01 What Salem Villa is
These are destination trailers - towed to a seasonal site, levelled, and largely left there - and the numbers only make sense read that way. Fourteen floorplans run 9,234 to 14,404 lb dry against cargo capacity of just 886 to 2,446 lb. On a touring trailer that ratio would be a warning; here it is the design, because the trailer is not being loaded for a trip. What it does mean is that the fit-out a seasonal site accumulates eats the margin quickly, and 886 lb is not much once a screen room, a grill and a season of furniture are aboard. All fourteen are bumper pull, with 1,260 to 1,855 lb on the tongue - a three-quarter-ton or one-ton conversation for a tow most owners make twice a year, which is why so many of these are delivered rather than towed by the buyer. Forest River splits the roster into a standard group and a Grand group, and the split is real: the six Grand plans start at 12,209 lb dry where the six standard plans start at 9,234 lb. Fresh water is 39 to 40 gallons across the whole roster, which is a plumbed-site number rather than a boondocking one and tells you plainly what these are for.
Across the whole Salem Villa roster the published dry weights run from 9,234 lbs to 14,404 lbs, cargo capacities from 886 lbs to 2,446 lbs, and dry tongue weights from 1,260 lbs to 1,855 lbs. Exterior lengths run 37 to 45 feet. Those are Forest River's figures for a standard build, captured from the factory roster block and confirmed against each floorplan's own factory page.
There is one thing to know before comparing Salem Villa against anything else: Forest River publishes no GVWR for this line. Dry weight, cargo capacity and dry tongue weight are published for every floorplan; the loaded rating is not. The factory's own glossary defines cargo capacity as GVWR minus unloaded weight, so the rating can be worked out - and a figure worked out is not a figure the manufacturer published, so this site does not print one as though it were. The weight label on the trailer itself carries the real number.
02 Floorplans profiled in depth
12 of the 14 Salem Villa floorplans are profiled in full below, each on its own page with the complete factory weight, dimension and tank block. The profiled set is spread across the weight range rather than taken from one end of it, so the lightest and heaviest plans in the line are both represented. Every plan profiled here publishes a full field set and, where Forest River publishes a GVWR, passes the dry-plus-cargo arithmetic check.
| Floorplan | Dry wt | Length | Cargo | Tongue wt | Factory grouping |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 353FLFB | 9,234 | 37' 9" | 2,301 | 1,335 | Salem Villa |
| 40FDEN | 10,574 | 42' 5" | 886 | 1,260 | Salem Villa |
| 42DMS | 11,484 | 43' 10" | 1,991 | 1,475 | Salem Villa |
| 40RLB | 11,604 | 43' 0" | 1,841 | 1,445 | Salem Villa |
| 42QBQ | 12,029 | 42' 4" | 1,336 | 1,365 | Salem Villa |
| 42FLDL | 12,209 | 41' 7" | 1,511 | 1,720 | Salem Grand Villa |
| 40FKP | 12,269 | 43' 3" | 2,000 | 1,585 | Salem Grand Villa |
| 42DL | 12,719 | 41' 10" | 1,136 | 1,855 | Salem Grand Villa |
| 40ZZZ | 13,694 | 45' 0" | 2,000 | 1,480 | Salem Villa |
| 42ICE | 13,749 | 45' 0" | 1,996 | 1,745 | Salem Grand Villa |
| 44ZEN | 14,309 | 44' 11" | 1,891 | 1,605 | Salem Grand Villa |
| 42ZEN | 14,404 | 44' 11" | 2,400 | 1,485 | Salem Grand Villa |
Every figure in this table is a Forest River factory publication for 2026, captured twice - from the line roster block and from each floorplan's own factory page - and cross-checked field by field. Forest River publishes no sleeping capacity, axle count, tire size or MSRP for this line, so there are no columns for them.
03 Also in the 2026 line
The remaining 2 Salem Villa floorplans are catalogued here from the factory's published figures. 2 of them are Forest River dealer-stock-only plans, which are real floorplans but are not orderable through the normal channel. A plan is catalogued rather than profiled when the factory has not yet published its full field set, when its own published figures disagree with each other, or simply because the profiled set is capped. Nothing in this table is estimated.
| Floorplan | Dry wt | GVWR | Cargo | Tongue wt | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 42FK (dealer stock) | 12,469 | Not published | 1,311 | 1,780 | Dealer stock only |
| 42VERANDA (dealer stock) | 13,754 | Not published | 2,446 | 1,815 | Dealer stock only |
Catalogued plans carry the factory figures Forest River publishes and nothing else. A row reading “Not published” means the factory does not publish that field for that plan - it is never a placeholder for a figure this site could not be bothered to find.
04 How to choose
Sort this line by the constraint you actually have. If the tow vehicle is fixed, start at the weight column: the lightest plan in the roster is the 353FLFB at 9,234 lbs dry and the heaviest is the 42ZEN at 14,404 lbs, and that spread is wide enough that the two ends are not the same buying decision. If the tow vehicle is not fixed, sort by cargo capacity instead - the 42VERANDA - DSO carries the most at 2,446 lbs, and payload is the number that runs out first on a long trip.
Do not sort by floorplan number. Forest River's codes encode length loosely and layout not at all, and this site does not decode them into layout claims. Two plans with adjacent numbers in this roster can differ by hundreds of pounds of dry weight and by more than that in dry tongue weight, which is the figure that determines what the tow vehicle has to be.
Where Forest River publishes a floorplan description it is quoted on the plan page and identified as factory marketing copy rather than a specification. Where it publishes none, the plan page says so instead of describing a layout that nobody has verified. That is the difference between a catalogue and a brochure.
05 What to weigh before buying
What this line is
Forest River publishes this roster under four names on two factory line pages: Salem Villa and Salem Grand Villa on one, Wildwood Lodge and Wildwood Grand Lodge on the other. The two pages carry the same fourteen floorplan codes and the same specifications - 231 non-null published fields on each side, and the only differences across all fourteen plans are five floorplan description sentences that differ because each names its own badge. That is the same east/west twin naming already reflected in this reference's merged Salem and Wildwood hubs, so this line is catalogued once under all four names rather than twice. Forest River publishes no GVWR for any of the fourteen, so the loaded rating row reads not published rather than showing dry weight plus cargo capacity added together - that sum is an inference, not a rating, and a trailer's real limit can sit below it. Twelve plans are profiled; two, 42FK and 42VERANDA, are marked dealer stock only by the factory and are catalogued with their weights instead. Floorplan descriptions are published for 7 of the 14. Sleeping capacity, axle count, tire size and MSRP are not published in this channel.
Five fields Forest River does not publish, and GVWR is one of them
Sleeping capacity, axle count, tire size, MSRP and GVWR are all absent from Forest River's specification channel for Salem Villa. The GVWR absence is the unusual one and it is not an omission on this page: the factory spec block runs tongue weight, unloaded weight, cargo capacity, dimensions and tanks, and stops. Any GVWR you see quoted for a Salem Villa came from somewhere other than Forest River's own channel.
Match the tow vehicle honestly
The plans here run from 9,234 lbs to 14,404 lbs dry with dry tongue weights of 1,260 lbs to 1,855 lbs. Dry weight is not towing weight - water, batteries, propane, gear and dealer-installed accessories all sit on top of it, and tongue weight rises with them. Forest River's own footnote calls unloaded weight an estimated average for a standard build. Read your own door sticker rather than a brochure maximum, and weigh the trailer loaded the way you actually travel.