Cardinal RV Club

Hi to all,

I hope to be a full timer this fall, or at the latest next spring. Winter in FL (or similar) would be nice, too From those who already enjoy this lifestyle can you tell me how you deal with residency? Are the various "clubs" like PA or Escapees worth the dollars spent? Any, and I mean "any" advice will be appreciated.

Thanks,
Cliff

Some people use SD and others use TX. There was an article recently in one of the camping magazines that discussed it. They discussed the many things to consider; income tax, personal property tax, vehicle insurance, registration/fees/inspection, medical insurance, voting and more.

As far as the "clubs" to get reduced cg rates, you need to belong to a couple of them if you like to travel around. If not, you're stuck with the cg in your package. We have coast to coast for the fixed $10/night and use camp club USA to get reduced rates. We are looking at others. We met a Canadian couple who camp free or spend $10/night for 6 months in the states. They belong to 4 clubs. Costly up front but is paying off in its 5th year.

Escapees works for us and the price not bad at all. TX address, TX registrations etc.

Here are a few sites that I have used to make my decisions of where I want to retire. As stated SD & TX are the best as far as taxes, but each perosn has thier own preferences as where they might go as there are a few other states that are not to bad either. I hope that this helps you as it did me.
Dale
http://retirementliving.com/RLtaxes.html
http://www.topretirements.com/reviews/
http://www.dmvnv.com/50_state_dmv_list.html
http://www.bankrate.com/calculators/mor ... d=m1033763

Found this site:
http://finance.yahoo.com/retirement/art ... kiplingers

Here is another tool to help you in your decision.

http://content.kiplinger.com/tools/retiree_map/

Don

This is our experience based on 18 yearsof fulltiming. We are Escapees(SKPs) and have been since we started. We were extremely please with their mail forwarding service and the fact that TX had no state income tax. Long story short when we bought the Bird, we were going to have to pay a hefty sales tax to register it in TX. Checked out SD which doesn't have state income tax either and found that we only had to pay a one time 3% excise tax--much less than the sales tax in TX. Bonus was that our truck insurance was basically halved; paying the amount we paid in excise tax over three yrs.
also there is no vehicle inspection and license fees are slightly less and you can get your driver's license in any county in SD unlike TX where you have to go to your county of residence. We are happy with our mail forwarding service and voting is easy. We feel more involved in SD since their population is so small.

We encourage everyone to become a SKP member. Vist their web site www.escapees.com Most importantly they are strong voice in the RV world from the RVers point of view. They have annual education programs--Escapades and one can learn a lot. I always refer to them as a "Blue collar" RV club. they have a limited park system.