RV Rental

[hmgvs]

First post on this forum!
Hubby and I plan to come to USA next May and travel around for 2-3 months, flexible on dates and length of trip. Original plan was to buy a RV in the USA, use it to travel round in and then ship it home as this way we would get a higher spec RV (secondhand) for less money than we would pay at home. We are now coming round to the idea of just renting an RV for the USA trip as extra costs involved with buying, insurance etc may not make it worthwhile. Has anyone any views on this? We were expecting to pay about 20,000$ for a van.
Does anyone know of good rental companies they would recommend?
We would probably start East coast and finish up on the West coast - have not got any itinery so far was going to do what was suggested on another thread, get a map, put pins in where we wanted to visit and then plan our trip.

[Midwest Michael]

Welcome to the RTA forum!

With the extra hassles of ownership, combined with the depreciation factor, I'd say renting will probably be a very good option for you.

We've actually got an entire article in our planning section about how to rent an rv, i think it will be very useful in your planning. You might also enjoy some of our other articles about planning an RV trip.

[Mark Sedenquist]

Original plan was to buy a RV in the USA, use it to travel round in and then ship it home as this way we would get a higher spec RV (secondhand) for less money

If you were to read 99% of the posts I have made on this subject over the last decade, you would find me in agreement with Midwest Michael above -- but... due to higher fuel prices, we are seeing a plethora of good RVs on the market at substantially lower prices than in past years. I don't think your plan of purchasing one and then shipping home makes as much sense, but you can certainly get a very good RV for $20,000 -- enjoy the heck out of it and then sell it before you leave. Alternatively, there are exchange programs like this one, that might make some sense for you. And then there are re-purchase option companies like this one. Another option to consider would be a time-share.

Here are some considerations about purchasing used RVs.

The "no worries" method is the RV rental -- so, I would say you still have some decisions to make. Here is a great guide book that might help with you those decisions.

Mark