7 ms·

I was recently motorcycle camping a few weeks ago and noticed a ton of sprinters and transits that had been tricked out into european style motor homes. Im an

• ianai 4y ago
  I think a friend of mine just spent 200k on a new mobile home. I’ve heard plenty of examples of similarly expensive mobile homes.
  • watwut 4y ago
    But mobile home is entirely different use case. They don't move at all or move only rarely.
    • ChoGGi 4y ago
      200k is pretty dang pricey for a mobile.
      • Kirby64 4y ago
        It is, but when we start talking about 'mobile homes' as some sort of 'luxury small living' thing, then the dollar signs come out. Traditionally mobile homes are on the low end of living, so the features and niceities coincide with that. Honestly, it feels like a bit of a grift most of the time when I see prices like that for tiny houses or what are basically fancy mobile homes.
• learn_more 4y ago
  Travato is based on a Dodge Promaster. Van based vehicles have some advantages over the traditional RVs: Unibody construction, so better efficiency, drivability, easier to park, less obnoxious looking. I have a Ford Transit with 600 watts of solar and a full sized computer workstation inside. I bought the vehicle used for 23k USD, and put another 10k in the build. If you DIY, it not that expensive.
  • brookside 4y ago
    Do you have photos of your workstation, or setup in general? Sounds great!
  • vsareto 4y ago
    I don't get how any of this is better than buying a decent truck and tow camper. Truck prices are likewise insane in the US but offer more utility if you decide you want to stop living out of a camper. A lot of this seems dumb but it would be nice to be the one selling overpriced camping stuff to millennials.
    • learn_more 4y ago
      If you move around a lot, its better without a trailer. I regularly spend nights in urban areas. Towing a camper limits you to typical campgrounds.
      • bombcar 4y ago
        Exactly this. You quickly find that you want to be “nondescript” as much as possible, and a van works great where a truck/trailer wouldn’t - unless you want to be stuck with campgrounds and Walmart parking lots.
        • _spduchamp 4y ago
          Or you can use a truck like the guy in this video and make something completely stealth and can park pretty much anywhere. https://youtu.be/py4zetCEYzA https://youtu.be/py4zetCEYzA
    • shkkmo 4y ago
      You keep assuming that the people buying these and living out of them are doing it for no reason. There are a whole slew of reasons why that form factor is growing in popularity. It's hard to beat the ratio of fuel efficiency, to living space in a good van conversion. A trailer, even a short one, is a massive problem to park in urban areas and to turn around on remote forest roads. That said, teardrop campers have also been skyrocketing in popularity, as have rooftop tents.
• dsfyu404ed 4y ago
  >most used three-axle full-size rv's start around 80k. these things seem like a grift to screw millennials out of what little cash they had in the first place. This is an 80k van. You can buy a ready to go motorhome for that. Nobody trying to have fun on a budget is buying this. The target buyers are going to piss their money away on status-broadcasting experiences and goods whether they piss it into Ford's bucket or someone else's. Why does Ford have any less right to get in on the action than any other business?
• Reubachi 4y ago
  Completely agree with you RE grift, but there is a realistic niche that converted work vans offer. Transits, sprinters, e350 etc are all very common/shared platforms and parts are incredibly cheap, well understood. Tire sizes are standard/cheap, and manufacturer warranty for the drivetrain often still applies. Significantly less GVW combined with 87 octane fuel in an economic 6 cylinder is very attractive to people into van life (for some reason). Also considering GVW, tripping in an RV allows for very little flexability (imagine getting into a campsite in the woods). So you likely need to tow a smaller vehicle, which at that point may require a CDL depending on area.
  • andybak 4y ago
    Had to look this up: GVW = gross vehicle weight. Ya coulda just said "weight"! EDIT - now off to Google "CDL".
    • ChoGGi 4y ago
      It's not weight so much as how much weight you can haul. The other side is tare which is weight when empty. Commercial drivers license
    • prottog 4y ago
      "Weight" and the gross vehicle weight rating are completely different things! The GVWR is how much weight the vehicle is designed (and in many cases legally allowed) to carry, including itself. People don't really think about it for regular passenger cars since you'd have to stuff them to the brim with lead to get it over GVWR, but it matters for cargo-hauling vehicles like vans and trucks, or when you tow; in those cases it's easy to go over. When towing, there's a separate weight rating called the gross combined weight rating (GCWR), which is the GVWR of the tow vehicle plus the GVWR of the trailer.
      • kragen 4y ago
        Also if you're doing a camper conversion it adds a lot of weight to the vehicle, especially if you use heavy things like particle board.
• rosnd 4y ago
  Full size RVs might be great if you avoid cities, with a van you can probably find a decent spot to stay on Manhattan. The fact that you can access so many more places could reasonably multiply the value of such a vehicle.
  • gbronner 4y ago
    There's an occupied one on my block. They have to move fairly often, but it is cheaper than rent!
    • throwayyy479087 4y ago
      The reality of people that have parked on my block (hoarders, tweakers, general nuisances) are diametrically opposed to the people you see in #vanlife posts. I get why camper bans are growing, even if it's just handling a symptom of the COL crisis.
• sbrother 4y ago
  My family was in the market for one of these a few years back, couldn't stomach the price, and ended up buying a baseline class C RV instead (about $90k vs double that for a decently equipped van). Now that we've lived in it a few years, I understand why RVs are so much cheaper. They're big and unwieldy, you can't just park them on the street or even take them up a lot of roads to backcountry campsites. And the level of finish on a basic RV is pretty terrible -- it's basically a $70k class C truck with the absolute cheapest finishings glued onto a box on top. That being said, we've had so many amazing times in it already and I'd make the same decision again because spending almost $200k on a van is ridiculous.
  • jws 4y ago
    I see people comparing the Sprinter class RVs to the class C frequently. The parent comment is absolutely the reason. a $90k RV is a great value for space, but it is built out of ticky tacky and will be begin rusting, breaking, and leaking probably before you even take possession from the dealer. That said, you can patch them (they make special tape), lose some of the bits that break off, and make do with the rest and have a great time then sell them on when you are done. In contrast, if a buyer is forking over for a Sprinter chassis then the RV builder figures you want nicer construction and all the pieces are better and it doesn't disintegrate around you nearly as rapidly. And just to put some concrete the class C quality… in no particular order… exterior latch screws which rust instantly, exterior locks with corrode to useless in a couple years, generator fuel pump lasts 30 hours, water tank did not have drill shavings removed when drilled (end up in strainer), water pump strainer installed backwards so it can't be emptied of said shavings, winterization drain valves are undocumented and inside a sealed compartment (found while replacing water pump which turned out to just be blocked by shavings), 120v electrical box with no cover because the wires were too bulky and it would not fit on (under the sink where you stick metal trays), roof membrane was slightly too short to overlap and engage front roof (manufacturer covered with copious sealant goo to hide, eventually failed and inflated roof while driving down road), mysterious current leak will drain starting battery if you park too long, battery combiner to use house batteries and generator to start main engine clicks relay but does not actually combine batteries, likewise circuit which chargers vehicle battery when plugged in does not function (there are no wiring diagrams available, not clear where it even should be), house fuse panel is so badly made that fuses bounce out while driving, furnace failed two ways in 5 years (once off, and once always on. Good variety at least), knobs snap off, anything screwed in might drop screws, black water tank outlet didn't fit so manufacturer kind of gooed it in place (it held for a couple years, sorry about that mess on your road, great state of California) . – In short (long) a class C is cheap for what you get, but is an ongoing project. Good news, you have room for plenty of tools and recovery equipment.
• jklinger410 4y ago
  Yes, it is a grift through and through. Van living (and therefore tiny homes) are incredibly expensive. Storing things you need for later, having room for certain activities, actually has a cost savings that these people are unaware of. Part of being born in America and not having a very intelligent parent to guide you through involves being an easy target for an ever growing and complex series of grifts.
  • notch656a 4y ago
    huh? I lived in a subaru outback in the forest for some time. I bought the car for $1500. It lasted ~6 months, I spent a few hundred registering and bare-minimum insuring it and when it died I called a junkyard and they hauled it away and gave me $100. It's not like it cost anything to park it in national forest. When I was homeless in North Dakota I met a guy with a Ford E350 ho bought for about the same price. He was handier than I was and as far as I can tell he could keep it running indefinitely from junkyard parts for almost nothing. The grift is overselling what goes into the van, or a new and overbuilt van. The bigger issue is van-life dumps your externalities on everyone else -- you aren't paying property taxes but you probably still avail yourself of local public services and utilities as part of the cheap living. It doesn't scale.
    • jansan 4y ago
      You are an individualist, maybe even a trendsetter. We are talking about a trend that has reached the well-off yuppies (does that word still exist?). A friend of mine was just about to shell out 70,000€ for a small van, without really knowing what to do with it, because some of his neighbors bought one recently..
      • klyrs 4y ago
        yuppies and hippies are all just boomers now
    • jklinger410 4y ago
      The grift I'm talking about is not the up-front price of the van, but the price of the lifestyle.
• insane_dreamer 4y ago
  I've seen this especially with Sprinter (which is what I would get if I were doing this; Mercedes vans are high-quality and last a long time).
  • deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  • insane_dreamer 4y ago
    downvoted? are we not supposed to talk about Mercedes?
• stickfigure 4y ago
  Not that I want to defend a $150k RV (my family loves the popup trailer I bought used for $3k) but there are reasons that small RVs can be more expensive than large RVs. Large RVs are built up from a bare chassis. Much of the internal construction is done with the walls off. Small van-type RVs start with a fully assembled body. You have to build, plumb, wire in tight quarters. Also, small custom fixtures are generally more expensive than standard fiberboard RV panels, drawers, etc.
• jshzglr 4y ago
  Not everything that doesn't make sense to you is a grift. Vans are tempting for a whole host of reasons and building one out as opposed to plopping a box on the back of a cut-off is going to be more expensive.
• Archelaos 4y ago
  There seems to be an excellent business opportunity for the typical HN looking-for-a-startup-idea person here: Import €50,000 European camper-vans to the US and sell them for $150,000 each. Even considering customs duty, paper work, etc. there should remain an excellent margin.
  • rootsudo 4y ago
    Can't, legally - now you can do 25yr old Japanese Kei-Vans but then you also need to support 25yr old Kei Vans, and that is far from a HN esqeue startup of an SAAS.
    • olyjohn 4y ago
      Most of the people importing Japanese cars are not supporting them. A lot of them are not even doing pre-purchase inspections IN Japan before bringing them over. That might cost about $200, but that's $200 that could be in their pocket. They'll bring in any broke, rusty, hunk of shit and someone will buy it, and that's it from them.
      • rootsudo 4y ago
        And that is a big deal, the other part is simple maintenance. I looked into this and spotted a huge market where, these dealerships do import these keivans, keicars, etc but have no idea about the unique parts for them for basic things like spark plugs, oil filters, belts and such. Some lines like the Suzuki Carry are great, same tail light assembly for 1998-2020, same timing belt, same accessory belt, etc but that is a big thing that everyone seems to forget. Everyone "fetishizes" these cars, but most can't turn a wrench, or know how to order parts for them. So it becomes a huge sunk cost. At the other hand, if you import them en massee, you also have a solid basis of guaranteed business. You can self guarantee a "warranty" on them for a huge premium with a "Swap out" guarantee, in case of disaster (for example, kei car is purchaed $500 at auction, shipping to USA is about $800-2000, and retail is $4500-$10,000). That's where the marketing and service catch is at. 3 months warranty, free swap out, and then when that expires you have a customer for life, because most shops will not work on a car they can't order parts from a USA national supplier, or have access to interchange catalog. But then it would be semi easier just to export/import whatever car was on Gran Turismo/Gran Turismo 2/Animes e.g. Initial D because those probably have minor interchange support and if there was a USA model, then parts are most likely 100% available, just that the car is in a RHD configuration vs LHD. Some cars like a R32/R33 skyline, MK3 Supra are $$$$ priced out eternally though.
• petre 4y ago
  For that amount of money one could buy a sailboat, have more space, travel to nice places and not pay road taxes. Boat maintenance is expensive though.
• carom 4y ago
  Winnebago Revel and the Storyteller are the main Sprinter builds. They're both > 150k. Almost bought one instead of an apartment building...
• vl 4y ago
  This is why a lot of people buy empty Sprinters and install internals themselves, basically to save on paying premium for interior installation. Now it will be possible also to buy quite capable Ford, which is a big plus for this market. After all, it's way easier to maintain Ford in US than Mercedes.
• doopy1 4y ago
  A grift indeed, but the target market are boomer retirees. Millennials are more likely to have some kind of sprinter conversion.