RV-Dreams
Blame Us For That New Neighbor In Your RV Park!
By Howard Payne
Feb 7, 2007 - 7:00:28 AM

Yep, that's right.  Go ahead and blame us for that new neighbor in your RV park.  What?  Who the heck are we?  Well, I'll tell you.

Introducing a Couple Crazy "Kids"

We are Howard and Linda Payne.  So?  Yes, I know that you have never heard of us, but there are more and more RVers every day that have.

We are forty-somethings that went from high paying, high stress jobs to full-time RVing in a period of about eight months.  Here is the short version.

From the summer of 2004 through Thanksgiving 2004, we started taking a closer look at our lives and our happiness.  Most people would never have guessed we could want anything more.

I was a six-figure salaried real estate attorney and manager of seven offices for a Fortune 300 company.  We had just moved into a 3700 square foot dream home.  I had a first floor corner office that was literally one minute from our house.  I was five minutes from a fantastic YMCA where I worked out each morning.  I was twelve minutes from our country club where I played golf at least three times a week.  My company paid my club dues and reimbursed me for almost all of my luxury car expenses.  We traveled a lot and spent time at exclusive golf and spa resorts in gorgeous places.  The American Dream, right?

You would think so.  But on one of those last fabulous vacations we realized how much happier and more deeply connected we were when our "working lives" were not interfering.  It was during that backwoods trip in Alaska that we fell in love again.  Really in love, not just "roommates" that have that "Of course I love you" thing going on.  Travel and nature were our passions.

It was our epiphany.  There are more important things in life than cash and stuff.  Why were we killing ourselves for three or four weeks of bliss each year?

But we couldn't just quit our jobs, could we?  Could we?  Hmmm.  It was Linda's idea.  What if we got rid of our house and stuff and simplified our lives?  What if we sold everything and bought an RV?  What if ....?

I couldn't believe she was willing to give it all up.  But she was always the one trying to get me to live for the day rather than the future.  I was the one pushing to get that magic "number" of dollars in the bank to retire early.  Suddenly, I was starting to "get it".

I spent the entire month of December 2004 researching this thing called full-time RVing.  Could we do it?  We had never RVed in our lives.  We didn't have enough money to just live off of savings and investments.  How much would it cost?  Could we earn enough on the road to survive?  By the end of December, we had our answer.  We were going to sell everything, buy an RV and live simpler lives on the road - indefinitely!

Seven months later, on August 3, 2005, we were off in our pick-up truck and fifth wheel trailer to discover North America and ourselves.  We felt so free, so liberated, so happy!  A year and a half later many, many others are following in our footsteps.

Spreading the Word

From the time we made our decision to become full-time RVers, I decided that there had to be several thousand people out there like us just looking for a way out of the rat race.  So, from all the research I had done, we established a website called  RV-Dreams.com .  Our goal was to open the door for others feeling trapped by societal pressures.  We wanted to let them know that full-time RVing was an option.

Soon, people were starting to discover our website.  They were fascinated by our age, by the fact that we had never RVed before, by our accounts of our thought processes and mistakes, and by our openness with our financials.

As soon as we went on the road, we started a daily journal.  Now we have about 700 daily readers, the website has grown to more than 80 pages, we have our own forum, and every day we get emails from people that say we have inspired them to change their lives or at least pursue their dreams earlier than planned.

We have learned so much about ourselves and about this vast community of RVers.  What tremendous people!  We heard about the friendliness before we started our journey, but we continue to be amazed that the people we meet and correspond with are even better than we expected.  And now we are proud to assist more of those folks in following their dream and getting out there.

So, if you have a new neighbor and it just so happens that they are a part of the RV-Dreams Community, you might just have us to blame.  But I can assure you of one thing.  Once you have met them, you will be thanking us for your new friends.