Buying a travel trailer - advice please

Ok I had to see why this just popped up in my subscriptions and I guess I started watching this because at the time my wife told me she wanted to look at trailers. Fast forward 6 weeks and this happened. A Sportsmen 180BH.

We also got a bunk house because we can sleep 4 without rearranging anything. We have a much lower towing capacity of 4,500 and wanted to stay near 3,500 GVWR. We looked at one with a slide out for the dinet but the on the ground dry weight was over 3,000 with the same 3,500 gross weight this one has a 2750 dry weight even with all the goodies like larger fridge and AC unit.

Its really only my wife an I but my adult sons are still sort of in the picture. We have a trip planed for next week to Cincinnati to see my BIL and one in June for a few days longer to visit son 2 in NY.

https://www.kz-rv.com/products/sportsmen-classic-travel-trailers/180BH.html

The Jay Flight SLX is pretty much the same as ours but with 4 people you will be at each others throats quickly. We have had 3 adults in it as we load things in and its tight. We would have loved the slide out but again didn't like the weight penalty.
 

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Oh my sister bought the big brother to this trailer last fall, dual axle, slide out and bunk house, and she planning a trip to the Fort next summer. If we can swing it I would love to also go, maybe even not go to the parks maybe just US.
 
@chartle That is a snazzy camper! Congrats on your new home-away-from-home. We have 2 small kids so bunks are a must.... What sold me on the Rockwood was the murphy bed layout. Having that space with the bed up, but then not having to make the bed at night... Genius. We are also weight-limited as I'm sure you've seen in my previous posts, but I think we can go just a bit bigger than the 18 footer.
 
@chartle That is a snazzy camper! Congrats on your new home-away-from-home. We have 2 small kids so bunks are a must.... What sold me on the Rockwood was the murphy bed layout. Having that space with the bed up, but then not having to make the bed at night... Genius. We are also weight-limited as I'm sure you've seen in my previous posts, but I think we can go just a bit bigger than the 18 footer.

Yes i saw you can go much higher and I just didn't want to read all those posts with all that weight math, but just be aware that for a lot of trucks you run out of payload before pulling weight.

Someone on a face book Page, RV Newbies you should join, just bought a really expensive fully decked out truck just for towing. Its pulling spec was something like 12,000 lbs really beefy. Well he looked at his payout sticker and he could put a whopping 1,450 lbs of cargo in it. He was going by the website not the sticker on the door. With everyone in the truck and the WD hitch and the tongue weight of the trailer thats 60% of his max pulling spec he was over 150 lbs over weight. but you should be able to pull a 200 level trailer just don't believe what a trailer sales person tells you they will only talk dry weight.

ETA: i see most of what I posted was covered in prior posts. But you should be able to do a lighter 2 axle trailer.
 
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@chartle That is a snazzy camper! Congrats on your new home-away-from-home. We have 2 small kids so bunks are a must.... What sold me on the Rockwood was the murphy bed layout. Having that space with the bed up, but then not having to make the bed at night... Genius. We are also weight-limited as I'm sure you've seen in my previous posts, but I think we can go just a bit bigger than the 18 footer.

You will love the Rockwood. We have it's twin sister the Flagstaff Micro Lite. It also has the Murphy bed and twin layout. The murphy bed gives you so much extra space. From all the ones we looked at, theses two brands from Forest River seemed the best well made. The are light weight, short (under 27' total) but also have so many extras included. We love ours and have had no issues. Good luck and happy camping.
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