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Hi, we are really interested in getting an old secondhand static caravan, as we have 2 dogs we think an older one would be ideal....& to see how we enjoy it.  Just trying to get an idea of campsite fees, we want one maybe in the lake district or north wales, that has nothing on the site, no shop etc as we don't really need this.  If we buy a caravan for around
£1000 are there many sites that would site this older caravan or are they more interested in newer ones......has anyone any idea on good websites to go onto...

cheers for any help & advice....

We had one once, we'd never get caught up in it again, the people we let use it wrecked it, the site kept putting fees up & up, they demanded it was replaced after so many seasons & you had to have everything done to it through them so they could nake a buck out of you every which way they could, it became a millstone.

We sold it & bought a tourer 13 years ago, we keep it for our own use, we can use it when & where we want or just sit in it on the drive with a cup of tea.

As a last resort, I'd consider putting a tourer on a site for a season if I was convinced it was a one place holiday home I was after but I'd only have a tourer because I would retain the ability to hitch it up & tow it away when the site thought it had me by the you know whats.

BB  

My other thought was getting a tourer & putting that on a site which allowed you to leave it there for the season & maybe winter storage, as we only have on teenage daughter, we don't have the need for a large caravan, just having an awning on a tourer would do.  Does anyone know of any sites that allow you to put your tourer on, preferably the lake district.

The one thing putting us off a static is the exact reasons you have given Basilbrush, I quite agree, these sites do rip you off & most of them make you sell your caravan back to them.....& not for very good prices.  Thanks for your replies 

My parents owned a lovely static on a really quiet site on Anglesey, no shop, no club just the wardens house and 11 statics in what was the garden! It was idyllic, no pressure to upgrade the van at a specific age, just as long as the van was presentable it was ok, very low site fees in comparison to other large sites (if I remember rightly about £800 per annum), site open 365 days a year, my parents often went on boxing day and saw in the new year there, the warden couldn't have been more helpful, and friendly! And we had many lovely free holidays there courtesy of my parents generosity.

Until the warden due to health problems and financial reasons had to sell the site and WHAM!

My parents had about 3 weeks notice to pay the new site fees at over double the old fees, site would be shut december-february, and all vans had to be upgraded within the next year to models less than 10 yrs old and kept at less than 10 yrs old! As my parents couldn't afford to upgrade (and there van was only 15yrs old and in damn good condition) and through principal didn't want to pay the increased fees for less time at the van, the only other option they were given was to give the new owners the scrap value of the van and vacate! And if they could have sold the van they would but as usual it had to go through the owners and they didn't even give us enough notice to advertise it!

So what was a superb set up for them for about 7 yrs, very quickly and abruptly turned sour and left them out of pocket and very bitter about the whole experience. They have since bought another tourer and are now wishing they had stuck to tourers in the first place! We certainly will never be stung by the statics!