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It really depends on what you are after, as Carol Ann said, its best to go round and look at the different types and layouts of vans available.  With £5000 you should get a fairly decent van, tho if i were you, i would go to a dealer with it being your first van so you have a fallback should you need it. 

You also need to make sure your car is heavy enough to tow the caravan you choose, so before you start looking, check out what the maximum weight you can tow is, that way, you can go prepared and not be disappointed or fined for towing illegally.  You can usually find the caravan weights on a plate below the caravan door, it will tell you the weight of the caravan and the loaded weight permissable.  Dont be fooled by people telling you  that you will be fine towing such and such a van with your car, check it out for yourself first, one dealer tried to tell us we could tow a coachman (heavy vans) with an old laguna - we didnt stand a chance when we looked into it.

Have fun looking around !

Ange x

you cant go far wrong with an adria alot of there models feature fixed bunks

Hi there, please also read the horror stories about damp on this forum and ensure you are armed with a sharpened damp meter and look in every conceivable place for damp.  Open every locker, look under the beds and explore the bathroom in fact everywhere you can get to and also use your nose - damp smells, well, damp!

Even vans around the £5,000 mark have been bought with damp so caution needs to be exercised and as has been said above, double check the advice given to you by the dealers as of course they want to sell at any cost and some are unscrupulous.  Some are excellent, they use the online sources to match your car to a van and advise you if it is up to the job or not.

You also have to consider storage, insurance, an annual service and running costs all of which can total around £800 a year upwards.  We pay £400 to store, £180 to insure and reckon on around another £200 for servicing and running repairs.

Caravanning is no longer a cheap hobby, the days of storage for peanuts are mostly long gone unless you are very lucky, but certainly here in the West Country it is very expensive.

Have fun!

Ali

Quote: Originally posted by the 4as on 10/4/2007

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you cant go far wrong with an adria alot of there models feature fixed bunks

 

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oooh, i just noticed you have the same caravan as me !

sorry, i got a bit excited there for a min cos i only ever seen one the same as mine before !