Holiday Caravans, rental business, anyone?

[Skribble]

Dream is to rent out nice holiday cottages to earn a living and build up an investment in the property too.

Reality is little money to put into this at the moment. So I was thinking about buying a mobile home on a medium sized sit nearby to rent out.

Does anyone do this solely as a business or do you have it for your own holidays and rent it out on free weeks to help with costs? Trouble is the ongoing site fees and the fact that caravans depreciate too.

If caravan is far away from your own home how do you arrange cleaning and key handovers?

we bought a static at the end of August

we are having probs paying the rental fees as they are so expensive

We are not really allowed to rent it out, but people do. WE are jut letting family anf friends/worl collegues use it and charging them so we can pay the fees

Only prob is, up to now Only Mum and Sister have used it lol

If it were a proper business and you didn't live near, you usually have a cleaner that would go in each Saturday and clean it

You would really have to look at all the outgoings and see if you would make much from it

You have site fees, possibly around 2k a year (thats a quiet site with no amenities except an outdoor play area), they can range from about £1300 to £3500, gas, electric, repairs, also at the end of the season you have to drain the caravan (so the pipes dont freeze) which you can do yourself or it can cost £25/35

It also costs us a lot to equip it with everything, although we did get a lot of Tesco value lol

It all adds up

It is something I would like like to do properly, but only if I lived near enough to the caravan to look after it myself

Hope that has helped a little and doesn't sound to negative!!

Thanks anniebear, very helpful.

There are loads of sites near us with privately owned caravans that they seem quite happy to allow you to rent out. There is a big huge Havan site and medium sized sites still with pools and small ones with just a bar and a pool room. So loads of choice.

Do you normally pay site fees at the start of the year or monthly? How is the gas and electric billed? Do you have your own meter or set fee?

Good thing is we live so near I can easily pop over to do the change over and easy to have more than one van too. It is a popular holiday area for a variety of types of customers. Tescos value items sound like a good idea as they can be replaced cheaply so damage and loss is less of a worry.

I know this won't be the same sort of investment or earning potential as a cottage would be, but I think it would be a good learning experience with less risks. Has to beat sitting staring at the wall .

If you have a Caravan on a Haven site you can charge a fortune....

some one said that you can charge up to £600 a week in the summer. But then the fees are around £3500!

We can pay our site fees in one go in March (it's only closed 6 weeks of the year 10th Jan-1st March). You can pay in 2 instalments but you have to pay about £200 more for the privilege!

We have gas bottles at £32 a go. We were surprised at how quick we went through the first one! But we have central heating so that may be why!

I am not sure about electric. We get billed for it but I'm not sure how often.

You obviously sound in a good area for a caravan! I would love to give it a go, but we are about 50 mins from our caravan

Just make sure you get the right site. If you decided after 6 months you were not happy with it, you have to pay the caravan park a lot of money to sell it. Even if you advertise it yourself. You have to give them something like 15%

We bought our caravan from a sales place, not on a park . It was cheaper like that. But when we came to finding a park to put it on, figures of 3/4k were mentioned to 'site' it

Which we couldn't pay so she knocked the price down for us

But it is expensive

When you are looking round a site, go and chat with the other people there and see what they think of it. I know it sounds silly, but treat it like you were buying a house....go and have a look at different times of the day

At one we looked at we found out that teenagers hung around the play area till midnight which made us not pick a spot near it!!!

Then again, yours is a holiday home for other people to use, so slightly different than us

Keep me up to date won't you, I will live my dream through you lol lol

Thanks anniebear, I was hoping to get a van already on site but still through a private sale, seen a few for sale on the Haven one and on the Parkdean one. They are only 15 mins away so ideal. I know siting it can cost a fortune as you have to hire the big truck and crane. Good thing is most of the vans come with all the furniture capets, curtains and white goods, so not to expensive to fit out with kitchenware and stuff.

I will have to have a good look at how much the other private caravans charge and work out how many weeks a year I am likely to rent it out. I have been trying to find websites for caravans on these sites with availibility calenders which might help.

Bump for daytime peeps .

anymore thoughts Skribble? Are you going to go for it?

I ahve just doen some leaflets for ours to give to friends and work collegues, hopefully some will use it and we will get a bit of money towards the fees!

Not too sure yet, I know DH wno't back me or be all that interested so I doubt I can use money from increasing the mortgage on the house even though it is still a bit less than its worth. I do have a credit card with a amazingly good rate (cheaper than a business loan) but that is scary even if I can pay it off in the first year.

I was looking at fairly cheap older models, but I will have to check if there any age limits on the parks. At least that way I won't have the huge drop in value on the caravan first off. I think if I can cover cost the first year and make enough over the next couple of years to be able to make a bit of profit.

I am really looking to gain experience and knowledge in this business before I have the money to buy the country cottages I want to do ths with. I am working towards getting anough for a deposit to get in to the bricks and morter renting.