Childhood looks a lot different for Dante than it did four months ago, before his mom lost the day care business she was running and the family was evicted from their four-bedroom home about three hours away. Now, living out of a roughly 175-square-foot RV with his mom and 6-year-old sister, Dante’s space is limited to a twin bed wedged under a loft, cordoned off with privacy curtains. Without regular Wi-Fi, he rarely plays video games anymore. Most of his belongings are confined to a couple of small bins, and his friends are hours away.
When the family is unable to afford a spot at a campground, which can cost $25 to $45 a night, they park on remote federal lands, which are free for two weeks. But those sites don’t come with water or electricity and have spotty cell service. At times, the family has bathed and washed their clothes in a river and gone to the bathroom in the woods to conserve the water in their RV’s tank.
“I’ve adapted to this lifestyle because we have to adapt,” said Dante, who now spends most of his free time outdoors exploring and started an online school program this fall. “If we don’t adapt, we won’t change, and if we don’t change, we’ll be mad, and if we’re mad, that just sucks. You don’t want to be mad.”
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It’s a lifestyle adjustment that data indicates a growing number of Americans are making. As housing costs rise beyond what many families can afford, more people are looking for shelter outside the traditional housing market. About 486,000 people live full-time in an RV, which appears to be more than twice as many as in 2021, according to survey data from the RV Industry Association. About a third have children, and a vast majority earn less than $75,0000 a year. A separate survey by the Census Bureau found a similar trend: In 2023, the most recent data available, it estimated 342,000 people were living in an RV, boat or van, an increase of 41% from 2019.