What Next

Thank-you for considering Value Mobile Homes as the manufacturer of your mobile home or static caravan.

COMPLETE ENQUIRY FORM – PHONE CALL
Please fill in our enquiry form with your postal and site address together with your full contact details. It’s really helpful for us to deal your enquiry if we can have your full details pre conversation. Include any questions or requirements you have. We will email you back with our phone numbers and contact details. Please do call us.

NEXT STEPS
Our company is essentially a small specialist timber frame building operation. We build about 10-15 homes each year. The General Public is increasingly learning about the planning exclusion ‘loopholes’ for mobile homes, subsequently we receive over 2000 enquiries each year (you may have seen we have several website to ensure you find us). We kindly and politely request that we work together to satisfy your enquiry. The quickest response will always be via email. These are the steps on how to proceed.

GENERAL ORDER OF PROCEDURE
  • Planning – If you are pre planning the viability of your project needs to be evaluated.
  • Floor Plan – Determine the size requirement and layout for your new home (not a description an actual sketch or drawing please).
  • Price Estimation – We offer a free and comprehensive estimation package pricing multiple finishes and materials.
  • Viewing – Please visit one of our finished homes.
  • Site Visit – After the first three stages are complete.

DETAILED ORDER OF PROCEDURE

PRE-PLANNING

If your project is a new venture, you are not replacing an existing caravan or have already received planning permission, you should apply for confirmation your development is Legal. Either with a full Planning Application or an application for a Certificate of Lawfulness. If you have already studied the law and understand your situation does not need conventional Planning Permission, you maybe correct but we still advise you apply for a Certificate of Lawfulness. This is a formal letter stating your project is not development and therefor doesn’t require planning.

Because we assemble and finish the mobile homes onsite our company becomes invested in each build project. It’s our policy not to start a project without a Certificate of Lawfulness, Planning Approval, or a letter from the Council confirming the siting of the caravan is Lawful. If you have studied the Law and consider your situation to be outside the requirements for Planning Permission, then reason dictates you should have no concern in applying for a Certificate of Lawfulness. If you are for any reason concerned (for example the location although curtilage could be too far from the house to be incidental, or there is a boundary discrepancy) then it’s sensible to seek determination before investment. So either way you need to contact the Council and seek a determination of Legality. Our Solicitors can do that for you.

We can recommend a Planning Solicitors to handle all your planning requirements. A Certificate of Lawfulness application usually costs £900. Email us for their details. They are a large firm that specialise in caravan law. Can you please detail (in separate points) your situation as clearly as possible. What is ownership of the land, use of land, history? Who owns/lives in what properties. They need to assess the current use of the land and if the use will change. If garden is the location domestic curtilage or part of the wider garden, or not part of the garden. The more details the better please including site plan.

If your plot is open field or unused non-residential land (i.e no previous house onsite) then you will need to apply for full planning permission for a mobile home (if you want to use it residentially, i.e live onsite). Regardless of the building you choose if you want to change the ‘use’ of the land then you will require planning. It is a common misconception that if you want to live full time on a new site a mobile home will be easier or more favourable to the planners. There is no difference between a mobile home and normal house with regard to ‘change of use’. This is for ‘living’ in a mobile home, if you want to use as storage or connected to the existing use then planning might not apply, but it will for all residential cases.

If you want to use a mobile home is connection with building and engineering works, i.e whilst you are building a house. It is feasible to keep the mobile home onsite after the build works have been completed providing that the location is domestic curtilage (not just the wider area of your garden) and the use will remain incidental to the use of the house. In these instances we still recommend documenting your entire circumstance to send to the Solicitors for a Briefing Note or recommendation.

We often suggest clients get ‘pre-planning advice’ from the Council. This is when an officer will come to site, discuss your options, and write an appraisal. It usually costs £150. We recommend getting opinions direct from the Council as opposed to the opinion of a local planning consultant. There is often a form on your local Council website to arrange pre planning advice or just give them a call and book an appointment. The information/letter they supply post visit often be used as the basis/background to any application if you need to make one.

FLOOR PLAN AND SIZE
The very first stage with us is to decide what size mobile home you require.
Measure the plot. Work out your budget. Think about the living areas and facilities your needed.
You can download a scaled design template to sketch in your draft, available with Metric and Imperial Grids
Local site access is not usually a problem as our company specialises in kit build mobile homes for hard to access back gardens.
The maximum size for a mobile home allowed under the regulations is 20 x 6.7 M (65x22FT).
Nearly all our ’twin-unit’ mobile homes are the full 22 FT width. Please remember our finished externals walls are 1ft thick.
On our Floor Plans page you can down a design template and look through dozens of previous designs.
Each homes is designed bespoke to your requirements, so have whatever you want.
Twin unit mobiles homes need a wall running down the center of the build for at least 30% of the length.
For self builders we don’t supply just exterior walls and totally open inside. We need to include all the internal walls.
You cannot make ‘L’ shapes. The overall size needs to fit within a 20 x 6.7M footprint. The roof can run over this size.
Please include your windows on the design template. Different window styles can be seen on our specification page.
Crude drawings are fine, we just need to get a basic understand of your requirements.
Camera photo and texting your design sketch is acceptable. Scan, email or post.
Look at our existing floor plan and you will see most designs have bedroom either to the left or right.
Looking at your intended location there will often be a front side with the view and a rear, often against a boundary.
First determine which side you want the bedroom and which is the rear side.
The rear side often will have the corridor, leaving a smaller room for bathrooms, studies etc.
The rooms on the other side of the corridor are larger and often used as the bedrooms.
We can work designs around this basic data.

PLAN DRAWINGS – BASIC £175 including VAT.
Low cost planning drawings.
A basic 4 side elevation and floor plan drawing suitable for most planning applications, from sketch provided by client including windows.
A3 format by PDF.
Also included general groundworks setting out diagram.
Costs will be deducted from the price of your build if you choose to order with us.

ESTIMATIONS
Please visit our Price page to see example of our estimation package. We don’t just provide one price but several prices base on different finishes. The estimation package gives a spectrum of prices based on different choses of finishes, like different roof types and windows. Prices are extensive and broken down in to labour and materials for each item. You can quickly assess the different price between for example cedar cladding and render board. Use the estimation package to determine your budget. We then together adjust the price to reflect your bespoke choice of materials and finishes before quoting your final price. Self builders and developers can determine which elements they can save on by conducting themselves. Our estimation package is probably the most comprehensive in the industry. We look forward to quoting your project.

VIEWINGS
We rely on the kind hospitality of previous clients letting you look around their homes as examples of our work. It’s also useful to learn about our homes from the people who live in them. Show homes are located around the country. Please visit our Viewings Page and will make an appointment for you. We kindly ask you limit your time at the show home to 30 minutes and please keep all technical questions for members of our company staff.

SITE VISITS
Due to the high level of general enquiries we can only visit sites for clients who are post or pending planning. For clients replacing an existing mobile home, please consider your floor plan, view a finished home and allow us to quote for your project in the first instance.

GROUNDWORKS
Details are on our specification page. click here

TIMESCALES
We offer a first come first served services. We don’t book production slot in advance as clients site situations are too variable. There is generally a 4-8 week lead time before a production slot. It usually takes 8-16 weeks to complete a home. So from today delivery is realistically 4-6 months. It usually takes clients 4-8 weeks to clear site and lay the slab i.e that same duration as our lead time. If you are pre-planning or pre-groundworks and we start working in conjunction, we should be ready to build when you are ready for delivery.

THANK-YOU TO EVERYONE
We strongly believe our mobile homes represent the best quality and value for money in the industry. We enjoy each opportunity to build a new home. As a small specialist building firm we do appreciate your patience in servicing pre-planning requests.

VISIT US IN BOURNEMOUTH, DORSET
Please do visit our offices by appointment to discuss your project. We are located in Central Bournemouth minutes from the beach. Clients can enjoy a mini-break whilst here and often visit a show lodge en-route (allow us to recommend a local hotel, restaurants and attractions).

JUST EMAIL!
You will always receive an efficient response via email.