We couldn't find one locally to look at, but found another line of Jayco that had the exact same floor plan with a few decor changes called the North Point. The office in the middle room had slight difference in the bunk in it, but literally the exact same and at a lower starting price. We found an RV dealer in Mesa with one on the lot. We really wanted to fget in one in order to determine that it was a workable space. We toured the one in Mesa and really liked it. They wanted more than wanted to pay and politely told us that in Mesa in the next 90 days the retirees were about to migrate home and trade in their old RVs before heading home and would gladly pay their asking price. We said our goodbyes at least knowing the floor plan that would work for us. We just needed to find one, and pretty fast, we were set to close on our house in about 3 weeks. We went out to dinner and took another gander at the RV trader app. We found somone with a new 2021 North Point we thought that they wanted to live in it full time, but with an 8 mounth old baby, they determined that it was too diffuclut for them. We started communcating and it looked like we found a unicorn. It had a washer/dryer and a generator, and was almost brand new.
Picking The Right Fifth Wheel
How we picked our future home on wheels
Since we didn't want a traditional motor home, our initial thought was a trailer of some kind. As I mentioned before, our initial thought was the smallest vehicle to pull the largest trailer, but as we soon found out, that didn't leave too much workable room since we were going to be working M-F in it. We came to the realization that a fifth wheel was ultimately the way to go.
We looked at a few RV shows and the local RV lots in Tucson to find something that already has some kind of office space. Initially there were some floor plans that had a bunk room which could be converted into an office space. We came across a model at Jayco called the Pinnacle which had a middle room that already had an office. So we set our sites on trying to find one.
We downloaded an app RV Trader (much like Auto Trader, but for well.....RV's) and we found a listing for a used one in California. It was 3 years old and was lived in by a family who bought it to live in while their home was being built. They had two small children and actually had a third while they were living in it. It had never been moved, they didn't even have a truck to move it. They bought it, parked it, and were selling it. They were nice enough tot give a FaceTime tour of the ins and outs of it. It had looked like it had been lived in....by three small kids. and we decided that we needed a newer model. We wanted to make our own dents in it.
He was even willing to deliver it to us for the asking price. It was the decor we wanted, too. We just had to wait until the house closed to buy it. We also looked into a having it inspected. Once we mentioned that to the seller, they stopped communicating with us. after a few weeks, we noticed the listing was marked as sold. I guess he found someone else and that's the problem with dealing with a private seller. Back to the drawing board.
The Timing Was Right
So now we knew what we wanted, we just need to find the right place to buy it from. As the time came closer to move out of our house, we came to the realization that we could just go get it. We found a place to stay in Tucson until it came time to head to Seattle to help Danielle and Thomas move into their apartment. So we determined that we would bring all of our stuff with us and go pick up the trailer afterwards. The day we closed on the house, we were sitting in the car dealership picking up the new truck and to have the running boards switched over. (If you haven't read the story of us buying the wrong truck, you can check out that story here) Theresa decided to take a gander at the app. As luck would have it, there was the model we wanted, the decor we wanted at the price we wanted. She gave them a call, Brandon answered. She asked if the price on the listing was the price the were asking. He said yes. Since we were about to get the finding from the sale of the house, she asked, "What's the lowest you can do for cash?" Brandon said, "Let me call you back" In 10 minutes, he called back with a $3,000 discount. SOLD. In one day we corrected the truck, closed on the house, and found our future home.
One Small Snag....
There was just one tiny detail with the fifth wheel. It was in Pennsylvania. We were thinking we might find something a little closer to Seattle. Well....new adventure. So now the plan included driving from Seattle to PA in a bout a week while working during the day and driving during the evening. We discovered that Marriot hotels allowed us to check out at 2 PM being Silver rewards members, sometimes 3 PM. So we mapped it out as long as we could have a Marriot hotel in a location that we were planning to stay in. It was exhausting to work and drive, but we did make it to PA in eight days. We had all of our stuff with us in a U-Haul trailer.
The RV dealer was nice enough to let us stay a couple days on the lot to get moved in. We also were met by a driving instructor who taught us how to safely drive , backup, and park the fifth wheel. More on that experience later.
