Pay what it takes

My caravan went into the dealer's workshop one week ago, as arranged last December. The annual service had revealed that damp was getting in around the front windows, and two of the side-hatches. It was basically a matter of deteriorating seals. They would have to be renewed, but there was also the possibility that the wooden plywood frame-with-cutouts that the front windows fitted onto might need renewal: an intricate task, needing a partial front-end rebuild.

There were also areas of the interior floor that had become rather too springy - the result of wear and tear over twelve years of ownership. The springiness meant that the insulating layer in the floor - which was a sandwich of plywood and insulation - had become compressed and may have detached itself from the plywood to some degree. Hours spent in front of the cooker over the years were chiefly to blame. The cure was to temporarily peel away the floor covering, drill holes, and inject resin or glue to fill any voids and stiffen up the floor again.

The initial estimate for all this was £900. I hardly flinched. It wasn't at all surprising that after twelve years the caravan would need major attention to stop more damp getting in, and make everything watertight again. I could deal with £900.

But when the workshop people began to delve deeper, they found that the upper edge of the front plywood window-frame (where the front windows hinged) was rotten. An entire new frame would have to be made and fitted. Additional damp spots in the rear corners had also been spotted. Those would require cutting out and replacement.

All this bumped up the total repair cost to £2,500 or so. Did I want to go ahead?

A good question! Did I?

Of course, the reply had to be 'yes'. It was the cheapest way to continue caravanning.

My caravan had originally cost £11,000 in November 2006, but was now barely worth £2,500 in a private sale, and somewhat less than that if traded in for a newer model at a dealership. Caravanning has grown in popularity in recent years, and strong buyer demand has kept prices for both new and used models very high. If I wanted to get mine patched up and off my hands, then I'd be facing a spend of at perhaps £7,000 to secure a good used 2-berth caravan like mine, that was not more than eight years old. A new 2-berth would cost at least £17,000. In either case, I'd be buying from a dealer and trading-in. (New or old, it would be very risky to buy a caravan without a proper professional warranty - so I'd always avoid a private deal unless I personally knew the seller and their caravan)

So I had to find not £900 but £2,500 to get my caravan fixed and ready for many more holidays in the years to come. It was an investment worth making, but in the short term having to find another £1,600 was a nuisance. More than a nuisance: I simply didn't have the money. I could just manage to put up £900, but to throw in anything more, something would have to give.

The next major expense coming up was my month in Scotland. If need be it could be sacrificed, although I was loath to cancel this long-awaited adventure. But it was the obvious way to free up funds. I decided to sleep on it. But I did email two friends in Scotland, warning them that I might not be coming.

Next morning, I looked into having a bank loan to cover the extra caravan repair work. I had a super credit rating, so I was certain to get a loan. But it would mean another year of loan repayments, when I had almost finished repaying the last loan, and had been so looking forward to being repayment-free after July. (How I hate loans)

Nevertheless, it was clearly worth research. And, to my surprise, I was able to put together a fuss-free online loan package with my bank. It meant borrowing £1,500, and making repayments to March next year. But the same repayments as now, so no extra pain was involved. And just another eight months on the end of my existing loan term.

Fair enough. I went ahead and now I've got the money.

Hmm. Eight extra months...

But now I can go to Scotland after all. And I get my caravan back, restored, in better condition than the average for its age, and ready for many, many more adventures!

This has been something of a crisis. I had the same thing three years back with Fiona (my cherished car had needed an expensive new auto gearbox). The same question as then. Do I invest serious money in repairs? Or trade in, and try my luck with something newer?

The same answer: pay what it takes to get the asset properly repaired. The caravan is manifestly suitable for my purposes, and still looks good. It's also full of personal associations and memories of happy holidays, and I don't want to walk away from those.

It's also comfortable, a real home from home. And that's partly because the interior is an old-fashioned poem in pine, warm-looking and inviting. Here's the front end of my caravan's interior with all the fabrics removed, as it was when I took it to the dealer's last week. Even in this stripped-down, skeletal state, it seems welcoming to me:

And here are some other, older shots, showing the interior with the fabrics in place:

I think orange pine and cream fabrics work really well together. It makes my caravan a pleasant place to be, even on a cold, wet day. In contrast, look at these shots of a 2019-model 2-berth model at my dealer's, which has an interior typical of caravans made in the last few years:

I admit the 2019 caravan wins hands down on style and fancy fittings. So it should: it was a 'dealer special' and the asking price was £23,299. But despite the big sunroof, and all those spotlights and concealed glowing LED tubes, the brown and white decor makes it seem gloomy and cold. I wouldn't look forward to spending a rainy day in there.

Dull decor is a major problem with the latest caravans. They have forsworn pine, embraced neutral or bland colours, and the interior ambience has suffered. I feel like staying away until pine (or something like it) is fashionable again. Which of course is a very good reason for hanging onto my lovely little caravan and paying to keep it viable.