Florida Camping for Snowbirds: Post-Hurricane Update

Wondering about Florida Camping for Snowbirds following Hurricane Ian? You may be surprised by what Florida campground owners have to say. Contrary to some media reports, they're saying the snowbird camping season is still very much on!

That's the main topic in Episode 417 of the RV Podcast as we talk to Bobby Cornwell, President and CEO of the Florida RV Parks & Campground Association.

Other topics in this episode can be found in the table of contents. Just click on the topics you want to read first.

To watch our YouTube video version of the podcast, click the player below:

You can listen to an audio-only version on your favorite podcast app or by clicking the audio player below:

Now, here are the full shownotes for this episode, everything we talked about on the podcast!

Our Michigan Property Update

This is a big week for us. If all goes according to plans (finger's crossed!), we will be closing on our long sought Michigan RV property. We've had many challenges in finding the land we are buying.

That's because there are no multi-acre developments like we have with the 5 acres of RV property we bought in Tennessee at the Woodlands.

In Michigan and most other states, land is sold in individual parcels with many restrictions. We have hunted for over a year across the state.

We don’t want to give away too many details until the property closes. But we can tell you that it is 10 acres in size. It even has a small little lake on it that we will own most of. And it is in Southwestern Michigan and we will, like we do in Tennessee, have two or possibly three RV sites where we can invite friends and family.

This property is very different than what we have in Tennessee. For one thing, maybe not at first but as soon as we can, we will be living on it. Full time. Not in the RV but in a house there. That house is going to need a lot of renovation and work, so it sure won't be an immediate move-in. Again, we’ll show the place and share more after we close on it, but we are pretty excited. We will keep both our RVs there, our Arcadia Fifth Wheel and our new Unity FX Class C motorhome.

And just in case you are confused by our eventual moving plans, we are not quitting the RV Lifestyle! We are just moving our main sticks and bricks. We will still be RVing as much, or even more than before.

Beware of Facebook Marketplace Scams

Sort of related - but only indirectly because in anticipation of the future move - we are downsizing and selling some furniture and household items that we won’t be needing. And in so doing, we’ve been advertising some items on Facebook Marketplace.

What we found was a pretty sophisticated scam that is apparently rampant on Facebook Marketplace and other similar online buy-and-sell sites. It involved Zelle, the peer-to-peer money exchanging service that works a little like PayPal.

We were contacted by a prospective buyer who claimed to be interested in buying a piece of furniture we had listed. The scammer offered to immediately pay for the item via Zelle to guarantee that we wouldn't sell it to someone else.

Immediately, I received an email purportedly from Zelle, claiming that the $150 sent by the purported buyer was recei...