So many people these days are thinking of quitting their full-time jobs that require them to stay at home in one place. Remote working is a real possibility for making a living on the road.
Many people want to hit the road full-time in an RV or campervan and live an adventurous lifestyle.
Perhaps you’re considering a full-time RV or campervan life.
But if you’re not independently wealthy, retired, or otherwise financially stable, you’re likely going to need a job.
You may not know what types of employment options are available to you on the road.
To help you come up with options for an income, we reviewed RV groups online to determine what types of jobs people have while traveling full-time in an RV or campervan.
There are so many different remote working options for full-time life on the road. Generally speaking, the jobs can be grouped into:
- Fully remote: Positions that you can do from anywhere while traveling; or
- Location based: Positions that require you to be located in a certain location for at least part of the time.
We’ve compiled a sample of the types of jobs available for fully remote and location based for RVers and people living the van life.
Remote Jobs That You Can Do From Anywhere
With Internet and mobile phone access, an increasing number of jobs can be done from anywhere. In fact, there are many people that take their full-time professional job on the road as remote-based employees.
While camping at the Goose Island Campground in Moab, Utah, we met a woman who lived full-time in her RV working as a technical writer. She said her coworkers had no idea she lived in an RV! She was fully set up with a small office that let her get her job done while traveling across the country in her motorhome. When we met her, her RV office had a great view of the Colorado River in Utah.
You don’t have to have a high-paying corporate management job to find one in which you can work remotely as there are many, many options for remote-based work that can be done from inside (or outside) your RV or campervan.
Many of these jobs are full-time with benefits, but there are also freelancer opportunities.
Here are a sample of jobs that the RV community has mentioned that they hold as they live full-time in their RV traveling across the country.
Full-Time Anywhere Job Ideas
- Medical billing, medical coding, or medical transcribing specialist
- Web designer
- Graphic designer
- Insurance adjuster
- Computer programmer
- Travel agent
- Marketing consultant
- Technical writer
- Blogger
- Avon, Mary Kay, Young Living Essential Oils, Pampered chef, etc sales representative
- Virtual assistant
- Life coach
- Online tutor
- HR recruiter
- Handmade craft or jewelry maker who sells on Etsy
- Customer service representative
Finding Remote Working Opportunities
One of the difficulties many job seekers face when looking for jobs that will allow them to work from their RV is that the big jobs sites, such as Indeed and Monster, do not make it easy to search for remote working jobs.
Further, the number of remote-based positions on these large job boards is a tiny fraction of the overall jobs listed.
People applying for remote jobs on these sites face a lot of competition as there are others looking for the same types of positions.
There are better places to look for remote jobs (i.e. FlexJobs) which I’ll cover below.
But if you do intend to search on Indeed or other job advertising websites, you should focus on including the following types of keywords in your searches to find remote jobs:
- Remote
- Virtual
- Home-based
- Home office
- Telecommute
- Telecommuting
You’ll still need to sort through hundreds of search results that may or may not be actually remote-based using this tactic.
You’ll come across lots of results for “remote sensing” and the like that aren’t actually remote jobs, but you can ignore those postings.
FlexJobs
A better way to search for remote jobs that you can do while traveling full-time or part-time in your RV is to search on job boards that are designed for remote workers.
In our experience, the best source is FlexJobs, which hand-screens job openings to ensure that they are actually remote positions.
At the time of this writing, FlexJobs had 33,343 remote working jobs posted as available for remote workers from 5,571 companies hiring today, which can be searched using the advanced search screen on their website below.
Search Fields on FlexJobs
FlexJobs lists full-time, part-time, and freelance jobs that can be done from anywhere. Using the advanced search screen, users can search for jobs using any combination of fields.
These include:
- Keywords
- Exclude words
- U.S. location (some jobs require that you live in a certain state)
- International locations
- Job type: Employee; Freelance; or Temporary
- Work schedule: Full-time; Part-time; Flexible Schedule; Alternative Schedule; Occasional; Seasonal; Short-Term; or Long-Term
- Categories: a list of different job groups, such as accounting, photography, sports and fitness, and more
- Remote work level: Remote – Any Level; 100% Remote Work; Partial Remote Work; or Option for Remote Work
- Career level: Entry-Level; Experienced; Manager; or Senior Level Manager
- Willing to travel?: Yes, a lot; Yes, a bit; or No
- Featured and award-winning employers
Job Categories
The site has jobs in over 50 different career categories for all different types of jobs, ranging from art and creative jobs, to government and politics jobs, to telemarketing jobs. Depending on your expertise and interest, you’re likely to find a remote job that would suit you.
Here is a random sample of 10 job opportunities listed on the site as of February 2019:
- Captioning Assistant: Captioning assistants needed for full & part-time positions working evening, weekend, or holiday shifts. $11/hour. Duties include assisting deaf or hard of hearing callers and repeating information into voice recognition software for transcription.
- Administrative Assistant: Temporary-to-permanent job opportunity for an administrative assistant possessing CSC or CPH licensure. Will be processing security transactions, responding to client inquiries, arranging travel, scheduling meetings, & preparing seminar materials.
- Marketing Assistant: Freelance marketing assistant needed for a long-term, one year, temporary job requiring MS Office proficiency, exceptional communication skills, and a marketing or similarly focused college degree. Will provide marketing support, conduct research.
- Production Artist: Freelance, contract position editing images for print and digital templates and using Adobe Creative Suite for retouching. Must have 3 to 7 years of production experience with HTML5 skills. POS experience is helpful.
- Brand and Packaging Specialist: Finalize mechanical artwork for products and perform proofing/production activities in this freelance position. Telecommuting position after 1-month of onsite training. Must have a bachelor’s degree in Design or Design Printing and 7+ years’ exp.
- Fandom Writer: Seeking freelance fandom writer for a commitment of at least three months. The ideal candidate is film and TV obsessive, a high achiever, has a perceived understanding of the show business industry, and strong web research and prioritization skills.
- Virtual Assistant: Part-time, remote contract job. Pays $18.00 an hour. Long-term role. Needs experience with CRM software and WordPress and needs to be tech savvy. Needs to enjoy being empowered to make what they are working on better, and go above and beyond daily.
- National Campaigns Director: Draft content for reports and grant proposals to funders, maintain relationships, solicit gifts from prospective donors and participate in solicitation activities. Option for remote job with travel required to Portland, OR and campaign events.
- Software Developer: Performs duties including developing and testing agency-wide and business unit applications, participating development projects, and designing and implementing pre-production environments. AS required. Full-time with remote option. $65k-$87/Yr.
- Gameday Support: Digitally assist stringers at minor league ballparks, which provides the data used in online live content applications. Must have exceptional knowledge of baseball and how to score a baseball game. Part-time, possibly remote position w/training.
FlexJobs Discount Code
FlexJobs really has something for everyone. For people planning to live full- or part-time in their RV or camper van, it’s a great resource for finding a way to bring in an income while traveling and doing what you really love.
Use this link to save 30% at FlexJobs with code SAVE30 and find your new remote job. Subscriptions start at $14.95/month with no commitment so you’ll receive 30% off of the $14.95/month price.
One reason we really like FlexJobs is their satisfaction guarantee. They will provide a full refund if you’re not satisfied or can’t find the right remote job for your life on the road.
Jobs That Require You To Be in One Location (At Least Temporarily)
The second type of jobs that RVers frequently have require you to be in one location.
These vary from full-time gigs to temporary, seasonal type work.
Many of these positions provide an RV site with full hook-ups. These types of jobs are frequently referred to as “workamping” positions.
As examples of how you can earn a living on the road while remote working, people living full-time in their RV or campervan report the following types of jobs:
Security Guard
There are options out there for security guards for industrial and commercial type facilities.
Some of these positions are designed with RVers in mind, as they come with full-hookups on site.
For example, oil pipelines in southwest Texas frequently offer these kinds of positions so can be a good place to look for jobs. Reports on pay vary, but some RVers are reporting pay of $150 to $175 per day.
Natural Gas Pipeline Surveyor Jobs
For people who like to get some exercise while they work, getting a job as a natural gas pipeline surveyor may the perfect position.
Employees travel to different gas pipelines and walks the entire distance of the pipeline searching for leaks. This requires no prior experience.
These jobs are sometimes advertised as Field Survey Technician, Pipeline Surveyor, or Leak Surveyor, depending on the company.
Southern Cross Corporation offers these types of positions. See below for their job description.
Some RVing couples both work as field technicians and travel the country this way working together.
Employees walk up to 8 miles per day and work 40 hours a week.
The pay starts at about $11.50 per hour plus a $300 per week per diem, which is to help cover the cost of your campground. Most of the employers who offer these positions target RVers and provide mileage expenses for traveling in between sites.
Most of these employers provide excellent benefits, with health insurance and 401K benefits.
National Park Jobs
The National Park Service (NPS) employs thousands of people seasonally and year-round in our beautiful national parks.
Employees welcome and educate visitors, conduct research, protect our resources, keep our parks looking beautiful, and more.
Many of these positions are at locations with a limited number of full-hookup RV sites.
For example, seasonal employees at Glacier National Park have a number of RV sites available for employees to use. As you can imagine, these are popular sites, so it’s best to plan early.
The National Park Service posts all seasonal vacancies on USAJobs.gov.
Search “National Park Service” in the “Keywords” field. Then when you get the search results, select “More Filters” and check the box for “Seasonal.” The available seasonal NPS jobs will be displayed.
The NPS accepts applications for summer positions between October and February and for winter positions between July and August.
There are also different concessionaire organizations that run services in the parks, such as restaurants and lodging, that hire employees for seasonal work.
A good place to find these opportunities is to look at the Cool Works website. Cool Works is an excellent resource to find seasonal type jobs, and even has a section devoted to jobs with RV spaces.
Amazon CamperForce
Amazon hires RVers each holiday season to work in its fulfillment warehouses.
Seasonal employees are hired to fulfill picking, packing, stowing, and receiving positions for the vast amounts of goods that come and go from Amazon’s warehouses.
For the 2019 holiday season, Amazon CamperForce is hiring for positions in Kentucky, Tennessee, and Arizona.
The benefits of working as an Amazon CamperForce employee are a guaranteed minimum pay of $15 per hour plus overtime pay, 401K, and medical and prescription coverage after 90 days.
Amazon also pays partner campgrounds up to a $550 per month campground stipend for its CamperForce workers.
For more information, see the Amazon CamperForce website.
Adventureland Workamper Program
The Adventureland Resort near Des Moines, Iowa is a large outdoor amusement park featuring over 100 rides, shows, and attractions spread over 200 acres.
Each year, they serve well over 600,000 guests during their full operating season from mid-May to mid-August.
The resort has a workamper program that provides free RV full hookups for employees, as well as paying an hourly rate ($8.50/hour for 2019) for workampers who stay in their campground and also work on the resort.
Workampers are hired to work in jobs such as the rides, retail, food, games, and other departments.
Workampers do not need to commit to a contract to work the fulls season, but the resort offers incentives for employees who stay for the full season.
This includes a $0.75/hour bonus for every hour worked and an additional $400 per campsite.
Other Temporary On-Location Job Ideas
There are many other on-location workamper type jobs available to RVers that want to stay put in one location for a few weeks, months, or longer.
The samples above are just a selection of the types of opportunities available.
Other on location jobs that RVers report include:
- Campground host
- Mobile RV technician for experienced RV technicians
- Uber or Lyft driver (if you have a vehicle to use)
- Traveling nurse, physical therapist, or speech-language pathologist
- Construction worker
- Car driver for auto dealerships and auctions
- Mystery shopper
- River guide
- RV delivery driver
- Tour guides
There are all sort of jobs out there for working full- or part-time on site in different parts of the country.
You can plan to stay in the southern, warmer climates in the winter and move to the colder climates in the summer months. There are many opportunities to travel to different locations based on your schedule and interests.
Now Go Find That Remote Working Opportunity!
Whether you want to work a full-time remote job while traveling to different sites across the country or whether you want to stay in one place for a few months while workamping, there are many opportunities for you.
Make that dream of full-time RVing or living in your campervan a reality by finding work that suits your interests and lifestyle.