Living in your vehicle in Phoenix.. in the summer.

[Grizzly Stardust]

Actually, I live in Casa Grande, about 50 miles from Phoenix. When my lease is up at the end of February, I'm thinking I will move into my SUV for a few months in order to build my savings up and also put some money into making my cabin up north livable.

I think I could do a solid three months. I work ten hours shifts at work, four days a week. I don't get out of work until 6 PM and after having dinner and getting in a workout the weather should be perfectly comfortable.

I will spend the weekends at my cabin because I think it is going to get to hot / boring to be killing time in my car all day in Casa Grande. And I have a lot of work to do up there, anyway. I feel I could do this until at least June.

I am just wondering if there are any Phoenix van dwellers here who live in their vehicles in the summer months? Also, if there are any Casa Grande residents or visitors here, do you know of any good places to stealth camp? I know the Walmart has a clear policy on no overnight parking. There are lots of hotels here as well as a Pilot and a Flying J.

 

[akrvbob]

I've never done it but I had a friend who did, what he did was run an ad on craigslist and offer $100 a month to sleep in their garage. It's a college town so he got lots of offers. I'm Pretty sure he ended up paying extra and getting electricity as well. Give that a try.

Many of the casinos will let you stay so you my look into them.
Bob

 

[Goshawk]

Wonder if you offer a resume and a credit check on yourself you could get more safe responses from folks when you advertise. Just provide them if they need them during the garage rental process.

 

[MrBob]

Actually, I live in Casa Grande, about 50 miles from Phoenix. When my lease is up at the end of February, I'm thinking I will move into my SUV for a few months in order to build my savings up and also put some money into making my cabin up north livable.

I think I could do a solid three months. I work ten hours shifts at work, four days a week. I don't get out of work until 6 PM and after having dinner and getting in a workout the weather should be perfectly comfortable.

I will spend the weekends at my cabin because I think it is going to get to hot / boring to be killing time in my car all day in Casa Grande.  And I have a lot of work to do up there, anyway. I feel I could do this until at least June.

I am just wondering if there are any Phoenix van dwellers here who live in their vehicles in the summer months? Also, if there are any Casa Grande residents or visitors here, do you know of any good places to stealth camp? I know the Walmart has a clear policy on no overnight parking. There are lots of hotels here as well as a Pilot and a Flying J.

 I'd be looking into memberships with GoodSam and the like as a possible source of places to stay. I stayed in my van last summer, the hottest one on record for Colorado. Days were out of the question unless I had good shade, but with few exceptions evenings cooled nicely late in the evening. Installing a powered roof vent helped a lot.

 

[SoulRaven]

We were in Marana and I also spent a summer in CO. CO is heavenly at night in the summer, I was near Denver. There is no comparison. One of the problems with the desert is everything gets so hot during the day that the heat dissipates slowly especially if you are around paved roads/sidewalks. The further from the mountains, the hotter it is at night. I used to get up at 4:00 AM just to take a walk before it was unbearably hot.

 

[Gideon33w]

I'd highly suggest you add an electric fan to your AC condensor. You will be wanting to idle the vehicle just to have AC but the condensor won't get enough air. An additional electric fan positioned right over it will help.