Why We Decided to Live in A Skoolie | School Bus Conversion | Skoolie Life
Why We Decided to Live in a Skoolie
At the tail end of 2019, my boyfriend Josh and I were at the point in our lives where we knew it was time to move in together. We currently live in Maryland, where everything is SO expensive whether you want to rent an apartment or house, or buy a home. Between the two of us we also have two dogs, Sam and Mojo, so we knew renting an apartment was out of the question ( and definitely not what either us wanted financially or for our lifestyle), so we began the age-old journey of looking for a house to buy.
We weren’t super thrilled about this option either, because we both wanted to eventually move out West, so Josh especially really didn’t want to get stuck with a mortgage and house here in MD to worry about selling later on. We also knew it would be near impossible to find a home here that we liked that was in our preferred price-range, since Maryland is so ridiculously expensive to buy a home in. Despite these misgivings, we didn’t really know of any other options, so we began the process of getting approved for a mortgage and looking on Zillow 23 hours a day.
After a few weeks of searching online at all the homes for sale, we were even less enthused about the prospect of putting down more roots (and expensive roots at that) here in Maryland. One day I was browsing Pinterest, and some photos of skoolie conversions happened to pop up on my feed. I began researching them, and it was like a light-bulb literally went off in my head and I just KNEW that was the right next step for us, which probably sounds insane! We both love traveling and want to see as much of the country as possible before deciding on where to eventually settle down out West, and with Josh being an HVAC Journeyman and basically a jack of all trades, I knew it was completely within our capabilities of renovating a school bus into a tiny home. As soon as I showed Josh photos of finished skoolies, and we talked about how they can have all the creature-comforts of a home but with a far smaller cost of living, he was fully on board and SO excited to not be buying a house! Josh is a much more adventurous person than I am, and had already done a cross country road trip in a van before, so I knew as soon as I said I was willing to live this lifestyle, he would be all-in and I wouldn’t even have to convince him.
We immediately began searching for the right bus to convert, which was at the beginning of 2020, right when a global pandemic just happened to hit, of course. The pandemic definitely made things challenging, but in April we finally found the perfect bus and began our conversion journey! Now, we’re currently about 6 months into the renovation and we’re on our way to having a completely off-the-grid tiny home with solar power, running water, a full kitchen, and a bathroom with a shower.
Follow @thebeccamathews on Instagram to watch our conversion and keep up with our travels when we hit the road!
Becca Mathews
Traveling Portrait Photographer, Private Photo Editor, and Business Mentor