I would like to rent some land to put a converted school-bus home on. (Lynchburg: apartment, condo)

[jessiedelane]

I am considering buying an already converted school bus RV (Skoolie) to live in full time. Its a great way to save money, and I have three dogs, which are hard to find an apartment for, and stressful to try and keep "secret". My boyfriend and I work in the Northern VA area and make great money. We would like do this so that we could save up quickly for a while in order to sell it back and buy a house.

I'm only going to do it if I get a call from a trailer park back tomorrow and they say that it is OK and within their parameters. If they don't, I'm still considering doing it, but want to ask ya'lls opinion.

Does anyone know anyone who would be willing to rent out their land to us for us to live in the bus? It would be awesome to find a septic hook-up. I'll be driving to Reston for my job.

When asking me why I'm doing this, consider that to rent a plot of and at the trailer park, its $785 per month. For four walls (meaning no roaches from neighbors, no bed bugs from neighbors), for being able to keep my animals, and for being able to have a manageable commute. My monthly rent for my terrible apartment right now is 1250. So consider these numbers, I have. Thoughts?

[Badger21]

Everybody is different, but I value having a separate place to go when my SO and I aren't getting along. You mention that both you and bf make good money. How much time are you saving between what you want in the near future versus a five or even ten year period? The opportunity cost just doesn't seem to be there for me unless of course you're saving a significant amount of time.

[gemstone1]

Have you already located your schoolie ? Have you paid close attention to fit and finish ? Are you going to be able to heat and cool it economically ? If you find something suitable, your best bet is a setting on private property, however county zoning may become an issue for said property owner.

Regards
Gemstone1

[ICS67]

Since you'll be working in Reston, why not come and live right here? I'm sure the Reston Association's Design and Review Board would welcome you with open arms, especially since the bright school bus yellow will fit right in with the DRB's approved earth-toned color spectrum. In addition, your choice of dwelling dovetails with the emphasis our County Supervisor For Life has on bringing more affordable housing to our area. And finally, now that Boston Properties, the owners of our elite Reston Town Center, has instituted paid parking at $2 an hour other than weekends, you could park the bus in one of their garages, download their swell parking app, and for about the same price as being in a trailer park live right within the awesome crossroads of Northern Virginia, if not the universe.

OK, sarcasm meter off, and please understand none of this was directed at you personally but rather at what Reston's becoming. There aren't too may trailer parks in this part of northern Virginia -- there's one on Rt. 15 in Loudoun County by Lucketts. But as Gemstone1 said above, if you end up looking for private property to live on, a lot may depend on county zoning ordinances. Living in a school bus...sounds very Sixties-ish!

Good luck and hope it works out for you.

[spencgr]

To be honest, renting out your land to someone in a schoolie SOUNDS like you are allowing homeless people to squat on your land. I doubt you will have much luck in NoVA finding someone. As other have mentioned, the zoning could be a problem; but if it wasn't, I think people might have issues with the appearance and potential eviction issues in the future.

Yes, I am aware of the tiny house craze going on...and I know these schoolies fall into that category; but it comes off differently when you are trying to do it on someone else's land; not your own.

[LynchburgLover]

There's a very, small trailer park in Hamilton in Loudoun County. You should contact a realtor who may know of available spots.

[jessiedelane]

Well, I guess I'll have to get used to being judged by people who didn't think of it first! No, the point of living in a converted school bus or RV is to navigate around zoning ordinances. For example if you bought a piece of land that you cannot build on, that you wanted to camp on, and lets say, build a small shelter just to sleep in. You can park an RV on it and still live there, and no one can say anything to you. With every small business up here working out of some guys' suburban home, I figure, we must not really give too many ****s about zoning.

In reality, nothing "up here" is normal. No one--no one, has something that they're not totally weird about, or cutting corners on. Some people drive an hour and a half every day from Thornburg. Some people are 47 and have a roommate. Some people rent out entire floors of their homes (THEIR HOMES!) to complete strangers just to make ends meet.

Since I don't want to do any of that, excuse me while I find an awesome solution! I suppose there will be the occasional challenge, but again, it's an awesome and extremely doable solution.

ICS67...thanks for your useless response. You're just going to assume its a yellow school bus? It's not, this is a fully converted RV and has been painted silver. It mimics an old fashioned Airstream. And for your information, sorry, not everyone up here makes 125,000/per year which is (seemingly) what it takes to have any standard of living here. Excuse me for trying to think outside of the box. Who are you? You offered no useful ideas, thanks. And I'm not just going to not take it personally because you told me not to..you personally attacked me. Also, I'm not looking for a private home to park it on. It is a last resort if no trailer parks allow me to put it anywhere. I would prefer to put it in a trailer park because the trailer parks have a septic. If I were to park it on someone's land, I would have to do to a campground every two weeks and empty the septic myself. Ew. Also, I haven't even purchased it yet, I'm trying to do research, which you are hampering. Dick.

Anyway, thanks to everyone for your tepid responses. Lynchburglover, thank you for actually offering advice. I'm contacting them today.

[VRE332]

Have you tried living in the Prince William Forest RV Campground ?

[tgbwc]

Originally Posted by VRE332

Have you tried living in the Prince William Forest RV Campground ?

I actually thought of this last night when I read this thread initially. I looked up the rates for a full hookup 30 amp site and I think it might be about the same as the OP's current rent.


Travel Trailer Village

[gemstone1]

Local, State and Federal campgrounds usually limit the length of your stay, and in northern climates are usually closed to RV's in winter, and none will condone locking 3 dogs inside for a typical work day.

Regards
Gemstone1