One time a policeman in Eugene Oregon came to my door in the late morning to tell me I couldn't park on the street beside the Walmart. He wouldn't have been there if not for the trash heap of an RV parked at the end of the street where the people had unpacked a ton of junk and left it on the grass between the sidewalk and street. Somehow those jerks felt it was OK to do that while their twenty year old Class A heap was parked there. Such people give people like me a bad name.
In Helena, Butte, Hollywood, Portland, and Monroe I was never bothered because I was hidden. I didn't hang out outside of the van. I didn't step into or out of the van side door if anybody was around. Most of the windows were painted black on the inside. They looked tinted from a distance. Light couldn't penetrate them. A thick black vinyl curtain separated the front seats from the rear of the van. Nobody knew I was there.
One Thanksgiving some people were going around bringing food to people living openly in their junky looking vehicles. Mine was one car behind a van with a high top roof. Those charitable people didn't come to my van because I was invisible. Even though they were living in that neighborhood and were familiar with the others parked on that street they didn't know I too was living on that street. I was very stealthy.
I stayed in my minivan for a little over two years. I worked in Hollywood for many months. Then tried Portland for a couple of months. From there I got a temporary job in Monroe Washington and remained there for three weeks before heading to Portland and then back to Hollywood. I got a job and would still be there if I could have bought a newer van. Unfortunately I couldn't prove I had a residence. Which meant I couldn't get car insurance. So the deal for the van I was intending to buy couldn't be completed.
The old van was dying so I quit my job and sold it. Living in Hollywood would have been too expensive in an apartment. So I returned home to Helena Montana to live in an uncluttered quiet safe place. I can go months without hearing any kind of siren. It's beautiful too. Plus the government isn't as insane as the one in California.
It is my hope that in a month or two I'll be able to switch to a more lucrative job and save enough money to buy a small RV trailer which will become my next home. Where it will be parked is unknown. An RV park would give me power, water, and internet. I really love having those things at hand, but; I could do without them just as I did while living in the minivan. It would just require more effort and planning.
I like living simply in my rented bedroom. A small RV trailer would be a little smaller than my room but it would have everything needed to live plus it would be mine. Nobody could tell me I had to vacate it because they wanted the space for a relative to move in. That has happened to me twice.
Living simply in my case means I can move on a moments notice. With an RV trailer as a home I could leave in the time it would take to unplug everything, put things on the counter tops into boxes on the floor, and attach it to an SUV or truck. In a few days I could be in any part of the country. The simpler life is the more freedom I have. It's great.