Preparing for the worst and the best

[RoamerRV428]

Power of your future is in your hands More power to you!

remember too you can camp host and live in a campsite and work or they have pay jobs also.....so there is a way to get out on the road and just be....takes courage and some planning but if ya want change bad enough, ya make it work. Sounds to me like you will be ok once ya decide how ya wanna roll out the future for yourself!

 

[NiferFo]

Power of your future is in your hands More power to you!

remember too you can camp host and live in a campsite and work or they have pay jobs also.....so there is a way to get out on the road and just be....takes courage and some planning but if ya want change bad enough, ya make it work. Sounds to me like you will be ok once ya decide how ya wanna roll out the future for yourself!

Thank you so much! I needed to hear that!

 

[Jim D]

Hi NiferFo! You may want to try applying to " HUD " for some low cost rent before you do the vanlife. It usually takes well over a year to get into the "HUD" program for low rent and you will have to pay a percentage of the rent out of your own pocket.

I most likely will go into van life again in 3 years but I lived in my van for 10 years in the 1980's and 1990's. I was up all night cleaning and doing janitorial work which paid well. I also had two beach campsites within 10 miles away that were only $3 a night. Remember, you have to be awake between 2am and 6am or you will be seen as overnight camping. You can find spots where you can sleep all night but you have to keep moving every night. Before or after 2am and 6am you can park and sleep wherever you please as long as there are No Parking signs.

As for your van, yes, you will need some emergency funds up above $5000 dollars. The mechanics where I am wanted $1200 just to do a complete brake job on my car, ( I have my van from the 1990's still ). Lucky I can do car mechanics myself. I just have arthritis and it gets somewhat painful to do some of these jobs anymore. I rebuilt the diesel engine in my van over 10 years ago and it only has 30,000 miles on it. You do need a good vehicle to live on the road for sure.

I'd go apply for HUD and see what you can get done in this government program for seniors needing low rent. I can't remember if there is a level of age you have to be at for seniors but I do know the program is there and millions of low income young people are getting "HUD" subsidize housing.

I myself don't think your ready financially or mechanically for vanlife. You may have stayed in a van for two weeks at your relatives house but that isn't being out on the road with no one to turn to. When I go out on the road again I'll be alright because I have personal resources and I'm studying my options 3 years in advance.

https://www.hud.gov/topics/information_for_senior_citizens

You can look at HOWA also but they are in the desert and the groups disban during the summer because it's so damn hot.

 

[RoamerRV428]

yea google host rv camp jobs or rv pay jobs hosting for campground and the internet gives you a ton of options. they are out there if one so choses to cut and run and go for it and this isnt just a fantasy thing, THOSE jobs are real ya know....more power forward as you research it to suit you as you need. Also HarvestHosts. While they don't have jobs and supply a site to visit their biz free for us in rvs on the road, they might have job placement to 'maybe' suit you and you get a site for free while you work there? but not sure on that but there are TONS of big ways to make life happen forward if ya want it that way. wishing you the best!

 

[maki2]

No need to think this the Armageddon. Just set up your cooking, sleeping, a toilet arrangement, a way to recharge your communication device. A light or two for night and go camping. Of course you do need a source of income for fuel and vehicle insurance.But I have seen that achieved with means as basic as people sitting at an intersection holding up a begging sign and using food banks in towns. Of course there are help wanted signs in almost every store. Where there is a will there is a always a way.

 

[[email protected]]

Hello nice to meet you! I am 54 also. I hope you like Van life, the community seems to me the biggest draw. I admire you for looking into it.
I want to suggest a job for you. I had a job working for a Supportive Living Agency with a developmentally disabled adult from 2015-2020. Paid slightly above minimum wage but paid to sleep about 6-7 hrs of the shift and I enjoyed the work. We had a co-worker who lived in her Van when she wasn't at work. We shared a client who was developmentally disabled needing 24 hr supervision who always had one staff member with her at all times.. She was mobile

My co-worker I'll call her... worked Mondays 3pm to Tues 9am and Thurs 3pm to Fri 9am. No overtime except on holidays but it allowed her to shower 4 days a week and we were paid to sleep about 6-6.5 hrs a night. Client was usually up a few times but even if you slept in and didn't see her, she was normally pretty good. We kept the staff door cracked an inch to listen for her. She was mobile so no real caregiving. The weekend staff grocery shopped with her so we just did some housework, made sure she exercised by walking with her to the gas station for a coffee, made dinner, did dishes, ensured she showered & brushed teeth, etc. Prepped her lunch for the next morning when we dropped her off at her day program.

I liked the job. It provided a 401k match+ internet so around 11pm-1am, I was online. Others who worked there would shower, chop veges at night to make their crockpot meals for the week (bringing a crockpot to work). Most others just slept.

I also had a client who needed someone from 3pm-8pm Mon-Fri. Client always let staff members shower at 7pm if they wanted to, which was helpful to one staff had a job which started at 8pm at McDonalds. She worked until about Midnight. She lived in her car saving up a downpayment to buy a condo.

In CA, this year it just started- the self determination program. I take my client home every Thu 3pm-Friday 9am. He sleeps about 7 hours a night out of the 18 hr shift. We sleep in our RV parked in our driveway. He also stays Fri 3pm to Sat 5pm a few times a month. It averages to 30 hrs a week at $21 per hr. nI provide most of his meals though weekends he has $ to eat out. We sleep in the RV at night which is parked in our driveway. Routine is to pick him up from his day program, drive 1 hr to my house, get in shorts, swim in the river (Summertime) for 30 min to get clean and cool off...(then he doesn't need to shower) I make him and my family dinner and we watch a movie together. We do not have a second bedroom hence sleeping in the RV. At 8pm we go to the RV, he plays on his computer for about 1-1.5 hrs while in bed and is asleep by 10:15pm. Many developmentally disabled adults seem to be on some medication which makes them sleep. I make him a lunch and get him up at 7:15am to go to his day program by 9am (It is a 1 hr drive). It's a GREAT job. I really like it.

I am an independent contractor , client lives with his Dad and Sister. It's called In home Respite Care however the Dad agreed he could stay at our house. I started a business so i could write off the mileage & his meal costs since each week it's a 2 hour drive. However you don't have to start a business, you can just remain an independent contractor. Not sure this is available in Tennessee or not but surely supportive living jobs with D.D. adults are available in your area. I am not a caregiver so prefer to take people who are mobile but very hyper. They are entertaining to me and I have a good amount of patience.

These kinds of jobs often have you paid to sleep (also check paid roommate jobs on Craigslist) I didn't like paid roommate jobs b/c you have to live with the client M-Fri on the premesis from 10pm-6am or 7am in the morning. So paid to sleep unless client is ill. They hire only singles. They take $200 out of your check to chip in for the rent and all of the utilities. Still it puts a roof over your head, medical care and you have the days all to yourself M-Fri in the home. Generally the client goes to a job or a day program.

Also i knew a Security Guard on Weekends at a Country Club. I rode my bike from about 9pm-11pm there since hardly anyone drove there, big hills and there was security. I knew a guy who worked graveyards from 10pm-8am Fri thru Sunday. He was expected to check the locker rooms and lock up so he'd shower in the locker room. He lived in his RV. . Since he sat at the guard shack, he'd chop vegetables and shred cheese, no one hardly ever entered. They were mostly vacation homes. He would then go to the Lodge and plug it in. Valla....he had meals for the entire week.

Most of the night he didn't see any residents, unless it was Summertime then it was busier. Otherwise it was almost completely dead, some nights not one car. It was located at Winchester in Meadow Vista CA. In Summer the Clubhouse opened up so if you worked days, the job included a free meal. Only half the year did people come and stay, out of all of the homes there is maybe 3-4 full timers. Very upscale place.

Your client bathed in the river ? Idk whether to laugh or cry.

 

[RoamerRV428]

Your client bathed in the river ? Idk whether to laugh or cry.

I didn't read that at all. the client went swimming after the caregiver picked him up for a usual job and key being, how many of us in life literally take a swim and consider that a shower done LOL I know I do it....lol....not in ocean tho, that salt water needs rinsing off but in a lake or river, oh yea I can swim in those easily and not 'shower on demand' after. I think you are taking it as 'their daily bathing time' and it isn't that at all NOW THAT IS MY take on it.....just normal life happening as it should to me. I think you are reading it as something way more and I don't feel that at all from what the OP wrote. Just a diff. read on it from what I read kinda.

 

[[email protected]]

I didn't read that at all. the client went swimming after the caregiver picked him up for a usual job and key being, how many of us in life literally take a swim and consider that a shower done LOL I know I do it....lol....not in ocean tho, that salt water needs rinsing off but in a lake or river, oh yea I can swim in those easily and not 'shower on demand' after. I think you are taking it as 'their daily bathing time' and it isn't that at all NOW THAT IS MY take on it.....just normal life happening as it should to me. I think you are reading it as something way more and I don't feel that at all from what the OP wrote. Just a diff. read on it from what I read kinda.

Whew lol!

 

[GypsyJan]

As long as he wasn't swimming with cement overshoes....

 

[user 423]

As long as he wasn't swimming with cement overshoes....

Those are more for....."former business associates".