Your experience buying your first caravan

Hi All

Now we are newbies to the rest of you here and your right certain information would be good however as most don't join this club until you own a van then perhaps we are not reaching out to those who need to know these things? We plunged in after seeing many vans and fell in love with our Avondale 2002 2 berth, No body however said anything about all the extras we had to buy! as we only brought the van and not the secondhand tat he was trying to palm off on us! So we started at the bottom and brought everything we thought we needed new..lol However as you visit sites and talk to others its then you realize I want one of those as well..lol So as time has gone on in our first season we can now say we do have everything including the kitchen sink, TV, windbreak, awning etc..lol

So perhaps we should warn new caravan owners that buying the van is just the start wait till you see what else can go in it..lol

Another newbie here - less than 12 months of ownership. We didn't even consider one for years, we were happy in our tents... until in our 60's decided that no more packing of wet flapping canvas, plus sleeping higher than the floor, without the need to cross a campsite for the loo at night, were all worth having. Didn't fancy towing, so looked at camping vans, then realised that the ones we liked cost too much both to buy & maintain, when we visited the NEC show last October. Looked at new caravans and... sorry advertisers... didn't like the currently fashionable layouts of 90%  of them (I can see I'm going to be very popular!) so after further research, some here, more on the Caravan Talk forum, we settled on a 2 berth 17yr old pop-top which has all the technology we need, has more light in through its windows, is a dream to tow, and doesn't bump the mpg up nearly as far. And as has been already said, didn't cost 30K to buy or anything like it. We're converts!

Info on the C&MC website was very useful as far as it went. As Merve says, there's a stunning absence of useful info on such things as non-EHU, and I'd add, or on other ways of making caravanning (and MH-ing) more eco-friendly; which is surprising given that the tide is now running more and more in this direction, and technologies are being produced to make this eco-tide go further, faster, and cheaper. If you want to appeal to a significant portion of  potential new members, you're missing a trick here at present, we feel.

We're motorhomers so not included in the invitation 😢. Sadly the name change to include motorhomes seems to be literally that name only 😂. 

We were both in our sixties and had never owned a caravan or a tent.  When the kids were young we did lots of Eurocamping so we were familiar with life on campsites.

We decided to buy a tent and the basics (including electricity) to see if we would still like campsite life (that's different from liking caravans).  We spent a summer with the tent camping in the Staffordshire Dales South Devon, West Sussex, All across Northern Germany to name a few.  Decided yes this is OK but it would be nice to have a loo to pee in in the the night. When on our last camping trip to The New Forest we spotted some small Vans at a nearby dealer.  We had done a fair bit of research so had a good idea of options and were settled on something quite small like a Luna Ariva.  The dealer had an Ariva but he also had a Compass Rambler which was marginally bigger but had a lot more space.  We spent £5,500 but drove two hundred plus miles home to come back the following week to pick it up after hurriedly getting a towbar fitted.  Loved the Rambler and took to round Scotland and soon later round France, Northern Italy, Croatia and Germany and others.  

We've depended on our "own nouse" for the most part but have had tips from family and friends who have years of experience.  The online forums have been very useful for tidbits of advice.

Traded up to a rear bathroom model after two years and loving the caravan thing 

In 2006 Our first adventure was in a rented caravan from a dealer in Manchester, we spent 4 nights at Marton Mere in Blackpool & learnt a lot!

Firstly,

Haven sites are not our thing!

15ltr water & waste containers are useless (I spent most of the 4 days going between the water tap & the waste!

15ltrs of water (or waste depending which direction your going in) is quite heavy to carry over a long distance,

NO number 2s! especially when you have never even heard of Elsan blue,

level the van side to side before uncoupling & moving the car,

Unclip the break away cable before moving the car,

despite the above (& the weather) we were well & truly hooked!

Six months later we bought a 10yr old Caravan on eBay which turned out to be a complete rot box! Another sharp learning curve!

We kept it about 12months, lost £1500 but had some great times in it, memories that the kids still talk about now!

We came to caravanning via the tenting route.  We rented for a few years, gradually increasing the size of our tents and eventually buying a trailer tent.  It was after a very wet year in Cornwall in the TT that we decided to move 'up to a caravan.  We bought our first caravan at the NEC show in about 1990.  Is was a basic, bottom of the range job, but it started us off on the caravan route.

David

We came to caravanning by way of tenting, which we had enjoyed for over 30 years. Initially it was because it was what we could afford, but even when caravan ownership was possible, I never fancied towing one. However, after severe back problems during one camping holiday, in the colder autumn months, we decided it was time for proper beds and heating.

We started looking round our local dealer, thinking to buy a second hand one to see if it was really for us. I wanted one that had a dual fuel heating, and in 2004 that generally seemed to be vans of less than six years old. As they keep there values better than cars, we were looking at having to spend circa £6000 to get what we wanted.

On wandering into the showroom with the new vans, we came across a new X display Abbey, with everything we wanted, including a fixed bed, which we had not been able to find in the second hand ones we looked at. At £13,000 we did not hesitate for long, a not used by anyone van with 3 year warranty. It was a great van and we used it extensively, finally trading it in for a new model after 8 years. They gave us £6500, so I feel we had good value.

The dealership were great, giving us plenty of info on what we needed. Advising us to take it to a local site to get familiar with it. Plus training us up on the systems and hitching up at the hand over. Just as well, as although campsites were very familiar, everything else was very alien.

About 1977 that was sixteen caravans ago. It was a locally advertised Trophy gold about ten years old, £500-00 and came with an awning. Didn't even have a tow bar on the MK4 Cortina so the chap gladly delivered it for us and showed us how to go on. No hot water, no shower, no heater, no fridge, We enjoyed that caravan for five years without a problem but then the season was only Easter 'til August bank holiday( if we were lucky with the weather ).

Although we now have a motorhome we bought our first caravan about thirteen years ago. We were used to seeing family and friends with a variety of vans. We went to a couple of shows and spent quite a bit of time at a big local dealership trying out vans and thinking about what might suit. We found a fairly new van we liked, it was well looked after, "smelt" OK, ( it's good to give vans a smell test ) and bought it. We brought it home and friends helped us set it up as we were clueless! That worked well, we went off on our first trip to Porlock, probably the worst place to choose for narrow streets etc but we survived. 

B2, yes the 'inclusivity' got missed in this thread....and from the CM, too

i had an interesting 'arrival' into MHing but never having had (nor wanted) a caravan, thats obviously for another thread