The Cost of Our Van Build

Going into the building process we knew we wanted to invest in items that would make our van feel more like home. Since we would be living in it full time, we wanted to make our day to day life as comfortable as possible. When we started this whole thing we had very little money saved. We took a loan out for the van itself, sold almost everything we had and moved out of our apartment. We worked full time while living in our empty cargo van. Over an 8 month period we were able to put all the money that we would have otherwise been paying in rent, into our van build. It was a long and somewhat uncomfortable process. We spent most days shuffling our stuff from one side of the van to the other while we built around it. We did everything ourselves which saved us a ton of money in labor, but cost us a LOT of time. At the end of the day we are happy to have made the sacrifices we did to have the home we do now. Daily life in our van isn’t a whole lot different than it was while we were in an apartment. Our electrical system is powerful enough to sustain us without the need to be conservative with our usage. It allows us to power our Vitamix, keep our refrigerator running, charge our phones/laptops/camera batteries and keep the lights on as needed. Our large refrigerator allows us to comfortably store at least a weeks worth of food, and our hot water heater makes it easy to clean all of our dishes and gives us access to a hot shower. Our composting toilet was a purchase I was hesitant about at first, but now can’t imagine living without. With all that being said, it is 100% possible to build a fully functioning home on wheels for a fraction of what we spent. A lot of the items you’ll see listed below can be considered luxuries and not completely necessary. It just depends on your budget and what is important to you.

Building Materials / Parts

  • Wood (plywood, framing lumber, ceiling, countertops, cabinetry, finishing)

  • Fasteners (nails, staples, screws, glue)

  • Electrical (connectors, switches, cables, fuses/breakers)

  • Plumbing (pipe, fittings, valves)

  • Gas (tubing, fittings, valves)

  • Insulation (sheep’s wool, polyiso foam boards)

  • Sound Deadener

  • Drawer Slides

  • Flooring

  • Paint

$6000

Electrical

$3,380

Plumbing

$1,315

Appliances

$3,470

Other

$4,400

Grand Total:

$18,565

Keep in mind, we may have missed a few things in the making of this list. We took so many trips to the hardware store that it’s hard to say wether or not we kept EVERY receipt. You’ll also have to factor in the cost of tools if you are doing the build yourself. We were lucky enough to have been able to borrow the majority of tools from family, but we did have to purchase a handful of specialty tools the were required for our build.

Courtnie Hamel19 Comments