So you’re looking to rent an RV for a week, maybe more. You’re skipping the hotels and airplanes to take a more down-to-earth and personal vacation, and that’s a unique experience to prepare for. If you’re looking for the 411 on RV rental prices, the best RV rental, things you might forget while planning for your RV excursion, or maybe just an overview so you can ensure you have it all, this is the guide for you.
Renting an RV for a Week, What You Need to Know:
There are a few things that might be common sense for expert wanderlust travelers, but might not be for RV first-timers. For example, looking into roadside assistance associated with RV rentals, potential fees, RV fuel efficiency (and what this means for gas costs), how to pack effectively, insurance, and securing a booking. It might seem like a lot, but being over prepared can ensure your rental process and general travel experience go without hiccups or hidden costs.
Booking in Advance Prevents Headaches
Just because you’re more self-reliant on an RV vacation doesn’t mean you can forego traditional vacation planning methods, such as comparisons, mapping out destinations, and booking in advance. You wouldn’t drive to a destination 10+ hours away, walk into a hotel, and expect there are vacancies just waiting for you, so why would you expect that from an RV rental company? The smart traveler wouldn’t: so make yourself a smart traveler.
Cost-Cutting Tips to Keep in Mind
First, you have a kitchen on wheels, which means you can budget in terms of food — buy in bulk or buy conservatively to stock the pantry rather than turning to eating out for most meals. Drive-thru costs add up and take time, especially if you go to sit-down diners or local dives.
Second, if you consider the en-suite bathroom an RV comes equipped with, you can then factor out gas station trips and caving for the pre-packaged, overpriced snacks you or your kids will almost certainly feel swayed by.
Third, you can pull up and hit the zzz’s whenever you please rather than having to push to the next hotel. Aside from the rental and cleaning fee, you only have to think about gas rather than unnecessary resort/hotel fees. After all, hotels are just a means to an end, since they contain beds to sleep on between events and adventures.
Cost to Rent an RV
If you want a more in-depth breakdown of the nitty-gritty budgeting stuff, check out this post here. We’ll give a quick overview of costs per model, cost per mile, and approximate average cost-per-day based on time of year and days of the week.
General Average Nightly Rental Price
$175/$275/night for a Class A
$100/$200/night for a Class B
$150/$200/night for a Class C
$50-$125/night for a Travel Trailer
$60-$150/night for a Fifth Wheel
$50-$100/night for a Folding Camper
$100-$200/night for a Toy Hauler
$75-$150/night for a Campervan
Now, those base prices will vary depending on the time of year, since some seasons are more privy to RV travel (think, summers). If you choose to rent during the “off-season”, which is everything but summer (spring, fall, winter), you’ll be able to save several hundred dollars on the overall trip. Additionally, if you travel when most people wouldn’t, you’re saving yourself from the tourist crowd and from spiked campground rates.
The Little Things
Most, if not all campgrounds have dumping stations for the waste accumulated on your journey. A waste dump station allows you to connect the septic tank to an underground disposal station, safely and efficiently emptying your tank the correct way. After emptying, you’ll need to rinse it, and most RVs have some sort of automatic rinsing system. If not, a simple garden hose will do. Full-service dump stations can cost anywhere between $10-$25 per dump, allowing you to do everything from emptying the tank to rinsing it. If you’re a regular traveler, you may want to consider a dump station membership rather than paying individually.
Different travelers have varying opinions of what to look for in a campground when traveling by RV. Most look for an all-inclusive campground where they can pay for location and convenience, in addition to technical stuff like emptying tanks, filling tanks, doing laundry (and having proper laundry facilities) and running air conditioning. Some more penny-savvy travelers choose to “boondock”, or stay on public lands in the middle of nature, for free. They’ll dock at the campsites to dump and fill up but won’t pay the fees for overnight.
Filling up means more than just gas when it comes to RVs. You have to ensure the water tank remains filled, especially during longer travels, or else you won’t have water on board. This could prove problematic when using bathroom or kitchen facilities. Do keep in mind when it’s totally full, you’re carrying extra weight. If you’re popping between closer RV campgrounds, you may not have to keep it totally full because you’ll not be in danger of running out between trips.
Book Your Next Getaway with RoamAway
RoamAway has a broad network of rental locations which makes your job easy: find the closest rental site to your starting point. We have a large fleet of the best RV rentals, travel trailer rentals, or whatever else your roaming heart desires in terms of RV rentals. Our blog contains a wealth of knowledge about preparing for an RV excursion, travel destination guides, as well as several tips & tricks to making the best of your vacations.
