Not my ER: CamperForce

[Tekward]

People that are full-time RVers and part of the Amazon contingent workforce. Best quote:

Bob compared the “slow-dawning reality” of his new life to waking up in The Matrix: learning that the pleasant, predictable world you used to inhabit is a mirage, a lie built to hide a brutal reality. “The security most people take comfort in—I’m not convinced that isn’t an illusion,” he says. “What you believe to be true is so embedded. It takes a radical pounding to let go.”

https://www.wired.com/story/meet-camperforce-amazons-nomadic-retiree-army/

 

[REWahoo]

An updated version of "living in a van down by the river"....

 

[Teacher Terry]

Another depressing article. I sure don't want to be working that hard at that age.

 

[Montecfo]

Certainly a cautionary tale. They did not realize how close to the edge they were living, till it all tumbled down.

 

[marko]

P
Bob compared the “slow-dawning reality” of his new life to waking up in The Matrix: learning that the pleasant, predictable world you used to inhabit is a mirage, a lie built to hide a brutal reality. “The security most people take comfort in—I’m not convinced that isn’t an illusion,” he says. “What you believe to be true is so embedded. It takes a radical pounding to let go.”

And Bob was an accountant? What the hell kind of accountant gets himself into that sort of situation and resulting mindset??

I think Bob needs professional help.

 

[flintnational]

There is an upside to this story. Apparently Wells Fargo has a fund that guarantees a 20% WR.

"Chuck still remembers the call from Wells Fargo that brought the 2008 financial crisis crashing down on his head. He had invested his $250,000 nest egg in a fund that supposedly guaranteed him $4,000 a month to live on. “You have no more money,” he recalls his banker saying flatly. “What do you want us to do?” Unable to think of a better answer, Chuck told him, “Well, shove your foot up your axx.” Then he hung up."

I guess we can continue to debate 2%, 3% and 4% SWRs but apparently 20% doesn't work.

FN

 

[foxfirev5]

There is an upside to this story. Apparently Wells Fargo has a fund that guarantees a 20% WR.

"Chuck still remembers the call from Wells Fargo that brought the 2008 financial crisis crashing down on his head. He had invested his $250,000 nest egg in a fund that supposedly guaranteed him $4,000 a month to live on. “You have no more money,” he recalls his banker saying flatly. “What do you want us to do?” Unable to think of a better answer, Chuck told him, “Well, shove your foot up your axx.” Then he hung up."

I guess we can continue to debate 2%, 3% and 4% SWRs but apparently 20% doesn't work.

FN

Yeah I'm sure there a lot of holes in this story. As a matter of fact there are plenty of details left out of each of these tales.
Who would ever guess that the housing bust would cause someone late in their working life to lose their home? No mention of extenuating circumstances, just that nobody told them that this could happen.
On the bright side I'm encouraged to see elderly people working like so many today plan to do. I guess denial is an easier path than simple LBYM living for 30 or 40 years.

 

[W2R]

And Bob was an accountant? What the hell kind of accountant gets himself into that sort of situation and resulting mindset??

I think Bob needs professional help.

+1

I don't like to post in these threads where we are all dumping on some poor guy and acting like we are smarter than those described. But My Gosh, sometimes it is justified.

The couple described sure seem like whiny "glass half empty" people. For example,

In Utah they worked as campground hosts—welcoming visitors, cleaning toilets, shoveling out fire pits, running an office—but the job didn’t pay; it just gave them a free spot to park TC, with hookups for water, electricity, and sewage. Cash was getting tight. Chuck was receiving $1,186 a month from Social Security, and Barb got some money each year from her family. Neither of them had health insurance. That summer, while waiting for a check to arrive, they watched their food rations dwindle to two cans of black beans, a can of corn, and some iced tea. Their account was down to $8.

What were they spending that $1186/month on, plus the money from her family? Surely they could afford $400 or so per month for food, given that their housing and utilities were paid for, and at his age he is on Medicare and she probably is too. But no, just watch the food vanish, can by can.... and spend the money on what, movies? Booze? Snazzy new clothes? The casino? Guess I just don't understand his priorities.

Also, as an aside, his SS payments are more than mine. I feel like this whole article is a major whine-fest.

And what's the deal with the guaranteed 19% return on a fund that collapsed in 2008? Who would depend on something that risky, given that risk and reward are so closely tied in investing? We are supposed to feel sorry for him because his risky investment fell through? Plus, his nest egg was only $250K which is pretty underfunded, so one would expect that he'd have at least some slight idea of how to live on a shoestring (something many learn to do before they are even old enough to vote), but no.

 

[Fermion]

There is an upside to this story. Apparently Wells Fargo has a fund that guarantees a 20% WR.

I guess we can continue to debate 2%, 3% and 4% SWRs but apparently 20% doesn't work.

FN

I dunno...20% SWR is not sounding unrealistic

 

[flintnational]

I dunno...20% SWR is not sounding unrealistic

I'm in if your in.

FN

 

[wyecrabber1]

I found this an interesting read, you could subtitle it; Life doesn't always go as planned. It's easy to be a monday morning quarterback and state; What were they thinking? For them the recession in 2008 hit at the worst possible time, just prior to retirement and with no time to recover. They didn't ask for handouts, and made a new life. Chuck was able to find someone to love and share his life with. It seems they decided to stop looking in the rear view mirror and get on with life.

There are a number of things, some outside of our control that can derail a golden retirement -- has the bull market fogged our memories -- many people lost everything in 2008. Maybe the rest of us were fortunate.

 

[splitwdw]

When I read these articles I wish they had all the details. What ever happened to who, what, why, where, when, when writing an article/news story? Why is his social security payment so low? Even if he took it early, should it be that low for the years that he worked? It sounds like he had a good paying job with McDonald's, did he blow his pay? Did he have a house with first wife? Did he lose it when she became sick? I don't like to judge without all the details but all these people living on a shoe string in vans/RVs/campers aren't living life. I understand that some people live a nomad life and can fund it but these people, in all of the retiree articles, are living hand to mouth.
Many of these people think it will be so easy to hit the road, in leaky, old RV's. It's like there is no planning involved. Do you think it's because they don't get along with their families or don't want to burden their families? I'd be sick if I saw my parents living like that.
Are there any articles about what happens to these people when they have to come off the road?

 

[Fermion]

Go to cheaprvliving.com This story is a dime a dozen there. People retire to living in a car, van or (popular) cargo trailer pulled by van. They usually have about $2000 net worth.

 

[Sanstar]

I'm half way through a book, "Nomadland" that describes the boomer van/camper lifestyle and work culture. Most of the folks profiled didn't plan for this type of non-retirement but unexpected job loss, divorce and/or work ending medical conditions led them to living "houseless". It's very much an eye opener. I hope if DH and I are ever in a similar situation we will be as resourceful, resilient, optimistic and hopeful as are most described in the book. I doubt we would fall into the, "I love the lifestyle and won't go back, no matter what," group. We'd be in the keep LBYM until we are no longer "houseless".

Where does the $ go? At the risk of seeming to be judgmental, which I sincerely do not want to be, I do wonder what impact a cigarette addiction would be to a limited budget.

 

[JoeWras]

Like the posts above, I immediately did that same math on the SWR on the $4k per month "supposedly guaranteed" return from the $250k.

I'm going to give the benefit to these folks and say they were swayed by some slick sales guy at W.F. This was 2008 or so before the tightening of fiduciary rules. And, it was Wells Fargo. We now know what was going on there!

splitdw has a point about the writing of the article. Something is missing. It says "he ran his own McD franchise." What does that mean? You roughly need at least $1.5M in capital to buy into a McD franchise today. I remember in the late 70's our neighbor held the franchise at the end of the street, and mom and dad would whisper how he coughed up a cool $250k for it.

Either the writing is bad, or the franchise money also evaporated. I'm suspecting he was managing "his own" franchise for a franchise owner. Otherwise, the numbers don't make sense, unless it was plowed into the failed tour company or something.

I guess it isn't the point of the article (which is the roaming Amazon workforce), but inconsistencies like this kind of spoil the article.

 

[pmac]

Pretty tough crowd here. While most of the folks on this forum are financially secure through a combination of hard work and good fortune, not everybody gets dealt the same hand in life. The folks in the article seemed to making a life for themselves, albeit a hard one, overcoming some apparently poor financial decisions and some things that were beyond their control. That is something that I would hope I would be able to do if forced into in the same circumstances. I'm hoping I never have to find out.

 

[growing_older]

As a young man, I graduated college and scrambled for a job. Money was tight, so I lived in a place with no furniture and calculated calories per dollar of my small savings to make sure I got the most for my meager resources. Rice featured prominently in my diet. Later in my career when tech crashed and my employer abruptly went out of business just as jobs were very scarce, these scrounging and making due skills easily saw me though when others floundered. Plus, I had had the advantage of planning ahead in case I ever found myself in such a position again.

I know how to do this. But I don't really want to. If I'm ever thrust into the role of a starving student, I will probably cope reasonably well. But I also know that I don't want to go there unless I absolutely have to, so I've been more than willing to sacrifice some current consumption in order to build up some assets as security to protect me from such eventualities. Apparently these people never internalized that second part about security, so they are coping as best they can.

I'm sure these people rationalize how they got here and I admire their pluck at making do as best they can, but I'm baffled how a 44 year career with a multi-national megacorp, rising to some prominence, didn't allow him to save enough to be secure for life. McDonalds in fact has both a defined benefit and defined contribution pension plan, so it's unclear why a 44 year career didn't qualify for this. Likewise, drawing 20% annually from an investment, no matter how misleadingly touted, should have still seen the rapidly dwindling balance and known something was wrong. At the very least the "too good to be true" alarms should have gone off long before the money ran out, hopefully before buying the crazy thing. As usual with these kinds of stories, I'm sure there is much left out or only partly explained to seem more sympathetic.

 

[walkinwood]

The resilience of some people! I too liked the quote.

“The security most people take comfort in—I’m not convinced that isn’t an illusion,” he says. “What you believe to be true is so embedded. It takes a radical pounding to let go.”

A good thing to keep in mind.

 

[Calico]

I'm half way through a book, "Nomadland" that describes the boomer van/camper lifestyle and work culture. Most of the folks profiled didn't plan for this type of non-retirement but unexpected job loss, divorce and/or work ending medical conditions led them to living "houseless". It's very much an eye opener. I hope if DH and I are ever in a similar situation we will be as resourceful, resilient, optimistic and hopeful as are most described in the book. I doubt we would fall into the, "I love the lifestyle and won't go back, no matter what," group. We'd be in the keep LBYM until we are no longer "houseless".

Where does the $ go? At the risk of seeming to be judgmental, which I sincerely do not want to be, I do wonder what impact a cigarette addiction would be to a limited budget.

The author of the article linked in the OP is also the author of Nomadland.

 

[daylatedollarshort]

If they are broke and living in an RV they could live in a state with expanded Medicaid and get medical care for free if they are not old enough for Medicare. Also is seems like they would qualify for food stamps and maybe some other programs like senior housing. Our local senior center has free, pretty hearty lunches and all sorts of senior services for a small annual membership fee. It would be interesting to have a program to review the finances for people like this and see how they could be helped out with a budget review and government programs. I don't doubt there are seniors in financial difficulty but it seems like the first couple in the article should have at least two average SS checks coming in. Plus, both their life savings investments going to zero, not 50% loss but zero and never bouncing back seems unlikely even post 2008. The article does not seem well fact checked.

 

[Amethyst]

They can't be spending much money at the hairdresser's...

The other thing I noticed is that they are in good shape, especially her. I hope they can continue to keep up.

 

[gayl]

I'm baffled how a 44 year career with a multi-national megacorp, rising to some prominence, didn't allow him to save enough to be secure for life. McDonalds in fact has both a defined benefit and defined contribution pension plan.

+1

unfortunately too many use the equity in their home as the bank and I'm sure that if he retired without a mortgage he could have made do on social security and DBP. These kinds of articles leave way too many questions unanswered

 

[flintnational]

IMHO, the way these type of articles gain attention is the premise "these folks are just like you". It either makes us feel grateful for our own situation and/or sympathetic for the subject's situation. I think the writing is tailored to elicit both responses (facts might not be a priority). As someone mentioned, the article author is also selling the book.

Edit: And, Saturday Night Live has already done the skit, so the topic is safe for humor.



FN

 

[marko]

+1

unfortunately too many use the equity in their home as the bank

yes, and use phrases like "...'gamble' in the stock market casino"

There's always going to be people out there that just don't know what they're doing financially and there's always some agenda driven writer out there hoping to cash in on their misery.

But these articles try to make you believe they're victims of some new change in the economy.

 

[JoeWras]

yes, and use phrases like "...'gamble' in the stock market casino"

There's always going to be people out there that just don't know what they're doing financially and there's always some agenda driven writer out there hoping to cash in on their misery.

But these articles try to make you believe they're victims of some new change in the economy.

Ah yes. And those things may be left out of the article.

My neighbor lost his house this way. Retired with a db plan from Megacorp, used the house equity to buy a $200k Class A camper, and announced to the neighbors he was going to dabble in day trading.

Then 2009 came along.

Despite the pension, he lost the house. He was very open about it while it was occurring, down to telling us the bank would never foreclose because he was too good of a customer. He actually played chicken with them.

I gotta say, it was eye opening to see how foreclosure goes, it was not pretty. 29 years in that house (multiple refinances) and it was all gone, just like that.