Domicile Decisions

[Bossgator]

We are getting ready to go on the road, we are going to be semi full time.  We have sold our house and will stay with our kids when we come back to the area.  We want to set up domicile in either Florida or Texas, kind of leaning towards Florida, since we do have family there.  What are the pro/Cons of both?

 

Thanks

BG

[filthy-beast]

Are you both on Medicare or will you need private ins?  I believe in FL you can still get private nationwide coverage but not in TX.

[sandsys]

A few things nowadays require having a real physical address. If your relatives in Florida are willing for you to use their address for those few things, I would lean that way. I would still use a mail forwarding service for everything else.

Linda Sand

[Kirk W]

5 hours ago, Bossgator said:

What are the pro/Cons of both?

The best choice is very much a personal decision. If you are planning to join Escapees and then use their mail service, it is available in both states. Neither of the two states have any state income tax so that is a wash. Sales taxes are also quite similar. If you are not yet on Medicare, TX does offer health insurance acceptable for traveling RVers but FL has more and better choices for most people. For me, the biggest advantage that TX has is the fact that everyone in Livingston knows how fulltimers live, but it isn't a lot more difficult in FL if other things favor it. We found the TX estate laws to be preferable, but that may not be true for all people. I suspect that in your case it may well be best to choose FL, but there is nobody who can really say for sure without an intimate knowledge of your financial, legal, and personal issues. Either one should work out for you. 

[Captain Happy]

I would agree with what Linda said about using your kids home address in Texas for insurance and vehicle registrations. I use Escapee Mail for everything else. I sure you're on Medicare. Because if your not you've one big problem, it's called affordable healthcare while on the road.

[Blues]

2 hours ago, Kirk W said:

If you are not yet on Medicare, TX does offer health insurance acceptable for traveling RVers but FL has more and better choices for most people.

Can you give specifics on what's available in Texas that would work for traveling fulltimers?  Everything I've seen is either an HMO or a PPO with only a local network. 

[remoandiris]

The Crestview Fl mail forwarding company IS a physical address.  

[Bossgator]

Well, We aren't on medicare, luckily we are both retired military, so Tricare cover most of what we need.  What the city in Florida fort Escapees?

[agesilaus]

I may be wrong about this but I understand TX has vehicle inspections, which FL does not. I'm not really affected by the domicile issue since we live in FL and have a real address. I'll still use a forwarding service when we go mostly full time next May. I'm leaning towards St Brendan Isle for that tho. If you cannot use your relatives address in FL then I've heard several folks comment that Gilchrist County FL is especially accommodating towards full timers with a forwarding service address.

[TXiceman]

Inspections  in Texas are no big deal.  The yearly tag registration is tied to the vehicles being inspected.  If you are out of state, you simply go online and pay with a credit card and check the box that you are out of state.  The state mails the new stickers.  You then have 72 hours to get it inspected once you get the vehicle back in the state.

Ken

[2gypsies]

2 hours ago, TXiceman said:

Inspections  in Texas are no big deal.  The yearly tag registration is tied to the vehicles being inspected.  If you are out of state, you simply go online and pay with a credit card and check the box that you are out of state.  The state mails the new stickers.  You then have 72 hours to get it inspected once you get the vehicle back in the state.

Ken

I'll just add that if you don't return to Texas in your travels you don't have to have it inspected.  It's only if you return.  Some use the Escapees mail forwarding but never visit Texas.

[Kirk W]

13 hours ago, Bossgator said:

What the city in Florida fort Escapees?

With both of you having Tricare there really isn't a healthcare issue so that makes the choices far easier. With Escapees, the Florida address would be in Bushnell at the Escapee RV park located there. While you may well find FL to be the best choice, I suggest that you take some time to read up just a bit about domicile issues to fully understand what is involved. There are several very good articles on the subject with probably the most current being Where do you live? Domicile for Full-Time RVers  While many people do not give much thought to the issues, in the event yours should be challenged it can become a very important decision.

[remoandiris]

14 hours ago, Bossgator said:

Well, We aren't on medicare, luckily we are both retired military, so Tricare cover most of what we need.  

With that said, you should also consider South Dakota.  Before you make a final decision, shop for vehicle insurance in each state.  SD has a lower sales tax, in case you decide to buy a new vehicle.  You may find the sales tax savings is enough to cover the first year (or more) of vehicle insurance.

The only drawback to SD is you have to physically go there for a driver's license.  But, you do NOT have to go there for vehicle registration or to set up your mail forwarding.

[sandsys]

4 hours ago, remoandiris said:

The only drawback to SD is you have to physically go there for a driver's license. 

Once you get it, though, you never have to go in winter even if that's when your license expires because SD lets you get it early or apply for an extension to get it late.

Linda Sand

[Danandfreda]

We are thinking South Dakota I didn’t know you didn’t have to go to register vehicles. We are planning on buying a new hdt and thought the sales tax would be better than illinois where we live now. I wonder if they can change a title from truck to rv without going there. Anyone know?

[Ro and Joe]

23 hours ago, remoandiris said:

The Crestview Fl mail forwarding company IS a physical address.  

Last September it took use only 1.5 hrs to obtain our licence and establish domicile/voting rights at the Crestview County Office which also has a DMV office (not the main DMV office is Destin.  MyRvmail.com has also been good to work with.  

[Kirk W]

3 hours ago, Danandfreda said:

We are planning on buying a new hdt and thought the sales tax would be better than illinois where we live now. I wonder if they can change a title from truck to rv without going there.

If you plan to continue to live in Illinois and keep the new truck there, you could very well have problems when your local authorities discover your truck isn't registered where you live. 

[Danandfreda]

we are selling our home and property and getting out of Illinois. Still looking at South Dakota domicile. Haven’t talked to anyone about LLC in Montana don’t know if it would be worth doing

[sandsys]

20 minutes ago, Danandfreda said:

Haven’t talked to anyone about LLC in Montana don’t know if it would be worth doing

From reading this forum for nearly a dozen years I would say for most people it is not worth doing an LLC. If you already have a business it might be but an LLC is a type of company and that has many implications regarding commercial licensing, insurance, etc.

Linda Sand

[remoandiris]

12 hours ago, Danandfreda said:

we are selling our home and property and getting out of Illinois. Still looking at South Dakota domicile. Haven’t talked to anyone about LLC in Montana don’t know if it would be worth doing

Not worth doing if you're going to change domicile to SD.  Plus, there is an annual fee to keep the MT LLC.

[remoandiris]

17 hours ago, Danandfreda said:

We are thinking South Dakota I didn’t know you didn’t have to go to register vehicles. We are planning on buying a new hdt and thought the sales tax would be better than illinois where we live now. I wonder if they can change a title from truck to rv without going there. Anyone know?

SD registration info;

https://americasmailbox.com/tips_and_tricks/27/Vehicle-Registration

You're going to have to search for the HDT to RV info.  I no longer have the link.  There are 7 (or so) items your HDT must have to be considered an RV in SD.  Whether you can get the title changed long distance, I don't know.  Maybe use a keyword search on the HDT forum for it.  There may be one or two forum members who claim it can't be done anymore.  That is not correct.  Unless SD stopped doing it within the last 12 months.

[Dennis_Sherry]

On 11/23/2019 at 2:40 PM, sandsys said:

A few things nowadays require having a real physical address. If your relatives in Florida are willing for you to use their address for those few things, I would lean that way. I would still use a mail forwarding service for everything else.

Linda Sand

We sold our house in Alabama in Sept 2019 and in Oct 2019 we declared our domicile in Fla, (St Brendans Isle address in Green Cove Springs),  registered our motorhome and truck in Fla, applied for and got Fla drivers licenses and registered to vote in Clay County Fla.   We got this all done in one day in person at 3 locations in Green Cove Springs, Fla.   One month later we applied for CCW permits as well.  We received our CCW cards in 3 weeks.

One interesting thing was we had to register our motorhome before applying for our drivers license.  (That is backwards from normal Fla residents). The Clay County offices were well versed in the procedure.  The motorhome registration must occur before the drivers license application because they now use the tag number on the motorhome as the Street Address on the drivers license.   

---

Dennis

Edited November 25, 2019 by Dennis_Sherry

[hamrs_62]

when we got here to the rv Park we were talking to a gal here, and  my wife told here we might go to Texas to domicile, and she didn't give a reason, just said stay away from Texas, not sure what she had against Texas 

[chirakawa]

In my rv'ing travels around the country, I met lot's of folks who didn't like Texas or Texans.  Same is true of other States also.  We all have our biases.  Sometimes the bias comes from what we've heard, sometimes from our own experiences.  You could do worse than making Texas your domicile.

[Danandfreda]

On doing more research registrations and yearly renewals from what I’ve seen on web sites are kind of higher in South Dakota. Cheaper here in Illinois but the sales tax on vehicles is 6.25 from what I’ve seen our drv we have now is the highest travel trailer renewal that Illinois has and its 50$. Rv are 102$. But a lot of it is going up 50 dollars the first of the year. Need to make some calls and talk to real people at the dmv. One web site said Illinois plates for cars are 78 dollars they went to 101 a few years ago and 150 in 2020