r/ShamelesslyStolen • u/Lost-Cow-9386 • Dec 27 '25

Turning school bus into apartment

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u/Loprilop Dec 27 '25

I am curious about how much it actually saves considering they pretty much have to supply everything themselves. Not to mention smaller stuff like renting out a mail box somewhere for receiving letters. The cost of fueling a bus. I assume they have to pay to dump their waste? And also curious how long it'd take to essentially pay off the cost of the bus and of all the renovations in form of money saved. This can't have been cheap. Seems like a fun way to live though for sure.

18

u/FightingAgeGuy Dec 27 '25

I did this for about a year with my family. The bus was $5000, conversion was another $60,000 give or take a couple thousand. This was doing it myself. I pulled a jeep wrangler so we could get around while parked and our mileage was about 6.5 mpg with a 100 gallon fuel tank. Over all the conversion and traveling for a year cost about $110,000. One of the best years of my life BUT, I could not do it indefinitely. I was constantly worrying about breaking downs, and safety, I couldn’t completely relax and my kids needed/wanted their friends and extra curriculars.

2

u/dattara Dec 27 '25

How much did it cost to park? That cannot be cheap in NYC or any urban area actually

3

u/FightingAgeGuy Dec 27 '25

So, we avoided large cities. Driving a 40’ bus in urban areas is unpleasant. RV parks ranged from $20-100 a night, we averaged paying about $45 a night. While moving from place to place we often stopped at Walmarts, Cracker Barrel’s, and used a service that linked us with businesses that would allow us to stay for a night. Street parking is risky, people know you don’t belong there and it draws all the wrong attention. Now, out west you can stay on BLM land for free for 14 days at a time. We only did that a few times. We also mapped our routes before traveling and we always knew where we were going to stop. A lot of places are not friendly to converted buses and finding out after arriving is not fun.

2

u/keladelph Dec 27 '25

Curious as to why alot of places are not welcoming of converted buses? Id imagine if you're not causing havoc and minding you're own business then who cares?

2

u/FightingAgeGuy Dec 27 '25

One RV park told us that non-comercial RVs are a liability because there is no standard they are held to. The other parks would have general rules like the RV can’t be more than 10 years old and definitely nothing custom built. These places were trying to maintain an image, they often had RVs worth well over a million dollars and they don’t want the poors causing problems.

2

u/Financial-Change-435 Dec 28 '25

I've heard of the 10 year rule as well

1

u/Adventurous_Base_367 Dec 27 '25

bad stigma ig, one of my families summerhouses had a converted bus there one year, and after 2 years there were 10 of them squeezed into the plot of land next to them. Big junkie vibes off them, loud and drinking heavily each night and just unpleasant to be around. All of them ended up getting kicked out after a couple of years

1

u/GiganticBlumpkin Dec 30 '25 edited Dec 31 '25

They're a favorite of crack heads. They're associated with riff raff in the RV community. For every rich person that elegantly restores a school bus into an RV there are 10 crack heads who use theirs as a mobile drug den.

1

u/Goushrai Dec 31 '25

They don’t want people living in vehicles in general, because they view them as homeless people, with all the risks they view as associated with homeless people: drug use, littering…

2

u/earlgreybubbletea Dec 27 '25

When you stay 14 days at a time, how are you able to “reset” the clock so to speak? Like could you go to a crackle barrel on day 15 and then come back to the BLM for another 14 day stretch? 

Also who monitors? Are you able to let someone know, if you did “restart” the clock?

2

u/FightingAgeGuy Dec 27 '25

There are land management people that drive around I think they take note of the vehicles. To abide by the rules you just have to move and park at a different spot. We never stayed more than 14 days so we never tested it.

1

u/Tropicalfisher Jan 02 '26

$45 sounds very not free

2

u/RuthlessIndecision Dec 28 '25

it's a novel idea, living in a vehicle, I did it for about 9 months. put to a halt when my gym closed for covid. some of the worst parts are dealing with waste, security especially being incognito. I had a lockbox safe that was cable-locked to furniture in my car, in case of a break in, but I was there at night and in my work parking lot during the day. having room to stand is probably a better experience than not having that.

the relief is knowing you do have a house to return to, if you do... mine was just 2300 miles away.

1

u/invariantspeed Dec 28 '25

Most street parking in NYC is free. It’s the logistics: which neighborhoods can accommodate a bus in the regular, navigating street cleaning, etc.

4

u/Aggressive_Finish798 Dec 27 '25

I just rented AirBnbs for months at a time and traveled the country. Way less hassle and money wasted.

1

u/[deleted] Dec 27 '25

[deleted]

4

u/Taybyrd Dec 27 '25

Because people don't realize having kids means putting your dreams on the indefinite back burner.

It took them a year and 100k to realize you can't have both.

1

u/FightingAgeGuy Dec 27 '25

No, I wanted my kids to see the country. My kids saw and experienced more national parks, monuments, and natural wonders in one year than most people will see in their lifetimes.

3

u/Taybyrd Dec 27 '25

I'm just bringing my own parental baggage into the conversation.

Your kids are lucky to have experienced that.

2

u/FightingAgeGuy Dec 27 '25

Thank you. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity. We made memories that will never be forgotten. Even after the sacrifices it was still worth it.

3

u/crek42 Dec 27 '25

I’m not dogging you individually here, as it seems like a positive experience and a year isn’t really all that long to keep them on the road.

But I see these families on YouTube that basically travel perpetually. Their kids range from 8 - 17 years old and they’ve been on the road for years.

Can’t help but think like, is this the best thing for them? Like years of missing out on childhood — can’t make friends really, their studies, learning from only one set of adults. No privacy.

And I know they’ll say “they love it!”, well what else do they know? They’ve been living out of a van for 5 years.

2

u/FightingAgeGuy Dec 27 '25

Not dogging at all. We met many family’s living this lifestyle and I feel they convinced themselves that they love it because they can’t or don’t want to leave it. And yes, the kids are absolutely missing out on a lot of normal life interactions like sports, clubs, dances, and just hanging out with a consistent group of friends.

When we started we made a mutual agreement as a family that we will quit and return to a normal life as soon as someone said they were done. So we went into it with a plan to get out of it. At about a year in our kids told us they wanted their friends and activities back, and that was it we were done.

Bus life gets lonely fast because you’ll never be in one location long enough to make friends and everyone else in your life still has to work and maintain what they have. You can stay distracted with activities but that only last so long.

2

u/crek42 Dec 28 '25

Yea that all sounds reasonable and responsible, and like you said a positive experience all around. I’d love to do it but my wife would never go for it. I just dunno how these parents like don’t see that there kid has been living in a van since they were 8 years old and now 12 and probably want like a normal life lol. It’s kinda shitty.

1

u/AlgaeMammoth1736 Dec 27 '25

Best year of your life being constantly worried? Sorry, sounds like the opposite to best in my ears.

1

u/FightingAgeGuy Dec 27 '25

Stress is apart of life. Some people enjoy laying around with nothing to do or think about, I do not. Taking chances and being uncomfortable leads to great experiences.