Pittsburgh – At the beginning of the pandemic, Adriana and Ken Fedunok's daughter decided to join the RV madness, which was brought up by newly discovered flexibility at work and in home life.
They teased them playfully and said: “Oh, we'll get one and park them right next to you” and expected a setback. Instead, she enthusiastically supported the idea.
Soon afterwards they bought a motorhome from a friend and immersed them in the lifestyle.
“When you go to the camp, it is like being on vacation all the time,” said Ken Fedunok. “Ask our neighbors and say:” You still live here? “”
Now you are planning to sell your house in North Strabane and hug the leisure vehicle that lives all day after retirement. She brought this to the Pittsburgh RV Show on Saturday, where they could explore the latest models and think about what their future home looks like.
A model with a king-size bed, a garage, a fireplace and a 55-inch LED TV noticed her.
“We hope that if we retire, they still make this design,” said Adriana Fedunok.
Every year the Pittsburgh RV Show, the longest-running indoor mobile mobile exhibition of the country, transforms the 350,000 square meter David L. Lawrence Convention Center into a port for motorhome enthusiasts.
With 150 models issued, the options of modest caravans worth 25,000 US dollars to luxurious motorhomes that cost more than 300,000 US dollars. The event usually attracts 25,000 people, said the show promoter and organizer Randy Giancola.
The pandemic cheered on a motorhome boom when the Americans removed work and took a nomadic lifestyle. Mobile homes also offer an alternative to expensive hotels and the unpredictability of air travel. “I have never heard of a motorhome that was delayed,” said Giancola.
Sales normalized to the time before the kovise, whereby the motorhome shipment has dropped by almost 92% from 2021 to 2023. However, this does not mean that the Americans don't love camping yet.
Today's buyers want more than vehicles – they want houses on wheels, said Giancola, who sold his RV retailers in 2015. It is found that the technology and the amenities in the latest models are now reflected in a standard house.
“It is amazing-but I was in the shop, there was no unit with a refrigerator in the residential building,” he said. “You go to many of the larger fifth wheels and the motorhouses, I mean, you will see ge home-style cooling steps.”
And he said that the demography of those looking for the vehicles also develop. He said he saw significantly more families at the shows than the Boomer amount of the past.
As self-described “big hikers” and “outdoory people” Courtney and Kodie Claypoole went to the show with their 2-year-old son Cooper with the hope of improving their current motorhome. The North Side couple desperately made a strenuous road trip to Florida for more space.
“We want to go from a motorhome to a motorhome because there is a little more freedom to move, and it is not sitting on a car seat for 20 hours,” said Courtney Claypoole.
The couple said it appreciated the opportunity to browse the retailers without the sales pressure. Her son had easier priorities: playing with all the steering wheels.
“We love to get to this event to just learn more about exactly what we want,” she said. “I just want to see things without opening.”
Of course, they also had to browse the luxury options, some of which contained lofts on the second floor. “We are happy to look at the fantasy. Yes, we won't do that, but they are pretty cool. “
The long -standing motorhome enthusiast Kim Volpe watched a model with a large outside terrace. But her husband Emmett believed that it was a bit outside her price range.
“You could put ours in this thing,” he said.
In recent years, the RVving costs have increased significantly, from 1,100 to $ 2,400 dollars of annual fees for staying at campsites, the couple said. “It used to be cheap to camp. Now it is quite detailed, ”said Emmett Volpe.
In fact, motorhomes are about shopping for motorhomes to compensate for aspiration with practicality. Mike and Tiffany Christie want to sell their motorhome to possibly upgrade on a larger toy tractor. Her son Nick and his wife Bethany want to start small.
“We start over. We almost need the cheaper, somehow like a starter at home, ”said Nick Christie.
And seeing the personal ones was much more fertile than online purchases. “You can only google so much,” he said, adding that he could be ready today to buy today when he saw a good offer.
For some, the social side of Rving is what makes the investment worth. This is the case for Mike and Christina Stewart, who said that the campsite where they spend the night every summer in Sandy Lake, Pennsylvania is different from what its name implies.
“You are building this community,” she said. “You just go outside and it is like before, you have your block of children in the neighborhood. My children have Summers in the style of the 80s. “