


Buying a Home on Wheels
The idea for joining the skoolie life all began when Joel and I were out in Connecticut for a family wedding. I had just left my job at a hostel in Colorado, and Joel works remotely. This meant we could take our time getting back home to Colorado and I got to take all my stuff that I’d left in CT to CO. We thought about just buying an SUV, then thought about a van. Vans are great since they’re much more stealthy to allow for city parking. However, we had such a hard time trying to find a decent van below 20K. We checked Craigslist, Facebook Marketplace, Used Car Websites, and even auto salvage yards. An ad for a shuttle bus popped up and it got me thinking how much cooler and more space we could get for a really reasonable price. After that, we were totally sold on bus life! We searched around and ending up buying the bus from DATTCO, a bus transportation company in Connecticut. Here’s a couple resources we used to try to find our bus:
- Local School Transportation Company
- Craigslist.com
- Facebook Marketplace
- ConversionTrader.com
- PublicSurplus.com
- TinyHouseListings.com
- GovDeals.com
- AutoTrader.com
VanLife Pros
- Stealth Camping – Park pretty much anywhere. Be aware of van height if parking in garages.
- Small & Compact
- Better fuel economy
- Common engine type – most mechanics will be able to work on it.
- Strong VanLife Community
- Less work taking out old school seats
VanLife Cons
- Small – not a lot of headroom, or room in general. This forces you to get pretty creative in the build
- Expensive upfront cost
- Typically fewer windows
BusLife Pros
- Spacious – you can fit A LOT in buses
- High ceilings – walk around comfortably at around 6.5 ft
- AWESOME skoolie community
- Unique, open to creative designs
BusLife Cons
- Removing the seats
- MPG can be pretty bad
- Parking in cities can be difficult/expensive
- Some RV parks won’t accept buses
Other Ideas: Ambulances, Box Trucks, Travel Trailers, Truck Campers, and more!