Question

[just638507]

https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/se ... ule_result
My question is with my limited funds at the moment would this be worth going after for my first camper.

[Woodbutcher]

Well, it is not expensive, but there is not much there. It's a homemade cargo trailer, without fenders. You should easily be able to build your own for that much or less and get what you need. No Galley and no roof fan would be a deal breaker for me. If you are not skilled enough to build your own, then fixing this one could be a problem. I would rather see you save more money and get into a better unit. Just my thoughts.....others may vary.

[just638507]

Thank you

[Dahlia47]

It's a blank canvas! Have fun with it! We bought ours with just 4 walls, a pull out bed and 2 shelves. I have slowly added to it. There are some pics on here somewhere here on the forum. We built a canopy bed for our daughter, added an a/c, fixed the roof, I bought a mini-fridge, I just built a small shelf to add a small toaster oven, got a one burner hot plate, built a gravity water system with a grey water tank, a small port a potty, a compact shower kit that can go inside or outside, new wood floors, a fresh coat of paint. I have had a ton of fun adding to it and fixing it up. Totally fun to camp in! We did it little by little over that past year. The greatest thing about it being wood? It's so easy to do any type of repairs. We can push and pull it ourselves. Not heavy at all. And it fits in the corner of our yard. No storage fees!

[Modstock]

Facebook wasn't letting me see it.

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[just638507]

It's a blank canvas! Have fun with it! We bought ours with just 4 walls, a pull out bed and 2 shelves. I have slowly added to it. There are some pics on here somewhere here on the forum. We built a canopy bed for our daughter, added an a/c, fixed the roof, I bought a mini-fridge, I just built a small shelf to add a small toaster oven, got a one burner hot plate, built a gravity water system with a grey water tank, a small port a potty, a compact shower kit that can go inside or outside, new wood floors, a fresh coat of paint. I have had a ton of fun adding to it and fixing it up. Totally fun to camp in! We did it little by little over that past year. The greatest thing about it being wood? It's so easy to do any type of repairs. We can push and pull it ourselves. Not heavy at all. And it fits in the corner of our yard. No storage fees!

Iam not the handy man but I might be able to do a few things and negotiate the price.I looked it up and saw yours that's nice.Do you mind me asking how much you paid for it.

[Dahlia47]

We paid $500. That's only because they were moving out of the country. They were selling it cheap. They were selling everything. We got lucky. You can definitely try to get the price down. Also, YouTube and Pinterest are your best friends when looking for projects and how to's. The canopy bed and the extra shelf were pretty easy. The roof my husband did, he used to do roofing after high school. And wood is so easy to work with. I'm a project person though. I love projects. But if you're not a project person, you may want to find something that doesn't need a lot of work. But then again, you may or may not have fun fixing it up.

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[just638507]

I have one other question a neighbor said maybe I should look for a popup trailer for now.And he said it could be cheap and something easy to start out with is that a bad idea or are popups a bad idea.

[Aguyfromohio]

I have one other question a neighbor said maybe I should look for a popup trailer for now.And he said it could be cheap and something easy to start out with is that a bad idea or are popups a bad idea.

Classic pop-up trailers have been hugely popular since the 1960s; countless people have loved them and still do.
I just checked for sales figures and see that the industry is selling 1,200 popups every month these days.
Popups have the best resale value of any type of manufactured RVs. They are inexpensive to purchase and you get back lots of that money when you sell it.
It's a great way to get started with camping and RVs.

[just638507]

Thank you for the info.My main worry was it would take me two or three hours on how to learn to put it up or take it down.And I heard some camp grounds would not allow them to come on the property.

[Squigie]

Thank you for the info.My main worry was it would take me two or three hours on how to learn to put it up or take it down.And I heard some camp grounds would not allow them to come on the property.

Some designs take a few repetitions before setup and takedown are intuitive, but most are pretty easy and relatively simple.
Being banned from some campgrounds is true. It's rare, but you can run across such.

In today's world, it is very easy to plan ahead, call ahead, and know what you're getting into before getting to the destination, though. It's very easy to avoid the few places that ban tents and/or tent trailers.

Usually, such rules are put in place in predator country, due to a history of incidents (such as with USFS and NPS campgrounds in/around Yellowstone NP) or insurance requirements (private parks). (But, even in this area, I can only name two campgrounds that I know of, that ban tent trailers due to grizzly activity.)

I have seen the rules in place for snobbish RV campgrounds. -- Either because they don't want 'poor folk' around, or they don't want to be bothered by the 'tent people' complaining about 50 generators running all night.

In 1996, I ran across a campground near North Platte, Nebraska, that didn't allow tent trailers for a different reason. They claimed there was a local law that set the rate for 'camping shelters with fabric panels' (tents and tent trailers) as just a fraction of what they could charge for RVs, but the tent trailers could only be parked in RV spots. In order to maximize profit from RV rates, they banned tent trailers (but still had a tent-only area on the riverbank).

The last category of tent trailer ban that I can think of is for security. When I lived in the Florida panhandle, there was a campground between a very, very bad neighborhood* and the military base. No tents. No tent trailers. 100% hard-sided, with working locks, only! ...Because they had had such a problem with tents and tent trailer canvasses being cut and the contents being stolen - or the entire tent being rolled up and hauled off with its contents inside - as well as a few unfortunate rape victims.


*(The kind of neighborhood where police wouldn't enter unless they were in a pack of 3+ cars, the bordering areas allow enough craziness for an entire season of COPS to be filmed in a single day, and real estate listings couldn't be viewed, utilities couldn't be managed, and cable tv couldn't be hooked up without scheduling a police escort.)


I currently have a tent trailer. Since 99% of our camping is done on USFS and BLM land, there are no issues with campgrounds imposing stupid rules.

[Modstock]

I avoided pop up trailers simply because it's still a tent, just on wheels now.
Once you've camped long enough you know weather sometimes cant be avoided and the rattling/buffeting of a tent during wind is what would keep me from a good night's sleep.

During a trip.
A friend came with that had a Aussie type fold out tent trailer. Lots of room for his family but not one of them got any sleep cause it was really windy that night.
In my teardrop I could hardly tell there was a storm going on.


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[just638507]

https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/it ... 935997452/
Guys be patient with me but I always have questions.A friend who knows iam looking for a camper said look at this maybe to get it dirt cheap and tinker with it and maybe save a few bucks does it look worth it?

[Squigie]

For starters... A Bill of Sale isn't enough. They need to pay the incredibly steep $10 (to ~$30) fee for a lost title. I've been down the road of BoS-only, lost title, salvage title, and various other undesirable "no title" issues. Don't do it! It is rarely worth the trouble.
Beyond the title...

Canvasses are garbage. Maybe not all, but several in the photos are trashed. ...And none look healthy. That means not just replacing the canvasses -- requiring substantial labor if doing such by yourself, or massive financial investment by ordering INSANELY expensive replacements -- but also repairing all of the additional water damage from leaks. It may not be obvious, but it WILL be there.

Interior is trashed. All soft surfaces (mattresses, canvasses, etc.) will be garbage.
Most of that wood appears to be water damaged.

I don't like it.

$400 is too much. I'm not there. I haven't seen it in person. But, based on photos, I'm out. It's a bad deal for the asking price. $100 for the frame? ...Sure. But it's crap, as a camper.

[Squigie]

Addendum:
If you want to consider a pop-up camper, hereafter refereed to as a 'tent trailer', find one with mechanical and/or electrical issues. Don't wast your time on something with bad canvasses and bad structure. Water damage KILLS these things. Many of them aren't even built with CDX plywood; they're particle board and OSB (even back in the '80s). Just don't...


However, tent trailers with furnace, fridge, electrical, brake, and mechanical issues - but no water damage, bad canvasses, or leaky roofs - are often nearly as cheap. But they can be repaired and put back on the road for less money and are still structurally sound.

Extreme example, but a very recent, very valid one:
My brother bought a new-to-him 16-foot tent trailer less than a month ago. (She's a big-un!)
Market value should have been about $3800. The sellers, however, noted that the inverter didn't work, the battery drained within an hour, the furnace and (LED) lights didn't work, the lift winch wouldn't lift ... and more on the electrical front. In addition, it had two flat tires and the pigtail to connect to the tow vehicle was torn apart (oops!...). But it looked really solid, leak-free, mold-free, and well-kept otherwise.

Asking price was $600.
He went through the photos several times, looking very carefully, before calling the owners and offering $700 if they could hold the trailer for a day.
He picked it up the next day and gleefully handed over his $700.

Why?
Because he figured that all of the electrical issues would come back to the bad inverter, possibly a bad lift winch, and/or something he saw in a photo of the tongue. His other tent trailer had tires that would fit (which he installed to haul the new one home), and he knew he could repair the ragged pigtail fairly easily (initially just hot-wiring brake lights for the drive home).

He was correct. That photo of the tongue that he thought was important turned out to be crucial.
The sellers had hooked the battery up with the polarity reversed. ALL of the electrical problems were caused by reversed polarity.
A new 36" pigtail cost him less than $30.
He bought two new tires for $140.
The battery crapped out the first night they needed the furnace, so he splurged on a new one at the closest store for $120.

He's into a $3,800 tent trailer for $990 plus registration fees, because he looked at the details.
Yes, it's missing some curtains, has a few minor tears in screens, the 'potty' was missing, and the door doesn't quite latch properly. But it was still a steal!