Thousand Trails Camping Memberships: Overview & Price Breakdown
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- Опубліковано 1 лип 2023
- Over the last few weeks, we have done a lot of research on the different Thousand Trails memberships currently offered. In this video, I go over the different perks each membership gets plus a price breakdown! Comment below with which membership you have (or want to get)!
Want more info? Check out the flyers for each membership here:
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Thousand Trails contact info:
Irma Stevens (469) 885-5236
She can answer any question you have about any tier of Thousand Trails passes. Make sure to mention that Ashley at anxietyinacamper brought you to her!
Thanks Ashley! It was my pleasure! Love helping fellow full timers!
Great work on this video. One of the clearest explanations we have seen. Thanks again.
Thank you! Doing all that research for my own upgrade helped me so I'm very glad it has helped someone else too! 😊
Comparing an rv lot to an apartment, house, or hotel rental is not the same. You have savings that offset the extra cost, like fuel mileage increase and rv maintenance costs. A better comparison is weekly or monthly rv spot rentals, which are in the $500 to $1000 range.
We received a camping pass with an rv purchase and found it very hard to get sites. I would get up at midnight when the site availability would rollover to book a West Coast trip and would just be able to occasionally grab a couple of days, nothing you could build a trip around. I would get a message on Encore resorts in Florida and Arizona that there were no sites available for
180 days. I found it best to just plan a route, and if something became available on the way great, but don't rely on it. I would never upgrade for fear that I would run into the same problem.
Hi! We actually don't have a ton of savings we use to offset extra costs, we both work full time to pay for our gas, food, and insurance. Most maintenance we did ourself, we even installed our AC unit ourselves to save on labor costs. It can be difficult to book campsites in the high use areas like Florida and Arizona, which is why we ultimately upgraded our pass to get that 180 day window. Since then we haven't had issues booking in Florida (haven't booked in Arizona yet). For other less frequented places like Alabama, Washington, and Oregon, we have had no problem booking less than 180 days out. I will admit, I did the midnight thing trying to book the Florida Keys and was unsuccessful so I do understand that frustration.
I typically compare the monthly lot rent to our monthly apartment rent because that's what we currently pay vs what we did pay. But everyone's experience is also different so what we experienced isn't what everyone else will experience 🙂
Edit: wanted to add that our RV spot is a monthly rental. There are definitely some cheaper yearly ones throughout the country, but where we are in Utah it's a monthly rental, we don't own it or anything.
@@anxietyinacamper Thanks for the response. That's awesome it works for you.
So do you still pay for the camp site or stay there free because of the pass
They are free because of the pass! There is no additional campground fee when we stay in Thousand Trails/Encore campgrounds. There are a couple very special ones (like in the Florida Keys) that do have a $20 a night fee because they are sooo coveted and have limited sites, but we avoid those to maintain the $0 a night campgrounds. Some TT campgrounds allow non-pass holders to stay, but they would have to pay a nightly fee.
I will admit, it is very nice to book a TT campground and see the $0 due for your whole 3 week stay :)
Is it hard to find availability in Florida?
Pre-November, we had no problem around Orlando/Clermont area which is where we stayed from September until right before Thanksgiving. Once snowbird season was in full effect, it did get more difficult booking a couple weeks out, but not impossible where we were. Although if you know when you're going I'd recommend booking asap for peace of mind!
A note though, I had a lot of trouble getting anything at the two Encore's in the Florida Keys, but I know those are highly coveted.
Great Info! Do you know, can the Elite Basic membership be bought/sold on the secondary market? Say I buy an Elite Membership, and after 3 or 4 years, for whatever reason, I'm done with full-time RVing, can I sell that membership?
Wonderful question! Short answer: yes if you buy new, the membership can be sold down the road if you'd like to do so.
Long answer: this is how we started our search, there are multiple groups on Facebook where people are selling their passes after traveling for however long they wanted to. I noticed a lot of great deals, and there are some pros to buying a used membership. The pros I noticed included usually a cheaper price (most people were selling the passes at either whatever they bought it for or whatever they owed), and these purchases can be done with the help of a Thousand Trails agent if you want. The reason we bought a new pass though, was because you can only transfer a pass once, so if you buy a used membership, you yourself will not be able to sell it later down the line. You also lose a couple of the side perks, but honestly I can't even remember what those were so they weren't exactly important... Regardless of if you get a new or used pass, I'd recommend keeping an eye on the booking window! That is the biggest reason we chose the connections over the elite 😊
You can also pause your membership down the road too! This is something we are considering for whenever we decide to take a break from full timing, and then if it turns into an extended pause... Then we would look into selling. But honestly we've had the pass for over a year so far, and it has benefited us so much full timing we don't see ourselves pausing it anytime soon lol
@@anxietyinacamper We pay an average of about $400 for each week at a RV Park every month. We only travel the southwest would it be worth the membership vis paying the $400 every month for RV park? Is the Thousand Trails one week stay free? or do you still pay something. I'm just wondering if it would pay for its self in 1 year of traveling?
We've been traveling full time for over a year, and have had our TT pass for about a year (I just renewed the dues). Paying the dues plus the added on trails collections for our Connections upgraded pass came out to $80 a month. It's worth it for us especially because the cheapest weekly campground we've found this far was still $250 a week (in Hermiston, OR) so we'll happily take $80/month instead. I would double check if the basic pass where you pick a quadrant would be beneficial to you or if you need to upgrade in order to get the entire country of campgrounds at your disposal. Trails collections adds all of the encore resorts too, which is more beneficial in the south east and Arizona. It works out for us better to add it on, but without that the monthly would be even cheaper!!!
Edit: adding that the southwest of California, Arizona, and New Mexico have a decent amount of TT campgrounds, but I'd recommend the trails collection add on for the extra campgrounds in Arizona. If you only plan to travel a year, I'd recommend trying the basic pass and pick the southwest quadrant before you upgrade. You can always stop the pass, pause, or sell (upgrades only for selling) if you decide it's not for you! We started out with the southeast quadrant basic pass. And no, we do not pay extra to stay in the campgrounds unless it's a select few special ones in the FL keys where it's like $20 a night. All of the others we've stayed at are $0 due at booking and $0 due at check in 😊
Do they allow tenting
Some campgrounds do, I think the encore ones since they're partnered with TT, not exclusively owned, so they have different rules. You'd have to check with each campground though as some might but others might not
How can I get a list of all the places I can stay at in the southwest region? I’m looking to buy an RV stay at one of the spots they have to offer and also be close to work. Can you please help me out?
Hey! I'd recommend either checking the website or reaching out to the agent who answered all the questions I had and more. Her name is Irma, and her contact info is in the video description 😁 I'm not exactly sure where the southwest region ends so I wouldn't want to accidentally leave some out/add ones not in that region
Why you went with the Elite Connection and Not the Elite Basic?
That's a great question! The main reason was we wanted the 180 day booking window. Basic allows for 120 days, but then you are booking after the Connection and Adventure people booked a whole 2 months before you. Basic is still a great plan though, definitely worth weighing your options!
@@anxietyinacamper great video, thank you. We have been full time for about 2 yrs with Elite Basic. The 120 day booking window has never failed to get us reserved into the park of our choice, no problem. We added TC this year to get into more Encore parks.
@@leehappy3259TC was a huge help to us when camping in Orlando as there was only one TT campground and a ton of TC campgrounds. We were able to hop around for a bit but definitely would not have been able to stay as close to the in laws in Orlando without the encore campgrounds
I had a one year membership with them through the purchase of an RV from Lazydays many years ago, so, I used them twice , so glad I never spent a dime on them , it would have been a terrible investment , they are a shady outfit at best
We started with the membership that lazydays gave us with purchase of our RV, but we've been to some great thousand trails so far! I've noticed the experience varies depending on the region you select (if it's the basic membership) or where in the US you camp the most. I'm sorry your experience wasn't as great. I hope you've at least enjoyed camping in general :)
we camp strickly in State parks now , we enjoy nature , and quietness , something you can't get from a ( resort ) @@anxietyinacamper
After buying a membership and then working for Thousand Trails for 17 years, from 2001 to 2018, I agree, they are a shady outfit at best. I have so many stories.
@@jimn6sxb644 It's been working out for us, but I'm sorry that's how your experience went. We don't work for them though, so I really can't speak to that side of it.
Do you ever go to BLM land to set up camp? It is free in most areas. Just no facilities or anything. It's off grid on federal land which they have land in all 50 states I believe
Yes! We've done so in Moab before and have also stayed in Walmarts before, but we're limited to perfect weather weekends in those cases and limited to our tank sizes. For the weather we can't run ACs while boondocking so the summer and sometimes spring and fall depending on where we are is a no go lol. We've learned we can go about a week on our grey tanks if we don't shower every day though. We like BLM land for weekend trips though when weather is cool enough!