RVs To Become Permanent Homes

As some of you may have read the county council is discussing changes to the Development Standards Ordinance. The discussion has centered around the sections developing vacant land into subdivisions of homes, but other things too like townhomes, apartments, also things like impact fees, parking lots, and setbacks around creeks.

By and large things are going well, but I disagree with the council majority and voted “No” on changing the ordinance to allow Recreational Vehicles (RV’s) to become permanent legal residences under the law (see picture 2).

By definition, RV’s or recreational vehicles are just that, vehicles and include motor homes, motorized campers, converted buses, tent trailers, fifth wheel trailers or similar vehicles used for temporary housing or occupancy while on vacation or recreational road trip. The change would give the owners the option to classify any of these as single family homes.

First, I want to say, I do not oppose RV parks. Those are different. An RV park is a place someone parks his RV for a week or two, sees the sights and then moves on to his next vacation spot. Second, those building a home to park and live in an RV for 6 months or makes sense too.

My opposition is to allowing someone to buy a plot of land, drive an RV or pull a fifth wheel RV onto it, register it with the county as a single family home.

Changing the definition of a home that drastically will have negative consequences that need to be thought through. RV’s are not renovated like stick built homes as they are a depreciating asset. In time many will become dented, rusted and broken down and the county will be littered with too many of them.

RV's are not built to the standards and requirements of a home like modular, mobile homes or stick built home. Why? They are vehicles, not intended to be 24-7-365 homes. Dropping the standard of what is a home, to make "homes" more affordable to more is not a wise choice.

Once RVs as legal homes start showing up in one place, less will buy or build traditional homes there. It will hurt property values and people will not like that. Simply put, most of the people don’t want to live in an area where their neighbor not only lives in his dwelling, but then can also drive it to Walmart to pick up a gallon of milk. Worse, some of these areas will become magnets for criminals, drug users and illegal migrants. All you have to do it talk with law enforcement or drug enforcement and they will tell you allowing people to live in RV’s is a bad idea and will make their job harder

The claim the poor will buy RV's and live in them as their own is faulty. It will not increase "home" ownership for lower income. RV's depreciate 20% when you drive them off the lot; depreciate 40% in 5 years. Banks will not make loans on these vehicles as permanent homes unless the buyers puts lots of cash down or can pay a high interest rate or has a high credit score. Who is the poor person that will qualify for such loans?

So most of the RV's in this coming boom will be rentals, as they will be cheap, easy and quick to setup and immediately generate rental income. As the years pass, if you think most landlords will renovate an aging RV he is renting out like you would a stick built home, we disagree.

RVs out in the elements 24-7-365-forever will depreciate even faster. Most RV rentals will be run into the ground until they produce no more rental income. Then they'll be scrapped or worse, abandoned. The aftermath of 15 years of this new policy will not be pretty.

Remember I said when mortgage rates rose from 3.5% to 8%, affordability fell from $310,000 to $190,000. The solution for many will be buy the high priced home anyway, put an RV in the back and rent it out. Easy, quick and a cheap way to make extra income.

The neighbor's house burns down, he collects the insurance check, puts in an RV and rents it out 24-7-365. Some will complain. Another unintended and unwanted consequence the county needs to think about, if these vehicles are given the option to be re-classified as homes.