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I am crossing over to the darkside and have (after a stressful holiday in a VW camper van with a non mechanically minded passenger) decided to buy a Caravan!

Have access to 2 tow cars the smallest being the Mark 4 Golf GT TDI so ideally the caravan needs to be light enough for this to tow (the other is a 4x4 but as this belongs to my parents we need to be sure that his car can tow it)

There is only the 2 of us and ideally therefore we only want a 2 birth van! Towing is not an issue for either of us, as we have both towed in the past and he has full licence upto and including HGV.

Looking for personal recommendations on vans and which manufacturers are best!

Would like it to have full oven and water heater (my specifications not his)

What do we need to look for when buying a second hand van? Prepared to go upto about £6k is that a realistic budget?

Emma

Hi Emma

When you are calculating your 'caravan' budget, be sure to take into account some of the less obvious costs, such as buying a gas bottle, battery, containers, security devices, spare wheel, storage fees, insurance costs etc, etc, - it can add up to quite a hefty chunk at the outset even if you already have tent camping gear.

The things to keep a look out for vans approaching their 10 birthdays would be signs of water ingress and delamination of the floor.  Damp can be very hard to spot and you should go over any potential purchases very carefully - particularly around front windows and rear washrooms/wardrobes.  A damp meter is helpful (although not infallible).

You will find there are a lot fewer 2 berth vans around than the larger berths, so I would recommend looking at any vans which fall within your tow car's towing limits, rather than dismiss any that sleep more than 2 people.

There are good vans and bad vans of all makes and models, so you really need to look and look and look until you've developed a sense of what will suit you best.

Happy hunting.

My advice would be to go and look at vans of all prices and see which layout colour schemes you like and go from there.  We love our Elddis but I would not like to comment on it being the best van around, as I think a lot depends on what you need or require.

Valerie

hi look here for an idea of what you can get for your money.gives a better idea when going round looking.no3 =  EX 2000 for example.to be safe stick to 85% of kerb weight

http://www.caravanfinder.co.uk/caravan_last40.html

08/17/2007 04:27 PM

Elddis Gulfstream EX2000 (1999) 2 berth

5,490

14.08

CLICK ON PICTURE

08/17/2007 04:05 PM

Lunar Arriva (2000) 2 berth

5,995

12.00

Thankyou for the advice it is quite useful

Hadn't though about security in so much as the van will spend most of its time at his Army base "behind the wire" so theft from there will not be too much of an issue, but do people use security stuff on site?

Have been told its 1400kgs for the golf

Emma