15 Things To Know Before Building A Skoolie School Bus Conversion

good morning on this wet and dreary Wednesday Tiffany and I have been talking a lot about some of the information that we wish we knew before we really started getting into the meat of converting the school bus what we're trying to do is make videos basically for our past self for people that could potentially be in the same position that we were in not that long ago so we're trying to be a resource in that way and we were thinking about some videos that we could potentially make and one of the things that came up was you know what are some of the things that we wish we knew or at least be aware of before converting your schooling so if you're anything like us these things will probably happen for you and that's okay but we've come up with 15 things that we wish we had known before we started building the school II so I thought further ado here they are number one you'll get overwhelmed guaranteed it's just going to happen even just looking for a bus to buy whether it's from a dealer or from an auction or anything along those lines you're you're gonna get overwhelmed but knowing that honestly kind of helps when you feel that happening you're like you know what it's okay we'll get past it especially if you're like us and you don't really have any experience doing this kind of thing whether it's buying the bus or construction or making some sometimes complex decisions you know so we got overwhelmed a lot and still are we're maybe 3/4 of the way through the build and we still get overwhelmed but we've learned how to adapt to that and we've started to recognize the signs of becoming overwhelmed and sort of pulling back a little bit before it becomes too much and we have to move away or or step away from it for too long so knowing that moving forward is definitely helpful number two you'll be spending way more on screws and nails and small pieces of hardware and and materials then you really thought that you probably would that has certainly happened with us I've developed a hatred for buying screws because what what happened to us initially we weren't very organized and we would buy screws and have them laying around everywhere all over the garage and stuff and then we couldn't find them when we needed them then we'd go out and buy more and then find the old ones later and fortunately we've pretty much used all of them up to this point so the ones that we've lost and found we've still been able to use so we're not just throwing away money but I hate buying screws i I just can't stand it anymore number three you will watch countless hours of YouTube videos just like this one it's definitely happened with us when whenever we get lost or start thinking about how some large project is gonna go we go to YouTube immediately we're definitely students of YouTube University and it's paid off for us pretty well YouTube's a great asset and the fact that there are so many people out there that are willing to share their processes and share their knowledge and information experiences that is HUGE so definitely take advantage of that but just know that you'll be going back to YouTube pretty frequently number four it'll probably take longer than you imagine it has taken us a lot longer now of course everybody's circumstances are completely different some people may have the ability to do nothing else except the build and then they're gonna be done a lot faster we had to continue working and we would run out of money run out of honestly motivation you know we would get we would get overwhelmed and we'd have to stop and move away just for the sake of our own sanity and that pushed the build back a little bit and so it is going to take a little around two years what we wanted to have done in one year or less so but that's okay two things happen but knowing that if you're if you're planning some time to build out a school and probably better to plan for just a little bit more time number five this is a hard one for me which sounds terrible you have to think for yourself there are a billion ways to solve one problem and when you you know you if you ask for advice or if you ask people about their opinions on how to solve a particular problem you'll get probably five different answers and the the right answer is the one that works for you not the one that works for someone else if somebody is suggesting something that doesn't make sense to you or you don't have the experience for it's okay not to take that advice it's okay to do the thing that you feel like is right and is gonna work for your needs specifically because your needs are different from anybody else's needs guaranteed that's been tough for me if I get somebody tells me that how you're doing something wrong I like I do soul-searching oh my gosh am i doing it wrong is this terrible should I do it their way and then I realized that you know what they may have good advice but ultimately what matters is my own decision and the decision that works for me and for our purposes so keeping that in mind and not getting too distracted I mean definitely ask for advice definitely listen to people but the buck stops with you and so you have to make that call number six you'll definitely be going to the hardware store like six billion times on days where we're working on the bus all day long I almost guaranteed go to Lowe's three different times that's for a variety of reasons it's either buying more screws or going and getting a fitting or an adapter that I had bought previously but was incorrect so I gotta return that go back and get the right one come back and maybe do that a couple more times so it's just part of it so yeah you'll be you'll you'll see we've know the people there and like we know the checkout people at Lowe's we've gotten really familiar with them so which is good it's just the thing though it's you have to you have to sort of understand going into it that you'll be you'll be at the supply places pretty often number seven you're gonna want to spend a lot of time working on the bus once you get in the bus and start making some progress and start to see things you know coming in the form it's really it's really exciting I read a book recently about motivation and in the book instead that you don't need motivation to get started you just need to get started and then motivation comes after small victories and that's you know 100% true like every little thing in the bus that we're doing every little finished surface or every large no noticeable difference or even small noticeable differences they make you want to keep going and they make you want to spend more time and do more for the bus which is fantastic but it's also sort of difficult when you have to do other things when you have to work and you have to have a work-life balance and and take care of chores and other things you want to be working in the bus all the time so prepping for that is it's nice number eight you'll build some incredible skills you know coming into this we didn't have any knowledge when it comes to woodworking or I mean honestly and and we we knew so little like we we had no concept of how to make cabinets how to make a table how to finish things how to you know make any sort of meaningful measurement and make two pieces fit together I mean that's just we didn't do that kind of stuff growing up we didn't we don't have that experience but doing this I mean half the reason why we wanted to do this ourselves is to build that experience and we're cert we're far from masters of any particular trade involved in this but man we know a hundred percent more than we did coming into it and that's valuable even if you sit on the sidelines watch someone else you'll be you'll be learning and you'll be able to understand how things fit together more after you're done with it then certainly when you first started number nine going hand-in-hand with eight you'll become more self-reliant honestly so when when you build out your bus and you're putting things together if you do the plumbing yourself if you build the cabinet's if you build tables things like that something happens to them something breaks or you want to add something later you don't necessarily have to ask someone to help you depending on the project you might be able to do it all yourself whereas before you may not have been able to do that so building to school yourself and even especially if you don't have any experience means that you can redo it again later and you that knowledge and you have that ability instead of having to ask a friend or pay someone to do it for you number 10 you'll meet new people we've had so many people just walk by the bus and want to talk to us they want to know what we're doing they want to know and and tell us how interested they are and how they wish they had done something similar to that when they were our age it's nice we've been able to have conversations with people and meet people that we would not have had those conversations with before and hearing their experiences and hearing their recommendations like oh this is great but you know would be really cool if you did something like that that we would have never thought of so you know doing the build yourself and getting that kind of feedback is very cool you make some connections that way number eleven you will overcome some seriously difficult mental and physical obstacles again you know coming from you know very little experience in terms of woodworking or building furniture we we ran into a lot of and are running into a lot of times where we don't know how to proceed we don't know how to make a decision that is the correct decision that will work for us and that also looks good and fits in with everything else but when you do make those decisions and you do go past whatever thing was blocking your white cat it feels good overcoming that is wonderful it's a great feeling number 12 you might want the build to be done with ASAP you know you may want to be completely finished with it and get on the road as soon as possible and that and that's been us to a certain degree but you know Tiffany had a great point the other day that you know this process it's taken a year and a half at this point it's a significant time in our lives it's something that you know we'll look back on and we'll remember building this we'll remember learning the things that we learned in order to make this happen and all of the struggles and all of the frustration but also all of the triumphs and the achievements and the small little victories those are those are important and it's I think it's a good idea to appreciate that and be in the moment and not just want it to be over with because you'll likely reflect fondly on it later so enjoy it enjoy the build enjoy the frustration enjoy the that's number 13 you're gonna learn some new things about yourself and if you're building it with your significant other you're gonna learn a lot of stuff about your significant other - Tiffany and I Tiffany and I have learned a lot about each other which is a good thing we've been married for I guess six years and we were we've been dating since middle school so we felt like we knew each other coming into this pretty well but as soon as we started doing this build and we started solving problems together we would both be working on one solution and oh my gosh we have totally different ways of solving the same problem and and we've even found that describing our solutions to one another can be really difficult it's we just we have very different ways of thinking about problem-solving and that's fine we've we know that now before it led to some conflict before it would be frustrating because I wouldn't be able to communicate to her my ideas and sometimes she wouldn't be able to communicate to me her ideas and that can lead to a lot conflict but we've figured that out and so now we still work together on a lot of projects but we have taken more of an individualized approach to different things so Tiffany will have a certain project that she's working on and I'll be working on a different project in the bus same day things tend to happen faster we get finished sooner and there's less conflict and because really you know we don't have to ask the other person every two seconds like what you think about this what do you think about that you know there's there's definitely the risk and we run into it all the time of paralysis by analysis and you think of how many billions of ways this one thing could could work and after a while you can't decide and nothing happens and we found that that would happen more often when we would work together on the same project but by working on separate projects and still communicating but different projects we we don't run into that as often and things get done faster and a much more sort of enjoyable and smooth more smoothly than if we were working on it and 14 you'll be proud of every little thing that happens especially again if you're if you are like us and are coming from a point of almost zero knowledge when it comes to this kind of work then you're gonna be really proud of every little thing that you get done every noticeable you know I mean even just in the very beginning getting the first seed out getting a row of seats out you know painting the floor getting the rust on each little thing builds on the next and it's it makes it more fun and you know that motivation comes from those little small steps those small victories you get one small victory and then you want that next victory and so on and so forth and then after a while you look back to where you came from and we'll we count you've come a long way it doesn't even have to be good like so many of the things in here are just I mean any any carpenter would come in and just shake their head and walk out and cry a little bit because there's not a straight line in here there's nothing T's up there's no nothing's plumb but it works and we did it and we're proud of that and so there's something wonderful about that lastly number fifteen and possibly the most important part of this little series is that you will find yourself in a community of extraordinarily kind interesting and helpful people we've been really impressed with the willingness of others in this community that are doing the same thing in the van life community too that they're willing to provide knowledge they're willing to provide advice there's you know you can it feels like there's always someone there that you can ask a question to and they'll be there to answer or at least provide some sort of moral support or whatever it may be but that's really valuable because this can be a really scary thing depending on your circumstances depending on if you're leaving everything if you're doing this alone if we've talked to a few people recently that are doing this that are thinking about coming from the UK over to the States I mean I I can't imagine what that would be like on my end if I was thinking through that process that's terrifying but knowing that there are people around that are willing to listen and willing to provide support and because we're all sort of in this thing together so it's a great thing it's a good good feeling so being in that kind of community is fantastic so those are 15 things that we wish we knew and we started our build certainly the fact that we didn't know them didn't hurt us really but it's good to know and so you know things things to expect things to look out for while you're just beginning to build hopefully you can find this helpful for those of you that are just starting to build out again you know a lot of these things will be mitigated by different people's experiences if you already have a lot of woodworking skills or you've done something like even somewhat similarly to this before you're going to have a lot easier time than we did but there are a lot of people out there that are looking to make a build like this that that have no experience and that was us so this videos for you guys we really appreciate you watching if you enjoyed this video and our others please like and subscribe it helps the channel out a ton we love to read your comments so please do leave one at the bottom we also wanted to mention that we're gonna be part of the Colorado tiny house festival will be there exhibiting our build and hopefully getting a few things finished before that but that's on June 22nd in Brighton Colorado so if you're in the area you guys come out and see the other builders the other DIY builders the other tiny homes out there it's gonna be really really cool and we're super pumped to be a part of it thanks guys we'll see out there [Music]

Channel: Rolling Vistas

Views: 334,785

Keywords: school bus, skoolie, bus conversion, tiny home, tiny house, tiny living, minimalism, travel, RV, tiny home on wheels, colorado, school bus conversion, Build it yourself, transformation, Before you skoolie, cabin, cabinvibes, Colorado tiny house festival

Id: V9tZ0zzHYrs

Length: 17min 1sec (1021 seconds)

Published: Wed May 02 2018