Speaker 1:And so do you want to talk about the theory with it? Because we're not going to say what we sold it for. It's not listed anymore. But if you saw it when it was listed, that's not a shock. But how did we eventually get to the pricing we landed on?
Speaker 2:So we considered what it would be to purchase a new one.
Speaker 1:So remember, this was a 2024 model and we sold it in 2024.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we technically barely and so while it was used, it wasn't heavily used, obviously, Well we full time didn't, so it was being used all the time. I mean years old.
Speaker 1:Yeah, years old, and we didn't roll down the road just constantly with it either. It's not like we were gone all the time.
Speaker 2:So we kind of looked at the value of a new rig and what they were going for in that market, what you were getting off MSRP and then also factoring in that you pay taxes on a new rig and that's roughly 6%, and on these rigs that's close to six grand.
Speaker 1:I was going to say and that's just in case you're not 100% aware of what Lauren's talking about If you buy from a dealership or a business entity, in whatever state you happen to be buying in, you're going to pay. You're subject to whatever the sales tax is in that state on vehicles.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:If you buy from an individual, and this goes for vehicles too if you buy from an individual, there is no sales tax because you're not buying from a business or an entity. And that's important if you're working with like a creator, like us, is you know, understand? Because if we had sold, like if Miller's in Motion had bought that RV Right and we sold it, we would have had to assess sales tax at that point, otherwise the state of Texas would be looking for us. So just you know in that process, just kind of know those things. So anyway.
Speaker 2:So we took into account what the new rigs were going for with the addition of sales tax, and then took a portion of that off because ours was used.
Speaker 1:So let's say whatever. We at the time thought the appropriate depreciation value would have been Right, which was really hard to charge.
Speaker 2:And then we kind of wrote down and priced out all the upgrades that we had done between the independent suspension and the solar, the washer and dryer that was going to be on there. There were just several, several things, all the MORryde things that we had done, upgraded the pin box, and then we kind of did the same thing. We took the new value and assessed a depreciation to that and tried to come up with something that was reasonable.
Speaker 1:And that's where we priced it. And then we even said, like we put, that we're open to offers, but it was reasonably firm Right Of where we were, because I'm not. You know, you can play. I think there's a couple of games you can play when you're selling an RV and you can do the whole okay. Well, I really want to get this for it. So I'm going to price it at you know, five, 10, depending on the dollar amount you're talking about. I'm going to add a couple of percentage points essentially to the rig, so that when I negotiate I land where I really want to be.
Speaker 2:Just know, when you do that, you run the potential of overpricing the rig Right and I think that we overestimated the market when we listed the Solitude at first.
Speaker 1:I agree.
Speaker 2:But that was the first RV we'd ever sold, and so we recognized that pretty quickly and we actually did come back off the price and on the listing because we didn't want to have to negotiate a whole lot of big number.
Speaker 2:I guess you could say well, the other side of that too was our valor was nearing completion, so at some point it need to go that is true, and so just keeping an eye on the market and what, what other stuff is going for, how people are feeling, time of year plays a big role and just know that if you are like, if you happen to buy a new, a rig that is new to the marketplace, like we did at the 44, you're you're in somewhat uncharted waters to a point, and so you have to do your best to make the decision you make.
Speaker 1:But we also allow, like, listen to it, like our rig was so overly specialty, we decided that we knew this was going to be a niche buyer and that we didn't want. I think the best way to say it is that we knew that, we knew this was going to be a niche buyer and that we didn't want. I think the best way to say it is that we knew that this might take a little bit of time and so have realistic expectations on timing, depending on how it's priced and the rig you're trying to sell, I think is the best way. Like, if you've got a Tiffin Allegro bus that's decked out like a 2023 and you paid you know six, seven, eight hundred thousand dollars for that, you're gonna try and sell it for, I'm guessing, at least six, right, if it's the use, the amount our valor was. Just know that that person is a harder person to find than the person looking for a, you know, a fifteen thousand dollar travel trailer it is.
Speaker 2:It's a diff. That's why I was saying niche buyer. They're looking for a big rig with big upgrades and they have a bigger budget.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Also a factor is time of year, and so go ahead.
Speaker 2:That's kind of a double-edged sword right, Because we listed both of them when we thought it was the perfect time of year and then we sold both of them in what would be considered the down season.
Speaker 1:So I disagree. I don't think we listed them in the perfect time of year and what would be considered the down season. So I disagree. I don't think we listed them in the perfect time of year.
Speaker 2:I think we didn't understand in the solitude, the process. Enough Right.
Speaker 1:But we listed that in summer. That's true, we did. The solitude was on the market a little bit longer than the valor was, I think.
Speaker 2:I don't remember.
Speaker 1:Okay, but we listed the valor in. Was it November or December?
Speaker 2:Oh no, I the valor in was it november or december?
Speaker 1:oh no, I think it was before that. Then it was october, but it was fall it was fall, so which fall is not ideal? No, realistically, like january, february I would. I would probably argue is about perfect timing. Um, if you think about rv shows, right, um, disregard hershey, it's in the fall. I'm not really sure. Sure why? Um, but the one of the bigger RV shows besides Hershey is the Florida RV super show. That's mid January every year. That's kind of the unofficial kickoff, if you may right, of camping season.
Speaker 1:So, between January, February, March, people start looking for RVs because I want to go camping when the pro weather gets pretty, that's right.
Speaker 2:And as soon as spring and summer start hitting and you know, April, May- they want to be out there.
Speaker 1:So I was gonna say april and may my understanding and talking to the guys at alliance april and may is kind of like prime season, like they like april and may are the big time, like they work all year to get through those two months and so. But by then if that's not a dealer or it's not on order, it's probably not happening kind a thing, and so but those are the months that they're probably the busiest in RV sales, because you get the combination of people that started looking in January, finally found what they want. Maybe they ordered it, maybe it just took a second to get the rig. It falls in those months and the people that waited until oh, it's pretty outside now rig time, and those are the ones that are going to go buy something off of a lot, and so that's when most RV sales. So ideally January, february, maybe even March would be like the three months I would circle if you're going to sell a rig.
Speaker 2:We did the fall. You know, sometimes life just works like that.
Speaker 1:Right, and that's the thing too, is you? If you're full timing, you kind of have to roll with the punches. And I think that's true with anything in full-time RV life. You just have to kind of roll with it. But when you're selling a rig, you know, we honestly thought. I thought it would be on till spring-ish of 2026.
Speaker 2:Oh really.
Speaker 1:I did. Well, maybe February at the earliest, kind of a thing, and then obviously we sold it. It's December and it's I don't know know, it's January now. Good night.
Speaker 2:But if you'd asked me like which month is our rig least likely to sell in, I would have circled December without a heartbeat and, lo and behold, that's when it sold.
Speaker 1:Because the holidays is my big thing. I couldn't imagine spending that kind of money in knowing Christmas is around the corner and all those things. Now, some people, it's just timing, and I will say too that I feel like the buyers that bought our rig were looking to do the things that we had already done and they had kind of heard some stories about. Well, new RVs aren't immune to problems. In fact, they're more likely to have them. And so you have this sweet spot. I've always thought this, at least in towables I can't speak to drivables you have the sweet spot of about six to eight months after you take delivery of it and you kind of shake all the problems out of it for about two to five years, depending on if you full-time, part-time, slash, take care of it that you don't have any like major major problems, barring anything self-inflicted accidents, that kind of stuff until you start to have product, you know, wear and tear, things start to happen, and then you got to start replacing stuff.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So we had essentially just broken her in.
Speaker 2:That's right. Well, and like you were saying that other people have their timelines, you don't know what their timelines are and their timeline just happened to mesh with ours in the month that nobody thought we would sell an RV.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so we find a buyer, we you come to terms kind of this. One worked a little bit backwards, but it's fine. That's how they wanted to do it, so I was fine with that. Um, typically, once someone starts talking to us which I handled most of this side- right um shocker, I'm more the sales guy in our relationship. Um what's that process kind of look like, at least from our side somebody?
Speaker 1:you're asking me, but you handled it well, I know, but we talked about it all the time. So so essentially, uh, you know, a prospective buyer reaches out, we talk for a little bit. Um, normally what happens is at that point, if someone's interested in it, they would either come and see it Um, in this scenario the buyer could not come and see it because of distance, but they saw the value in it and so they hired an inspector, which were big proponents of you know that Now, the first people did not inspect the solitude, these guys did inspect the valor.
Speaker 1:And I will say the people that didn't inspect the solitude. I repeatedly said are you sure?
Speaker 2:Yes, you did.
Speaker 1:At least twice out loud. I probably said it five times in total, and so we're big proponents of it. Know what you're getting yourself into. Yes, they're expensive, but at the end of the day it's peace of mind. It's a piece of paper and pictures, typically that give you kind of hey, this is what's really going on. If you have to buy a rig sight unseen, I'd almost say it's a requirement. Now, if you know a lot about RVs and you want to go do your own little self-assessment, go for it, but that's you putting your eyes on it Then you have to weigh your comfortability on that side and know that you're not going to be able to pull that underbelly down and they might not either, but they might stick their head in places you might not have thought of when you do the inspection. So anyway, so they chose to have an inspector come out early. They did it, and then they as Bailey almost knocks my coffee cup over they did the inspection, and then we talked through the negotiations, which I've always found negotiations kind of funny.
Speaker 1:Well, right, and especially in this case, Like we're dealing with genuinely nice people who have similar goals and yeah, Well, and it's you know, you go camping with all these people, you meet people out on the road and as a whole. If you're listening to this, you're probably already reasonably into the RV lifestyle as a whole. Rvers are friendly and nice.
Speaker 2:They are.
Speaker 1:There's always that one but, it's rare and so it's weird trying to negotiate with them and so I'm very upfront when it comes to it. So they set a number. I said, realistically, that's not even close. You know, we're kind of firm on the price. I have a little bit of wiggle room, but not much, and we came to terms. I think the negotiation lasted all about six minutes on the phone.
Speaker 2:All right, and again, when you've got this niche buyer who these are six figure rigs, let's put that out there because that's no secret and you're not going to have somebody who doesn't understand come in and be like $5.
Speaker 1:Well, maybe on Facebook you did.
Speaker 2:On Facebook. Yeah, but you know, it's just a different process.
Speaker 1:I'm curious if people can hear Bailey making noises.
Speaker 2:They can probably hear your chair squeaking more than Bailey.
Speaker 1:Oh, okay, so we come to terms. And then, typically, at that point when you come to terms, there's a process, and I'll say there's two different versions of this process. One cash buyer. That process is easy Please pay us, take the rig, bye, bye, that was the solitude. And no, they financed, but they financed with a company that pre-approved them and did everything, and so they came with a check from the finance company I was going to say we got cash in hand Right For us. They brought a cashier's check because, they knew what the price was.
Speaker 2:It's easy for us.
Speaker 1:Sometimes it's a different lending companies. Different lending companies have different policies and procedures, so this wasn't the easiest process. It wasn't difficult, but it was. Now you're coordinating with a handful of people from a company, like there's a title people, there's the, the actual like lender, and then you have the guy that sold it, all kind of a thing, and so you know they have certain forms that they have to get to satisfy themselves, which is perfectly fine. I understand that. Um, again, we did this during the holiday, so it was kind of like nailing jello-O to a wall with them.
Speaker 2:sometimes it was yeah.
Speaker 1:And so you know. I would say that if you have a cash buyer over a lender, take the cash buyer. If it's the same price, it's just easier, it's cleaner, there's not a whole lot to it. That's assuming you have multiple offers. We did not. We had this one and we had that Sure. So they asked for a bunch of stuff VIN numbers, pictures of some things, documentation of things. Obviously we had to sign a few documents as well so that the title transfer all happened correctly.
Speaker 2:And I'm going to say nothing. That was unreasonable.
Speaker 1:No, timing was just that. Yeah, none of the asks were unreasonable, just getting them to actually finalize or send anything over that for some reason.
Speaker 2:That was the hiccup well, and at one point we'd been like a week without an update and we were like hey you know, kind of what's what's up, what's going on, and they're like, oh, you didn't sign this form and it's like, tell us, tell us, we're happy to do it right and I think once we knew that, we signed it and sent it over within minutes yeah, I mean it mean it's not hard.
Speaker 1:It's all virtual signing anyway, right and so. But yeah, so we go through that process. The buyer finally gets everything approved. And I will say that you know there was in this scenario there was two kind of processes.
Speaker 2:There was what the lender was lending and then a little bit of I don't even know how to call that second payment Like a cash lender was lending, and then a little bit of I don't even know how to call that second payment A cash down payment kind of thing, but that all came directly to us, so we essentially got two.
Speaker 1:well, in this case, wire transfers. But wire transfers, cashier checks, those kinds of things. The only thing I'll tell you and this had absolutely nothing to do with this buyer but when you're exchanging that kind of money, I would always lean towards wires.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that's a lot safer.
Speaker 1:If you can. Yeah, it's safer for you, it's safer for the buyer. Quite frankly, it's easier for the seller because there's nothing you have to do. The money gets there. Cool, here's the keys. Bye. Sign the title to whoever you need to sign the title over to, kind of a thing.
Speaker 2:And then you're done.
Speaker 1:So our first one. They came with a cashier's check, which I didn't have as many qualms with it, but I didn't you know, if you're selling an RV, be mindful of. Don't release the RV until you verify funds.
Speaker 2:Right, exactly.
Speaker 1:While RVers are nice there's always the person looking to scam you, so protect yourself. And so, again, our buyers were both amazing.
Speaker 2:They were both phenomenal On both sides.
Speaker 1:There are families that are going to go full-time and both these rigs are going to still be out there and hopefully with these owners for long periods of time. I'm assuming the Solitude's still with its original owner or with its second owners. But there are instances out there where people get scammed and so just verify the funds are in your account before you let that RV actually roll away, because once that RV rolls away, there ain't nothing you can do about it. Nope, I mean if they choose to scam you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Now if it's a legitimate person and there was a mix-up. They'll probably make it right, but again, you're putting a lot of faith and hope.
Speaker 2:That is true.
Speaker 1:And so just know, protect yourself when you're doing this process. Another thing too and there's another reason why I like rv trader kind of on the scammer route is you do all the messaging through rv trader and use your phone number email. All that stuff stays anonymous to the other person. Now, obviously, at some point if that buyer becomes serious, you're probably going to exchange contact information with them. But what RV trader kind of says is like start here and then, if you feel comfortable after a handful of conversations, then you can move over into your own personal email, because you know, especially with working with lenders, they need to know addresses and those types of things. But that's a legitimate company, not necessarily an individual.
Speaker 2:So something I would also recommend is that we've always had insurance on our RVs and so, like this particular buyer for the Valor after the funds were received, still didn't have it picked up for several days, and so we encourage them to make sure that they had it insured in that time, because even though they haven't taken delivery of it technically, it's their rig and if we were to get a hailstorm or something just unforeseen, that's still on them, unfortunately.
Speaker 1:Now, to just ensure that nothing came back on us, we left the insurance active on our side until the day it rolled away.
Speaker 2:Right, which you don't have to do. We just did for kind of safekeeping in that regard. And then the other thing that I felt very strongly of is that I didn't release the title for either rig until the funds had cleared not just were pending, but had cleared.
Speaker 1:Which in the in the Valor sale was unique because the lending company, which is a national company, happened to be like a block from your office.
Speaker 2:It was, that was really easy.
Speaker 1:And so for that scenario, that was easy because they wanted to have the title in hand by like x, they. They said, I don't remember what it was x amount of days after, the seven days yeah well, we could kind of drag our feet on that a little bit because we weren't dropping in the mail. Right we were. You were just like can I just run it down there?
Speaker 1:and they said, sure that's weird, but sure that's when we're like well her office is literally like there and they're're like oh yeah, come on by, and plus they could also tell you where to sign, so nothing gets messed up on accident.
Speaker 2:And then the last thing is that on both rigs we had a very simple bill of sale that was completed by both the buyers and ourselves. That was outside of anything a lending agency or whatever required, and it basically said the buyer has had the opportunity to have an inspection, if they so choose, at their own expense. The rig is sold in as-is condition and just kind of some of those plain and simple things that it's nice to have that signed.
Speaker 1:Well, and again, protect yourself.
Speaker 2:And this goes for both sides.
Speaker 1:Right and protect the other person too, like we're selling it, we've disclosed. It's kind of like when you buy a house, you get. We're looking at a lot of houses right now, and so we're getting a lot of disclosures, disclosure we're looking at a lot of houses right now.
Speaker 1:And so we're getting a lot of disclosures, disclosure forms our realtors giving us. It's kind of that same thing of like, hey, we've disclosed the things that we're aware of, kind of a thing, kind of in best faith kind of a situation, like if there's something wrong that I'm unaware of. That's why inspectors are important, because half the time I probably would try and sold it. We were kind of cleaning it up and I was like, of course a problem would pop up as I'm doing this, which it was something super minor. I don't remember what it was, but I remember having to fix something real quick.
Speaker 1:Oh, it was a trim piece. The inspector was like you know, that trim piece fell out I'm like what trim piece? And then he put it on the inspection report but then, practically five minutes after he was gone, I had already fixed it and so I took a picture and sent it to the buyer just so he knew it was already fixed, even though it was on the report. So, yeah, that you know. As far as selling the rig, for the most part, like nobody likes going through that process, I did have one tip that I completely forgot about back when we were talking about listing the rig.
Speaker 2:Oh, your coffee kicked in.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I looked at notes for a brief second. So when you are listing your rig, take your price into consideration when people search for your rig.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah.
Speaker 1:So we originally priced ours a little higher, and what it was. So, full disclosure, we listed our rig, not going to say an actual amount because I saw you starting to stare at me close enough to what some dealerships were willing to list new rigs at a low end for. Some dealerships do different things.
Speaker 2:Right right.
Speaker 1:Most of them list on RVTrader in some capacity, and so we were right in that ballpark. Well, some of the ones that really were lower were just beating us out in the search criteria.
Speaker 2:By like $900. Oh yeah, we're not talking a lot lower, were just beating us out in the search criteria by like $900. I mean, it was by such a small margin Right Again.
Speaker 1:Our rig, even though it was used, was much more done, and so we decided to lower the price, just to get in front of them.
Speaker 2:It was yeah, and that was a tactical move.
Speaker 1:Right. And so, just like when you're pricing the rig, look at the market. Now again, because of all the upgrades which we had done, what did we determine? It was close to like 40 or 50 thousand dollars in upgrades yes, it was close to 50 yeah, not even including time and effort just the actual dollar amount spent kind of a thing.
Speaker 1:And so you know, for us to land where new rigs were priced on the low side was where we thought we would be, but we just wanted to make sure we beat them out in the search criteria, so we lowered it by. I think it was $1,000 or something like that. I mean, we were just underneath them and then we negotiated after that. So just a little tip on that side. So, all right, any regrets on selling the RV? How we did it Not selling the RV, there's obviously always going to be a little bit of like oh, we love it, bye.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that was kind of bittersweet. But no, no regrets. I think I'm happy with how it went both times, honestly, yeah.
Speaker 1:Any last minute tips.
Speaker 2:No, I've sprinkled them in.
Speaker 1:You sprinkled them in, if you could always see the hand motion to finish that off.
Speaker 2:You have to listen to the whole podcast if you want all the tips.
Speaker 1:There you go. With all of that being said, we appreciate you coming and hanging out with us talking. It's been fun actually talking to somebody else.
Speaker 2:Otherwise, it's just been me and the voices in my head, voices in your head, which is dangerous.
Speaker 1:Hopefully we're seeing you well actively right now, probably when this comes out at the United Rally. We have a couple of fun panels that we're hosting, and by we, I'm pretty sure it means Ryan, where pretty much all the hosts which, if you know, the United Rally is a big conglomerate of YouTubers. I don't know a gaggle of YouTubers, oh, a gaggle.
Speaker 2:I like that.
Speaker 1:I don't know how to refer to us in like more than two, but a lot of the big channels, some friends of ours, some people we haven't met before, but we're aware of them now. And so there's two panels that we're all going to sit down and talk a little RV, a little YouTube, a little content creator, whatever version everybody happens to do. We're going to record them for the podcast, that's right, I'm going to stir their brains right quick.
Speaker 2:Did you catch that we are going to an RV rally and we don't have an?
Speaker 1:RV.
Speaker 2:How do you think that's going to go?
Speaker 1:Backpacking, tent, tent, yeah no air mattress.
Speaker 2:No, I told you a long time ago I will never tent camp again, so I will let you guys ponder on how we're going to do an RV rally, hypothetically, without owning an RV right now.
Speaker 1:And I will say it's not what you would normally think Most of the time when people do that kind of stuff, like, oh, there's a cabin at the nope, nope, there are no cabins. So no cabins, no tents. We will have a show dedicated to it at some point. But yeah, we are going to an rv rally, rv list. So as far as what's coming up in our lives, kind of wrap up a little bit as far as the process. So obviously the valor is gone when we say it's gone, it's gone, gone, it's been gone for a week and a half, two weeks now about two weeks um and we are homeless is homeless ish.
Speaker 1:We're staying with people and which we're super appreciative of. Um, we are in the process of getting our new rv ordered. It is the valor sold faster than we honestly thought. Therefore, the rv is not even close to ready yet, so there's gonna be a little bit of downtime. We also have the house, so you're gonna get some podcast of us of transitioning from full-time to part-time. That kind of stuff, storing, winterizing that's new to us.
Speaker 2:That's true, never had to store it.
Speaker 1:Wow. And so we're going to have to. Now, when I say store it, we're looking because the horses, we're looking for a little acreage. So more than likely the RV is going to be on property. But how do you leave it on property for a couple of weeks of downtime without, you know, destroying it on accident? That kind of stuff. That's all new to us. So that's what's going to be coming from us in the very near future.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:Does it feel weird talking on the mic again?
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:Someone's ready to be done.
Speaker 2:Don't you love that he acknowledges it and then refuses to be done. Don't you love that. He acknowledges it and then refuses to move on. This is the life I lead, y'all.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for listening. If you haven't followed us on the main channel or anything else, please do so. Everything you can find everything over at millers in motioncom. Or RV shenanigans or RV shenanigans podcastcom, and we look forward to chatting with you next week. Bye. Or rv shenanigans podcastcom, and we look forward to chatting with you next week. Bye.
