Buying a static caravan

Becles

Think of the other start up costs as well. My parents have one and have spent money buying things like a TV and DVD player, microwave, kettle, kitchen utensils, crockery and cutlery, bedding, towels etc., which are all left up there to save lugging stuff backwards and forwards. Even the little things mount up, like dish washing and cleaning stuff, toiletries etc. You could build stuff up as you went along though to save a huge cash outlay.

Also check the heating system in the van. My parents had another static but it only had a gas fire in the sitting room. The site closes in the winter months, and it was often too cold to go in Spring and Autumn which limited their use. They've since upgraded to a static with radiators in all the rooms and it's much warmer so they get more use out if it in colder weather.

dirtysexymonkey

JodyBPM wrote: »

LOL, I posted on here hoping that everyone would reassure me, but you're mostly feeding my fears!

To answer just a few of the points raised (trust me, I've done a LOT of research and probably have already considered most of the issues!)

The age of the van is not a problem on this particular site. The ground rent is cheap, and £2k pa will cover ground rent, insurance and utilities plus a small surplus for maintenance. I appreciate that ground rent may (will) go up, but ultimately if it goes up more than we would be prepared to pay, then our loss will be the cost of the van (£4k) minus anything we get for selling it, minus the non financial "value" of the time we have spent there up to that point. Now up to £4k is quite a lot of money, but in the scheme of things in life, its probably not really that much (or so I keep trying to convince myself).

We're happy with the pitch, the local area and the opening times in the season.

We're reasonably high earners, have a 3 bed house in a nice area already, which is a perfectly suitable size for our family, and at most will owe £5K on the mortgage, so small raises of costs aren't going to be an issue.

In the case of redundancy, we'd give up the van! In all honesty we have plenty of slack in our normal household budget where we could tighten our belts. If I was made redundant, we would be able to survive quite comfortably on DH's salary alone, if DH was to be made redundant I would probably have to work full time rather than my current 2 days a week, but cutting back, either one of our full time earnings would be sufficient to pay living costs with no mortgage or rent payments.

I think I'm struggling, because a) I don't like having no savings (even though that would be a very short term situation) and b) deep down I know that owning a static is not a financially sensible thing to do. But there will be a lot of non financial value in us owning a van. I think I'm struggling as I can't quantify that in financial terms.

I don't want make the family miss out because of my irrational fears. Left to my own devices, I'd probably be one of those mad old women who refuse to put the central heating on and freeze all winter despite having £100K+ in the bank!

neithers living. think about it! you waste all that money on just keeping yourself alive. total waste.

the caravan will bring you happiness, it will also bring your children happiness. lots of it. when you consider that 4k and then 2k a year is cheap!

i speak as the grandchild who spent summers and weekends in the lake district and i wouldnt give them up for the world. it was on a site like you described, tiny, family run and in the most beautiful location. its been 7 years since they sold up but i cant wait to get on the waiting list. and by the time theres an opening, ill have enough for a brand new van! which i guarantee youll want after a decade or so. so youll have somethng to save for then and worry about.;)

thorsoak

You will be buying your children a store of memories ...they cannot be priced! Go for it!

Who knows what is around the corner? The opportunity has arisen at a time when you can - just about - afford it. Go for it! Life isn't all about predicatabilities - its sometimes about now! As someone said to me - and it is very trite, I know - today is a gift - that's why its called the present!

iwantoneplease

I have a caravan which we bought in June/July this year, I let out the van during the school holidays and any weeks that we knew we wouldn't be able to go up this has covered the cost of the ground rent and next year we will let it for another few weeks which will cover other things like insurance, gas and water (our site doesn't charge for electric).

Insurance is costing me £23 per month
Gas is £52 per bottle now on my second
Water - Free this year as part of the sale

My plans for next year is to install an electric fire to reduce the gas costs. If you have the option of letting it out go for it when you feel the money is tight. (I get £350 for a 3 bedroom caravan in high season)

My advice is go for it, it's so nice knowing that you can go away for the weekend without having to think about where to stay.

Enjoy if you do get one, and if you need any advice on the caravan just send me a pm.

Good site for advice is www. gostatic.com

RLH33

Personally I'd go for it. It sounds like you have thoroughly researched it and as you say, if it all goes wrong you have only really lost £4k which is not a lot in the scheme of things.

As a previous poster said £2k may equate to £280 per weekend but how many times would you pay to go away for a weekend? Not many! But having your own caravan you would be down there lots of weekends and the memories for you and your kids will be worth it.

I think the loss of the savings is something that I would also worry about, I like my safety net, but you will have it back within 6 months and if the worst comes along you can always let it out to earn some money back on it. It wouldn't need to be let for many weeks before it pays for the site fees all by itself.

meritaten

you say you have the finances sorted out, and accept there may be a loss in years to come! you also say that the benefits reaped are not Financial and that is what you cannot get your head around!
I had a static on a small family owned site when the kids were small - we had it for three years and it was fantastic - memories of our caravan hols are like little nuggets of gold! unfortunately after two years the park changed hands to a large company and costs spiralled from under a thousand a year to nearly two thousand - and we got less for our money! they started charging extra for things we didnt want! previously all facilities were free but now they gave you a measly couple of hours free - the rest you had to pay for! you also had to pay for security (and old geezer with a dog who walked around once a night), then they started charging for rubbish collection - !!!!!!.........everyone just took their rubbish to the collection point - that hadnt changed!
So if this park is 2k all in - thats a bargain!

Go for it hun - if you are sure you will get your use out of it! and for those who say that with the miserable weather you wont use it or it will be awful - some of my treasured memories include us being there in one of Britains worst storms (hurricane) and the van was actually hovering!!! the kids were awestruck! but it was more dangerous to leave than stay!
evenings spent listening to rain hammering down and being cosy and playing board games. I hated to sell our caravan - but we could no longer afford the site fees plus extras!

annie12

JodyBPM wrote: »

We're thinking about buying a static caravan as a holiday home. It's an oldish van, so there's a few K upfront cost to buy it, plus an ongoing c2K each year in ground rent and other associated costs.

We're in a fairly healthy financial situation, but buying this van would have an impact.

We were planning on paying off the mortgage on the house in full in Feb and the savings are on plan to do that. However, if we also buy this van, then we will literally be leaving ourselves with no savings at all in the bank once we've paid it off, which really worries me. Having said that, we will be able to (and more importantly we are quite disciplined and actually will) be able to save around about £850 a month even after taking into account the annual caravan costs once the mortgage is paid off.

We could leave ourselves a small balance of £5k in savings, and keep £5k on the mortgage for a few more months to give ourselves a safety net, I guess.

I'm really twitchy and anxious about committing to taking on the van, though. I know dh would like to, and I know that the children would love it. It's close enough that we would get loads of weekend use out of it as well as summer holidays/half terms/bank hols etc. We also love caravaning and have well researched it and know all the risks, potential costs etc. We're only in our 30s, so honestly, deep down, I know that being mortgage free with a good chunk being saved each month is a really comfortable and secure financial situation to be in.

I'm worried that I will end up making the rest of the family suffer because I'm so unable to take any financial risks! But I'm so used to having a good buffer in savings, and the idea of having an empty savings account, albeit for a short time is worrying me. But the kind of van and pitch that have come up (oldish van with no time limit on site, quiet facility free site with lower ground rent than holiday parks, in our preferred location etc) very, very rarely come up, so we can't just leave it a year or two, as it might take years to find just what we want again, and I do think our children are just at the right age to do it now.

I need someone, objectively, to tell me that I'm worrying about nothing! The worst case scenario would be that at some point in the future we give up the van and have effectively wasted the purchase price of the caravan, but in the scheme of things, its "only" £4K which isn't a huge deal.

Can someone give me a bit of perpsective please!

We have had a static caravan for 10 years.
It is very costly, we pay around £3300 per year.
You also need to factor in things like gas & electric, if it isn't included.
Try and talk to someone already on the site to see if there are any hidden costs.

Also, you need to remember that you have an initial outlay for pots, pans, fridge, duvet's, T.V etc.

All that being said, We love it!!
How far away from home will it be?

annie12

JodyBPM wrote: »

deep down I know that owning a static is not a financially sensible thing to do. But there will be a lot of non financial value in us owning a van. I think I'm struggling as I can't quantify that in financial terms.

You can't put a price on quality of life
That is why we did it 10 years ago.

Gloomendoom

thorsoak wrote: »

You will be buying your children a store of memories ...they cannot be priced! Go for it!

^^^^^ This

I'd say go for for it too.

We've had a static van since I was a little boy. Ownership has passed down three generations (same plot, several vans.)

JodyBPM

I think we're going to put an offer in on it tomorrow!

Big decision, and not one I'm taking lightly, but I think it will massively improve our quality of life, and is worth the money.