How can you tell a FEMA trailer ?

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eliallen

eliallen

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Joined
Oct 19, 2010
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It appears that a lot of FEMA trailers are on the market. Are dealers required to tell you? I want to stay away from a them.
 
Many of the FEMA trailers were made without holding tanks and were intended for use on a fixed site with sewer and water connections.  They were not made for over the road use.  If they are true travel trailers, I don't know of any way to tell if they were made for FEMA but they would be look like any other trailer of that brand.
 
I guess I have missed somthing.  What difference does it make if the trailer was baught bythe government (FEMA) or a private individual?
 
FEMA wrote construction specs for their purchase and did not specify anything "Recreational". They were just looking for fast, cheap, housing. As Ned said, they mostly did not include any self-containment features, like battery systems, holding tanks, etc. The bottom line is that the FEMA trailers are not RVs - just small, movable housing.
 
Early on the FEMA trailers were self contained, these typically had no decals and not many windows.  When I was at Lazy Days we bought a bunch of these.  They sold like crazy, but these were functional for over the road RV-ing.  Heck we even had lightly used class C's.  These had been used by FEMA, not victims.  Never cooked in, just slept and bath use. 

Could not be told frm another.
 
This caught my attention.
http://www.rvforum.net/SMF_forum/index.php?topic=12509.msg115915;topicseen#msg115915
 
Early FEMA units were whatever the manufacturers or dealers had available for quick delivery. It was an emergency, right? Later units were mass-produced as quickly and as cheaply as possible to meet the needs.
 
I read somewhere that the formaldehyde problem in the FEMA trailers wasn't so much from the adhesives, but the materials used inside.  FEMA's massive order depleted the stock of low formaldehyde interior grade panel board, so the manufacturers used whatever was available and a lot of that was the higher formaldehyde content exterior board.
 
I just placed 15 park model FEMA trailers on the reservation. Every one of them had a tag on the frame under the left front of the trailer that read FEMA 34 foot.
These obviously were built for FEMA for the golf coast. After their intended use there they were sold to GSA. The tribe bought them from there. Some of the natives called them chicken coops, but a local pastor said they were much better than a South Dakota snow bank.
 
eliallen said:
It appears that a lot of FEMA trailers are on the market. Are dealers required to tell you? I want to stay away from a them.
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they have hookups for mustard gas don't buy them.
On a serious note, I would stay away from them and I just got in to rv'ing unintentionally....
 
I would like to weigh in on the other side of this. I bought a FEMA trailer last year and have gotten a lot of use out of it. I could not afford to spend $10-15,000 on a camper. I found a brand new, never lived in 32' Gulf Stream Cavalier and bought it for $3400. It had everything a normal RV has with the exception of the holding tanks. I bought a 32 gallon tote tank. I added 2 6volt deep cycle batteries and bought an el cheapo generator at wally world. This camper might not be for everyone but for me it has been perfect. Some may look down on my solid white box on wheels but personally I could care less what other people think. It keeps me cool on those hot days and warm on those cold nights.
 
I am not looking down at the FEMA trailers. I buy what I like and not what other people like.  At the time of my post I was looking for a trailer in that price range, my wife found them in Mississippi.  I found this on another post here...
".I can tell you from experience that the levels of formaldyhe in the FEMA trailers is dangerously high. Last April, I went on a mission trip with my church to Mississippi. We worked on a guys' house who allowed us to cool off and use the bathroom in his FEMA trailer. As soon as I walked in the door, my eyes began to burn and tear, then my nose began to burn and run. I literally could not stand it inside the trailer. And these weren't mild symptoms, they were pretty severe. The next morning when I woke up, my eyelids were swollen and red. The air conditioning was on in the camper, and I know that is supposed to make the formaldahyde less noticable, at least it does in my camper. But it was bad. And I started wondering how people could actually live in these trailers for months or even yrs. I've heard of law suits against FEMA due to lung and other illnesses they say were caused by this. I believe it.  It was so bad that I started closing my eyes and feeling my way to the bathroom, and there was no cooling off in there for me. I think FEMA didn't put much thought into long term use of these trailers, and wonder if they would let their families live in them. I think it was probably a good thing that so many of them sat unused for so long."
 
I read the same story before I bought mine. I know some people will be more sensitive to this type of things than others.  I think the problem was when they first came out the trailers did not have the normal idle time since they were built and shipped very quickly. This idle time that normal trailers have lets the unit cure and makes the fumes much less. I bought mine in 2009, so it had been sitting for 3 yrs in Alabama. I have not had any kind of trouble with smell or irritating odors. When I first bought it I cranked the heat up and tried to cure it as much as possible before I used it. For the price I couldn't have gotten anything near as nice.
 
Hi, in July I got a Caviler trailer to live in. It's a 2006. Picked it out of 40 of them. It's nice and not as nice as the Motor Home I had to sell, It's a nice place for me and my little dog. Hardly lived in and closed up for years there was an odor like a new place has. Drove , er pulled it off the lot for 3995. even. All these horror stories is just silly. For less than 4000.00 it's a great buy. It's strong enough to be towed, and when traveling will hook up to any rv park. The A/C is wonderful, a normal size refrigerator and all the comforts of home. In this case don't believe all you read. The A/c Heater Thermostat went out, but that could happen on a 100,000. Motor coach.  I out of choice have lived in RV's most of my adult life. Your neighbors are better, and If you get tired of the view, hook up and be gone in an hour or less. 8)
 
Nice explanation of the RVIA sticker, but not sure the FEMA trailers would not have it.  Plus if they don't have it doesn't signify that it doesn't meet these standards. 
 
PancakeBill said:
Nice explanation of the RVIA sticker, but not sure the FEMA trailers would not have it.  Plus if they don't have it doesn't signify that it doesn't meet these standards.
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I was a little too inclusive. FEMA did buy some existing stock from dealers and companies and those have the seal and meet RVIA specifications.  FEMA had its own specifications (as any government contract normally would) and these did not meet RVIA standards as far as I know.
 
They may still meet RVIA, the sticker has to be bought and displayed by RV dealers.  When you buy a new RV you will see a lime item for the sticker.  The feds didn't need the sticker.  I don't have the list of what is required.  Some of the FEMA trailers had no tanks, being made ready to just hook up to lines, but this ought to be pretty obvious to anyone looking.  Not all were set this way though, I think there were a few different 'standards' they needed to conform to.
 
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