What Are the Biggest Operating Expenses at an RV Park?

August 27, 2026 · RV park investing, explained

Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

People sanity-checking an RV park pro forma usually import assumptions from an asset class they already know, like apartments or hotels. That's a reasonable starting point, but RV parks have a different cost structure. The line items that dominate a multifamily budget aren't always the ones that dominate here, and the reverse is true too. That mismatch is where most of the confusion comes from.

"Payroll is the biggest expense, just like an apartment building"

In multifamily, payroll is often the single largest operating line. At an RV park, it can be, but it often isn't, and the range is wide. A small owner-operated park with 40 sites might run with one or two people and payroll under 15% of revenue. A larger resort-style park with a pool, activities, a store, and seasonal staff can push payroll well past 20-25% of revenue. The kernel of truth in the myth is that labor is real and it scales with amenities. A park that markets itself as a destination with programming and guest services will carry a payroll line closer to a hotel than to a bare-bones campground. The mistake is assuming a fixed percentage before you know the staffing model.

"Utilities are basically a rounding error"

This one is common because people picture a campground as a simple product: gravel, water hookup, electric hookup, done. In practice, utilities are one of the categories most likely to blow up a pro forma. Water and sewer costs have been rising in a lot of municipalities, and if the park isn't submetering electric to each site, the owner is paying for every guest's air conditioner and RV battery charger directly. Depending on climate, site count, and whether utilities are submetered, this line can land anywhere from roughly 8% to 20% of revenue. Parks on well and septic have different exposure, mostly maintenance and eventual system replacement, rather than a monthly bill, but that's not free either. The honest takeaway is that utilities deserve their own line-by-line review, not a percentage pulled from a template.

"Insurance is a small, fixed cost you can basically ignore"

This used to be closer to true. It isn't anymore in a lot of markets. Property insurance costs for RV parks and other outdoor hospitality assets have climbed meaningfully in recent years, especially for properties in flood zones, wildfire-exposed areas, or regions with frequent severe weather. It's not unusual for insurance to have doubled or more over a several-year hold in some of these areas. The myth persists because older pro formas and older sellers are quoting premiums from a few years back. When you underwrite a deal today, get a current quote, not a trailing twelve-month number from the seller's old policy. Assuming insurance stays flat is one of the more common ways buyers underprice risk.

What actually matters instead

Rather than memorizing which line item is "the biggest," the more useful habit is understanding the total expense ratio and where it's likely to move. RV parks generally run lower total operating expense ratios than apartments, often somewhere in the 35% to 45% of revenue range, versus 45% to 55% or higher for multifamily. That gap is a real structural advantage of the asset class, but it only holds if the specific park's expenses are actually in that range, and plenty aren't.

A few things worth checking on any specific deal, in this order:

• Get twelve to twenty-four months of actual utility bills, not an estimate, and check whether electric is submetered.
• Get a current insurance quote in the buyer's name, not the seller's expiring policy, especially in flood or wildfire zones.
• Understand the staffing model as it exists today and what it would take to run the park the way you intend to run it, not the way the seller has been running it.
• Separate recurring repairs and maintenance from deferred capital projects. A seller's low R&M line sometimes just means deferred maintenance that's about to become your problem.
• Check property tax history for pending reassessments, which are common right after a sale closes at a higher price than the prior assessed value.

None of these require special expertise to check. They just require pulling actual documents instead of trusting a percentage on a spreadsheet. That's most of what separates a pro forma that holds up from one that doesn't.

At Invest With Zac, this is the kind of line-by-line underwriting we walk through with investors before any capital moves, because the difference between a good deal and a bad one is usually sitting in these expense assumptions, not in the headline cap rate.