We Are Storing Our RV In Florida For Summer, What Should We Do To Get It Ready For Storage?

by Judy
(Florida)

We're leaving to go back home & I want to know what I should do to the inside & outside of my rv before we leave. We won't be back for 9 months.

ANSWER Greetings Judy thanks for submitting your question on our Ask An RV Question Page.

Here is some information you need to know for setting up your RV for storage. Yours is a unique situation in that you are going to store your RV in Florida during the summer months. Since you do not state whether you have a motorhome or trailer, I can only give you general suggestions. I am going to assume from this point on that you are going to storing the RV outside and that the RV will not be connected to electricity while in storage.

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The first thing you need to do is drain all of the holding tanks. The grey and black water tanks should be completely empty. You also need to completely empty the freshwater tank. If you leave any water in the freshwater tank, it will develop all kinds of algaes that will be hard to get rid of when you are ready to start camping again.

If you do not have an RV Cover available to you; you need to make sure that all tires are covered to protect them from the sun by using tire protector covers. The sun accelerates tire deterioration. If your motorhome or RV does not have these tire protectors you can purchase them through the EARV Camping and RVing Accessories Store just type in "Tire Protectors" (without the quotations) in the search box in the upper right hand corner of our store to see what we carry. We also carry RV covers if you are interested.


If it is a motorhome, you should also make sure that you have some sort of cover over the windshield. If you have leveling jacks on your RV, they should be down during storage. If your RV is being stored on grass or dirt, you
should also use jack pads under the leveling jacks so they do not sink into the ground.

One problem with storing a Gas or Diesel motorhome for longer than a month is that the fuel starts to deteriorate and could gum up your engine. So I would recommend that you put a product such as Sta-Bil Fuel Stabilizer in your motorhomes fuel tank. Sta-Bil works for either Gas or Diesel engines and keeps the fuel from causing problems during storage.

Make sure that your propane system is shut off at the propane tank and that all appliances in the RV are shut off.

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Now let's talk about the RV batteries. Since I am assuming that you will not have the RV hooked up to electric during storage, you are going to have to deal with the batteries. Unless your RV is equipped with a solar charging system, your batteries will be dead when you return. Some people remove the batteries from their RVs completely and store them elsewhere; others just turn off the battery kill switches located in their RVs. You have to choose the method that works best for you.

Let's talk a little bit about the interior of the RV. One of the things I recommend to do is to clean out the interior of the RV completely, leave the fridge doors open with a box of baking soda in the fridge and freezer. So I do not have to reinvent the wheel here, I am going to refer you to this question I recently answered Tips for Florida RV Summer Storage which will outline what should be done to the inside of the RV to keep it mold and insect free.

Hopefully this information has been helpful to you. If any of our visitors would like to share some additional tips with you they can do so by clicking on the add a comment link located near the bottom of this page.

Happy RVing

RVing Al

Comments for We Are Storing Our RV In Florida For Summer, What Should We Do To Get It Ready For Storage?

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RV storage
by: Anonymous

When storing travel trailer should i leave the vent open?

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Covering , do I or don't i
by: MikeAnonymous

I would like to know whether or not to cover I here pros and cons people say the cover will cause mold inside and out also chaf the paint from high winds we covered our fifth wheel from November to January 20 all seemed ok but we are very worried about leaving it covered from mid April till November . We bought an account designer cover supposed to be the best for all seasons, please advise us thanks

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