How do you shortlist parks to visit if thinking of buying a static caravan?

[Kate Parkin]

Hello Static Forum

I hope everyone is well?

I have just joined this forum as I have been thinking of buying a static caravan for a year or so as a weekend and holiday retreat from London. But I am overwhelmed as to how you chose between parks, whether family run or larger and prices of caravans and licence info, it is hard to know where to start!

Briefly as we are in London, I was looking at sites in Kent ( of which there seem to be about a million). There are four of us, myself and partner and our two teenage children, 14 & 17, plus a dog. Primarily it would be for enjoying some peace and quiet, walking and chilling out. We aren't worried about clubhouses/facilities etc and I was looking at smaller family owned parks, but obviously second hand caravans are less available and new ones are way out of our price range. I realise visiting the parks would be advisable and that is something we can do this year more freely than last year, but how do you work out which ones might suit your needs, travelling around Kent every weekend to look at sites seems very stressful!   I have seen some caravans on sale within big parks through Ebay for example as private sales, are these safe? Often the licence left on them is just a few years, so can you renew, will it be worth it ? Help!

If anyone can recommend parks in Kent or the best ways to reduce a search down to just a few parks, that would be hugely helpful. It does seem a bit of a minefield and I realise there is alot of advice on this forum about the nuts and bolts of owning one, but finding the right one in the right place first seems a major challenge!

Many thanks in advance about any help you can give me!
Cheers
Kate

Linkback: https://staticforum.co.uk/index.php/topic,706.msg1798.html#msg1798

[Slattster]

Hello Kate ,don’t rush into buying a van , take your time have some lovely days out searching for your ideal site . Don’t think about the van you want yet , find your site first , then the pitch then the van - hopefully their will be a decent van for sale on this pitch . Most sites will turnover 5 - 10% of their vans each year so vans are always coming up for sale so if you find a site you like ask them to let you know when one is coming up for sale.
If buying privately be aware that there will be fees payable to the site so make sure the cost of these and if you or the seller is to pay them , speak both to the site and the seller.
You’ve already reduced the sites your going to be visiting by ruling out facilities . Google sites , use google earth to look for small sites . I would try and keep it to no more than 2 hours travel if planning to go down regularly at weekends.
Don’t go stressed , dont think it’ll happen the first weekend , we were looking for 2 years before we found our site. Have a list of questions ready  . When you find a site you like you can ask the residents about the site and owners , and have a chat with the office / owner.
Good luck

Linkback: https://staticforum.co.uk/index.php/topic,706.msg1799.html#msg1799

[DaveE]

Welcome to the forum Kate.
I’d suggest your first way of narrowing down the “millions” of sites is to almost ignore them, and try and narrow down the area to one that you all will be happy spending time in on a regular basis.. I.e. One that offers the facilities that keeps your interest long term.
Then those day trips “scouting” the area are really an invaluable part of the process , to my mind. If you don’t enjoy travelling there  now how soon would you get fed up of travelling back and forwards to the ‘van on a regular basis.
Whilst your looking at areas, you might have a quick tour around a caravan park or two but only if you fancy.
To me a park has to have that interest outside it’s gates to be any good no matter what it has within it.
Best of luck with your searching when you do find the right place it really does seem worthwhile.



Linkback: https://staticforum.co.uk/index.php/topic,706.msg1800.html#msg1800

[Kate Parkin]

Thank you so much for you advice, yes absolutely agree the travelling distance is key as don't want to spend hours in the car getting to a weekend retreat! Or maybe access by train could be an option, so this could create a more natural shortlist.

Also the services charges are something I have to get my head around but thanks for suggesting to be wary with private sells and get all the full information.

I will pinpoint a couple to visit (and google map) to see what is available around the parks as you rightly point out this is probably of more importance to us!

I really appreciate your time and answers and will enjoy finding out more information from this great site. Hope you get down to enjoy your caravans soon in the next couple of weeks!
Cheers
Kate

Linkback: https://staticforum.co.uk/index.php/topic,706.msg1801.html#msg1801