Do you mean a touring caravan or a static caravan?

I have never lived permanently in a caravan but spend most weekends in one as we train 3 hours drive away from where we live.

Last winter we stayed most weekends in a small touring caravan. It wasn't ideal. Like others have said cold, problems with toilets and water freezing.

Last March we purchased a static caravan. It needed some work doing to it but we paid €600. OK we haven't been there for the last 3 or 4 weeks but have been there in very cold and bad weather. Normally when we arrive and go in it can be cold but I walk the dogs whilst OH unpacks and by the time I am in it is lovely and warm. It has both gas and electric heating. We haven't found either that expensive to run.

I can't wait to get back there

Here are some pics.

I'd want more than a static caravan for £70K

I would

However most of the static caravans around here are for travellers and I didn't really fancy living among them, I have no ill feelings towards them however their way of life is different to mine and tbh I wasn't sure I'd be welcome as an outsider. The empty caravans are always filled before you get a chance

you can buy terraced houses for that much! that's insane.

I would NEVER live in a caravan of any kind. I grew up in beautiful old properties, i don't care if they are tiny cold and pokey like a caravan might be, but i need my period features!
I like having my own front door, and a proper garden i like the quirks you get with houses, especially older ones. I don't think a caravan would ever seem like a home, harder to decorate. etc.

I know someone who lives in a static in a retirement village, and it's nice enough, bit of a tardis on the space front, but i couldn't live in it myself. Ok for a weekend in the spare room, but not for me. I like stairs and floorboards and brick, and BEAMS. I LOVE beams haha.

From what others have said, it sounds just as costly to buy a caravan and rent a space on a site as it would be to rent a bedsit or a flat! If your only issue with renting a place of your own is money, have you considered looking at a house share? You might find it tricky to find somewhere that would allow pets but you'd probably be able to find something eventually

A caravan might be a good fix if you want to be able to move out ASAP but you'd be spending money that could be put towards moving into an actual house or flat so it depends what's more important to you - moving out as soon as physically possible or saving up for a little while longer and looking for a house share.

Personally I'd never live in a caravan. My friend lived in one when we were growing up and I just remember how awful it was! The pipes were forever freezing, she always moaned about not being able to have a proper shower and it was freezing cold! And she had lived in a huge farm house with no central heating or double glazed windows so that gives you an idea of how cold it must have been!

Precisely. Definitely not for me. Ok if you're 9 and on your holidays........ but permanently? Never!

Not forgetting that nothing in life is for free! I have a static on a woodland park where they do allow dogs, are only open 10 months of the year, vans are centrally heated with all mod cons, people live there for the 10 months that it's open, BUT, you pay £3K a year for the priveledge of having it there, even though you own it, so when you work that out, plus your gas and electricity, it's definitely not as cheap as you think. Add all that lot up, plus renting for 2 months of the year, you might as well get yourself a nice little rented flat imo.

The very first thing you have to find out is whether they take dogs, because most of them don't, same as most rented properties. It HAS to be a static, you cannot possibly live in a little tourer in a field somewhere with no utilities!

We had a static for over 15 years and used it just about every weekend. My little retreat away from the stresses and strains of working life. It's what drew me to moving permanently to where I live now.

However, we never did manage a full week in it. I'm afraid I'm very much a home comforts girl and even thought the statics were big and all mod cons, they just weren't 'home'.

Don't have many terraced houses here, but you can get a two bed semi bungalow for around the £80K mark and a detatched bungalow for from around £100K upwards.

A flat in town went for £23K but needed full refurb.

£70K for a caravan? Nah!

Mind you, we are at the opposite side of the country from where the op would want a caravan

On a residential site, where you can live in it all year round, you're then talking £150K upwards!!!

Well actually you do get more 'cos that includes what I suppose you could call a 'lifetime lease' on the land, another important point is that you never own the land, you pay an annual 'ground rent' which on some parks is quite a lot.