Home Time Housing

I've been OTR for almost two years now. Now that I have a bit of experience, and making more money, I'd like a place of my own.

I love visiting my family during hometime, but I am essentially, homeless.

The reason for it is that I have some trepidation in purchasing a house or renting a house that I will be in one day per week per month on average (I stay out five to six weeks at a time).

I've thought about travel trailers.

I am single. What has worked for you guys/gals?

Per my 20 years military experience there are some basic things I picked up on, and incorporated into my daily routine/life

~ Better to have it and not need it, than need it and not have it.

~ Single item, multi.purpose and uses.

That being said? I'd look at finding a piece of proper, (with an eye towards one day, one day putting something more permanent on it, house, mini home, building a house, a house trailer, etc.)

Clear it off, get electricity (a security light pole) running water (eventually) running to it, etc.

Or

A friend or family member who would let me keep a travel trailer on their property (Perhaps work something out to where they could have ~make use of it from time to time?)

Then not only would you have a place for your Home Time? You'd also could use it for legitimate vacations to the beach, lake, mountains ~ whatever.

Without knowing more about your particular situation, I'd 2nd Dan's suggestion of purchasing property. But that is really based only on my personal preferences. Yours may be different.

In 2000 I had the opportunity to buy 104 acres. Mostly because I always wanted a spread, but also because, as my dad would say, "They ain't making any more of it. Get it while you can."

The land and house I put on it are both paid off now, and worth over 5x what I paid. Although I don't plan to ever sell, if I did the investment profit would be massive.

Obviously my situation may be unique to me. But what I'm getting at is you have a world of possibilities ahead of you right now, and you're in a unique position to take advantage of them.

Another alternative is to rent a storage unit for your stuff. Then for home-time rent a long-term-stay place for your time off. You will have little to worry about as far as buildings and security.

My two cents - home ownership and OTR is not such a great combo if no one else is at the house to take care of things. Whenever you are home, your "break" will be filled with home maintenance projects, and you will never keep up. While you are gone, the mice will move in and think the place belongs to them. If you totally enjoy home projects, it's fine, but they can completely eat up your reset.

If I were in your shoes, I like the idea of a piece of property, and get an nice little motorhome to sit on it. You know the smaller kind where there is a walk thru, not the gigantic bus ones lol....that way it can be set up with electricity and water etc, and if you want to move it, its quick hook up and go, and when you done park it, lock it up and get back to work...plus you can call it your own.

I was going to buy a house at home in NJ but i love MO. therefore my latest idea is to rent a room from my sister in NJ, but buy a home in the much cheaper MO. the best of both worlds. ;)

Another option may be to purchase a multi family home. You can then set up in one unit, whether they are one up one down or side by side. The other unit you could rent out which could cover the cost of the house payment. This would also have the benefit of having someone living onsite. I knew many military families that would often buy a house at each duty station. Upon pcsing some would then rent out the old house instead of trying to sell it. They’d often have the property managed by a property management company so they could remain fairly hands off in regards to the rental.

Another thing to consider is that buying land or a home is probably going to take a lot of the fun away from travelling in a rig. Now that may not matter to you. But once I bought a house I wanted to be in it. I was already preparing to get out of trucking anyhow, so that was fine. But if you're enjoying the road I wouldn't be in any hurry to buy a house or a camper or anything. Just enjoy travelling and save up your money. Life on the road is 1000 times more exciting than life at home anyhow.