buying holiday homes as main residence

sparkle83

I hope this doesnt sound really stupid.

Can you buy (with a mortgage) a chalet/mobile home on a holiday park? Even if you also have to pay ground rent? What does 10 month holiday occupancy refer to (is it that your property could only be used for 10 months, or for holidays only, or that for 2 months there'd be no holiday makers on site?)

Also, if you bought a small plot of land, could you then buy a caravan/huge tent and live on it?

I'm really sorry these are such dumb questions, but I couldnt think of anywhere else to ask.

seven-day-weekend

AFAIK, ten months occupancy means that for two months of the year it must be empty. This is so that people do not live in them full time.

Having said that, I knew someone who lived in her holiday caravan for the ten months and then at her daughter's for the other two, she classed the caravan as her main home

As to whether you can have a mortgage on them I'm afraid I don't know, but it might be possible to get a bank loan if a mortgage is innappropriate.

If you bought a plot of land to live on, whether it be tent or caravan, it would almost certainly need Planning Permission for change of use from whatever it was (pasture? industrial?) to residential - and then maybe a further Permission to site the caravan.

Think this is correct and hope it helps.

(Edited to add - I see on your other thread that you say that may have to camp in a tent in your mum's garden. This would not need any permission other than from your mum! It would just be classed as auxilliary to the main house and would just be like having another bedroom (I assume you will not have extra mains services connected).

sparkle83

so chalets/moble homes that dont have 10 month occupancy could be lived in right through the year?

seven-day-weekend

You would have to check the lease, I'm sure they all differ and there may be other restrictions to prevent it becoming a permanent home.

I would advise that you take legal advice if you are not sure.

guppy

sparkle83 wrote: »

I hope this doesnt sound really stupid.

Can you buy (with a mortgage) a chalet/mobile home on a holiday park?

You wouldn't get a mortgage on one of these - the low value of them reflects the fact that you can't live in it like a normal home.

I would also imagine that when you "buy" one of these, its not freehold or even on a proper lease. Rather it will be on some sort of private agreement between you and the site owner, which will no doubt be highly restrictive and grant you few rights.

zzzLazyDaisy

If you decide to go ahead with this type of purchase, do check the site requirements very carefully. Some sites stipulate that if you decide to sell, you must sell back to them, which means they also dictate the price.

Also, some sites state that you can only have caravans up to a certain age, so you could find yourself homeless 10 years down the line (or whatever age the site says)

sparkle83

I had a feeling that would probably be the case

PasturesNew

sparkle83 wrote: »

I hope this doesnt sound really stupid.

Can you buy (with a mortgage) a chalet/mobile home on a holiday park? Even if you also have to pay ground rent? What does 10 month holiday occupancy refer to (is it that your property could only be used for 10 months, or for holidays only, or that for 2 months there'd be no holiday makers on site?)

Also, if you bought a small plot of land, could you then buy a caravan/huge tent and live on it?

I'm really sorry these are such dumb questions, but I couldnt think of anywhere else to ask.

No
1] You won't get a mortgage on it, you need a personal loan, which usually has a minimum of 20% deposit.
2] The site will usually have criteria such as having to provide evidence of a main address every year - plus - you can't receive mail there.
3] Yes, you still pay ground rent and maintenan ce and council tax - and probably for on-site facilities whether you use them or not.
4] 10 months usually means the front gates are locked, all the power/water to the site are turned off and there is no access whatsoever.
5] If you buy land you would need to obtain full planning permission on it to site a mobile home, which you're unlikely to get. You'd also need to pay a lot of money to get services to it.

If it were as easy as that we'd all be doing it.

starnac

i don't know about chalets but i do know a little about caravans. most parks rent the space the caravan is parked on for a set amount of years. friends of ours have a 12year lease. after that to keep the plot they must buy a new caravan. this is to keep the high standard of caravans right across the park. also the value of the caravan decreases over the years and so when they come to sell it in 12years time it will be worth a lot less than what they bought it for which means that the bank will not offer a mortgage as they wouldn't be able to re-coup their money should they have to repossess it.

they also have to vacate the park for 2 months of the year and the park is empty. this is usually when all the maintence is done on the park.

carefullycautious

If you are that desperate for a home have you tried Shelter. Can you elaborate a little on why you are contemplating the above?