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AIBU?

To not want anyone else using our caravan?

220 replies

Welshmaenad · 13/09/2016 15:23

I have recently bought a caravan (static) in a very popular holiday spot (well, I've paid a deposit and will be settling the balance when it is sited and ready). The money has come from my DDad who recently passed away. He and my mum, who died 2 years ago, always planned to get a nice caravan when they both retired, sadly mum died before she took retirement so they never fulfilled their dream, so thus feels like a special thing to do with some of the money I have been lucky enough to inherit from them. It's a very nice site with excellent facilities and the caravan itself is pretty swish, brand new and was quite expensive - not bragging at all but just pointing out that it's a significant and quite special investment for me.

I am already getting people commenting that they would love to stay in it and giving me sob stories about how they haven't been able to afford a holiday in ages, etc. I know it probably sounds selfish but this is something I am doing for my family, not to give people free holidays. My DP used to live in this area and his DC lives here so he will be using it as a base to spend more time with the DC; I intend using it frequently with him and my own DC, and my ExH will be using it in his weekends with the DC too, potentially with his partner and her child who I both know and like. And frankly that's as far as I want it to go, the second bedroom in the vsn will be the kids room and they will have their own bedding etc, we will be keeping lots of personal possessions there for ease, and I don't want all and sundry sleeping in it, poking through our stuff and so on. We may host friends whilst we are also there but I don't want others using it when we're not. When I've told people this they seem really put out and insinuate I'm being selfish.

I'm not, am I? I feel like I need to be really strict from the start or it will be a slippery slope and I will end up providing free holidays for all and sundry. AIBU in wanting to keep it for ourselves?

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Rainbunny · 14/09/2016 20:14

YANBU! We have a cabin in the mountains about a two hour drive away from where we live. It's in a ski resort area and it's not even ours really (DH will inherit it but not yet). Our PILs own it but they're getting on and don't ski anymore and they are a 10 hour drive away so for the last few years we've had almost exclusive use of it during ski season, we also do the maintenance on it as well. I can't tell you how many people have straight up asked to use it and some develop quite an attitude when we have to say no. We always explain that it's not actually ours and we are in fact using it as guests throughout the season but selective deafness seems to occur and they ignore that pesky little fact.

A junior colleague of my DH asked to use it one weekend in February last year and DH explained it isn't our cabin and we were using it that weekend anyway. Junior colleague proceeded to get really pushy about it because he wanted to propose to his GF with both his and her parents present and that weekend was the only opportunity! I think it was meant to be an orchestrated surprise that the families were part of, GF was to be surprised by him proposing IYKWIM. DH just said how nice but surely you didn't plan all this without booking a cabin? It turns out the Junior colleague had left it too late (ski cabins book up very early) and was desperate to use ours as he had no plan B. He thought DH was awful for not lending it to him for that weekend! I never did learn what happened with the surprise proposal...