Sorry a little late to this party, but will throw in some of my own experiences.
I don't own a truck and don't really have a need for one, besides, I need seating for 6 people, three people over 5' and the rest under 4'. So TT and 5ers are out of the question for us.
First step above a Tent was a PopUp for us, less expensive and we could shove it in out garage (barely) to keep the HOA gremlins at bay. Chasing three curious active kids while trying to set up and tear down got to be too much so we started looking for a motorhome.
Few Class As that we found then or later have the ability to sleep four or five people (comfortably) while rollling down the road, so a Class C was our only option. What I have found is that today more Class A's are offering a bed above the driver area, but that bed cannot be used while operating the rig. Also just about 80% of those slide down beds had some sort of malfunction or broken mechanism on the lots. If it cannot survive the lot lizards for basic operations then it is not gonna survive a tired adult trying to deploy the bed after a long day...
Looking at the Class C's all manufacturers seem to have a Plymouth and Chrysler version of nearly every floor plan. For jayco, Redhawk is their Plymouth line of value RVs and the GreyHawk is their Chrysler equivalent. For FR, think Sunseeker and Forester in a similar manner.
Towing - whether flat towing or not the general price for new gear is around 2k. A lot of front wheel drive cars cannot be flat towed and will require a dolly. The Acme Dolly with surge powered disc brakes is like $1500.
Our first Class C was a Sprinter based unit which gets fabulous MPGs at around 13MPG. BUT the sprinter platform is usually limited to a total length of 25'. One thing we learned was that having two fuels needed to keep the whole vehicle running, Diesel for getting places and then propane for the Generator, is a real pain. Try to find propane on a sunday afternoon when the generator stops running..... Now I am learning that at least I never had to worry about the carberator becoming gummed up(varnished).
Anyway those are some of the things that led us to what we have now. We are still getting used to its quirks and the added space we now have.
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Carl & Dawn
2015 Greyhawk 31FS (with 4x4 conversion by Ujoint Offroad)
2012 Lincoln MKZ Hybrid (our TOAD on a DEMCO Dolly)
DW, DSx2, DDx2 Catx2 Dog
Tampa Bay Area of FL
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