Fetch Camper Vans

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Angus Clydesdale Sep 2020 4:29pm, 18 Sep 2020 19,754 posts	0 Angus Clydesdale Very nice.
mrs shanksi Sep 2020 4:54pm, 18 Sep 2020 11,283 posts	0 mrs shanksi Great pic Synge, we've climbed the Roaches too. Keep the photos and campervan stories coming, the thought of our van coming is making me happy.
Northern Exile Sep 2020 10:44pm, 18 Sep 2020 6,842 posts	0 Northern Exile Excellent stuff
bigleggy Sep 2020 5:59pm, 19 Sep 2020 6,550 posts	0 bigleggy Can I ask about cost and affordability? How do you all afford a van and keep costs down ? Do you SORN them for 6 months of the year, for example I just struggle to understand how people afford a vehicle they use on weekends and holidays. Help me understand please
Northern Exile Sep 2020 6:13pm, 19 Sep 2020 6,850 posts	0 Northern Exile Initial outlay is the biggest expense, insurance and road tax isn't too bad. I sort out most elements of maintenance myself, so have never felt the need to SORN it. Plus I do use it throughout the year, not in very snowy conditions though. Admittedly having it sitting on the driveway is an expense when I'm running two other vehicles, but I'd only spend the money on beer and fags otherwise.
Northern Exile Sep 2020 6:15pm, 19 Sep 2020 6,851 posts	0 Northern Exile I know someone is going to say something, so alright, you can probably add gambling and chasing women onto that list 🙂
Mandymoo Sep 2020 6:31pm, 19 Sep 2020 10,171 posts	0 Mandymoo We only have the van so use it as our daily too
Angus Clydesdale Sep 2020 7:00pm, 19 Sep 2020 19,765 posts	0 Angus Clydesdale We ended up buying a caravan, mostly because it was a gift horse whose mouth I couldn’t look into but partly because I didn’t want to give up my Landrover and I didn’t want a 3rd vehicle* sitting on the drive not getting used enough. We still have plans for a camping van in due course, but this is good for us right now. * actually 4 if you count the SIIa which is awaiting some tlc.
Angus Clydesdale Sep 2020 7:02pm, 19 Sep 2020 19,766 posts	0 Angus Clydesdale The upside is that having owned and run a succession of Landrovers the costs of camping vans are relatively reasonable!!
♪♫ Synge ♪♫ Sep 2020 9:56pm, 19 Sep 2020 36,491 posts	0 ♪♫ Synge ♪♫ Bigleggy, it depends almost totally on what you spend on holidays and travel and the like. There's no universal answer to your question. For example, if you currently camp under canvas and are thinking of switching to a van, your costs will go up because it costs more to run a van than a Vango. 😉 We've only had ours six months and, yes, the capital outlay is the big one. I really don't think running costs will be high, but of course it depends what sort of expenditure pattern you are replacing by using the van. For us, in case you're interested in the detail ... site fees are about a third to a quarter of B&B costs. Diesel replaces the petrol we would have used if we'd gone by car, so it's not really an extra. Food costs are a lot less because we cook simple (but nourishing and hearty!) meals instead of going to pubs or eating out, which you're pretty much forced to do if you go to B&Bs. And in our case, we're likely to spend more time in the UK than overseas, and that's through choice rather than for COVID-19 reasons. I've been looking at our budgeting pretty closely and I really do expect our monthly/annual "holiday/travel" costs to come down. (Road tax and servicing are obviously extra if you're not replacing a car, but I think we're paying something like £50 a month extra for those two, so yes, that offsets some of the savings above.) And I must say that, regardless of all the above, we didn't buy it to reduce holiday costs, we bought it because we thought it would be fantastically good fun and enable us to go to lots of different places very easily. So, it's all about initial outlay and obviously everyone's personal financial circumstances are different. Again, in our case, we decided at delaying retirement by a couple of years was a price worth paying to finance the cost. 😀