Ad disclosure: this site contains affiliate links, marked (Ad). If you enquire or book through one, we earn a commission from the operator, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what our guides say.
Lodge LedgerUK ownership, honestly costed

Costs

What does a 12 month holiday park licence actually mean?

A 12 month licence is a season, not a right to live there. Here is which named parks are open all year, what one operator's published price list shows about whether a longer season costs more, and what the extra winter months cost to use.

Published 2026-08-07 · updated 2026-08-07 · 10 min read · all figures sourced below

A 12 month licence means the park's site licence and planning permission set no closed period, so holiday homes can be occupied on any day of the year. It does not give you a right to live there, and on the one price list that publishes season and price together, a 12 month park does not cost more than a seasonal one.

The phrase is used loosely in sales. Some parks are open all year. One large operator sells 12 month use as an extension you buy on top of a 10 month agreement. Another closes for a month and lets owners stay at weekends anyway.

What does a 12 month licence actually mean?

It means no closed period in the site licence or the planning permission, so the park can let you occupy your holiday home in January.

Section 5(1) of the Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act 1960 is where a closed season comes from. It lets the council attach conditions to a site licence "for restricting the occasions on which caravans are stationed on the land for the purposes of human habitation, or the total number of caravans which are so stationed at any one time". A park carrying no such condition, and no equivalent planning condition, can stay open all year.

Acorn Leisure describes the difference from the operator's side. A 10.5 month park "closes for a short period each year (typically 4-6 weeks)", while a 12 month park is "Open all year with no formal seasonal closure". Acorn also states the limit of it: "a longer holiday season does not change the planning and licencing status of a holiday park. Holiday homes on a holiday park cannot be used as a primary residence unless specifically licensed for residential use."

That is the whole of it. A 12 month licence buys access in February and changes nothing else. Our article on whether you can live in a holiday lodge all year covers the residency rule, the statutory definitions and a 2026 planning appeal that tested them.

Which holiday parks are actually open 12 months?

Several named operators publish a 12 month season, and the wording differs enough to matter.

Holgates says "All of our ownership parks are open 12 months of the year (for holiday and recreational use only)". Leisure Resorts says its parks "operate on a 12-month holiday license and not a residential license", and names Angrove Country Park, Ullswater Heights and Aysgarth Lodge Holidays in its 2026 site fee list. Darwin Escapes answers the question directly on the site fees page for Aberconwy Resort and Spa: "Yes. Aberconwy has a 12 month open season, but it is non-residential."

Hillandale Caravan Parks publishes the season next to the price for each of its eight parks. Four are listed as "Year Round Holiday Use": Borders Hideaway, Hay-on-Wye, Lickhill Manor and Riverbend. At a fifth, The Coppice, the caravan pitches run 15 February to 15 January and the lodge pitches are year round, so one park has two seasons on it.

Away Resorts is the outlier. Its running costs page says the pitch fee covers "Use of the park 12 months of the year, all year round (this applies to selected parks if you buy an extension to the standard 10 month agreement." So at Away Resorts the standard agreement is 10 months and the extra two are a purchase, on selected parks only. Away Resorts does not publish what that extension costs.

Shorter seasons remain normal at the large operators. Hoburne says "All of our parks have an 11 month season, meaning that you can use your holiday home every year from 7th February - 6th January." Northcliffe and Seaview Holiday Park publishes a nine month season, 1 March to 30 November. Haven says site fees are "payable before the start of every season in March".

Does a 12 month park charge higher site fees?

No, on the only published price list that shows the season and the price side by side.

Hillandale's 2026/2027 pitch fee page gives a season and three price bands for each park. Taking Band A, the cheapest band: the year round parks are Riverbend at £3,625, Hay-on-Wye at £3,870, Borders Hideaway at £3,925 and Lickhill Manor at £4,215. The seasonal parks are The Glen at £3,775 on 1 March to 31 January, Lincomb Lock at £3,965 on 1 March to 9 January, The Coppice at £4,220 on 15 February to 15 January, and Morfa Bychan at £4,460 on 1 March to 9 January.

The cheapest park on the list is open all year. The most expensive is closed for seven weeks. The two ranges overlap almost entirely. On this evidence the fee tracks the park and its location, not the length of the season.

One comparison inside the same price list gets closer to the value of a month. At The Coppice, a Band C caravan pitch on the 15 February to 15 January season is £4,385 and a Band C lodge pitch on a year round season is £5,350, a gap of £965. At Riverbend, where both the caravan pitch and the lodge pitch are year round, Band C is £3,780 and £4,400, a gap of £620. If the lodge premium is similar at both parks, the extra month at The Coppice is worth roughly £345. They are different parks in different places, so that is an order of magnitude rather than a price.

Hillandale's fees include the pitch licence fee, gas, water and drainage standing charges, rates, VAT to 31 March 2027, and reinstatement insurance to 1 April 2027. Comparing them with other operators' headline numbers does not work, because those cover different things.

The other published figures for year round parks are higher, and none of them measures the price of a season. Darwin Escapes quotes Aberconwy from £7,951 a year, against a stated average across its resorts of £4,470 to £8,234. Leisure Resorts publishes 2026 site fees of £5,596 at Angrove Country Park, £6,128 at Aysgarth Lodge Holidays and £7,041 at Ullswater Heights. Those parks differ from each other in every other way too.

Haven contradicts itself on the same page. One paragraph says site fees "start from £4,645 per year". Another says "Annual site fees range from £4,770 to £10,000+", based on costs at Golden Sands in Lincolnshire in January 2026. A range with a floor of £4,770 cannot have a starting price of £4,645. Take the higher figure when you budget.

What do the extra winter months cost to use?

No operator publishes a winter only running cost, so the answer has to be assembled from three published charges.

The first is energy. Haven's figures for Golden Sands in January 2026 put average gas and electricity at £426 a year, spread across a season starting in March, so that number tells you nothing about January. Ofgem's price cap for 1 July to 30 September 2026 sets a domestic direct debit electricity rate of 26.11p per kWh with a 57.19p daily standing charge, and gas at 7.33p per kWh with a 29.04p daily standing charge. A pitch supplied and billed by the park is not on that cap, which our article on how park gas, electric and water billing works explains.

The second is a charge for heavy use, which Hillandale publishes and most operators do not. Its pitch fee page says "An additional service charge applies to pitches in regular use and/or which have a utility usage of 3 times the average (or more), at £325.00 on all parks, other than The Coppice at £450.00". Using a caravan through the winter is one way to reach that threshold.

The third is the caravan itself. Leisuredays, which insures static caravans, says most are built to EN1647, "which means they're only designed to be used as temporary or seasonal accommodation, not for permanent all-year round use", while BS3632 units "have extra insulation in the walls, flooring and roof, as well as double glazing". Its winter guide collects supplier quotes for the usual retrofits. Sheppey Caravans estimates a basic central heating system, including a 24kw LPG condensing combi boiler, up to eight radiators, a towel rail and lagged pipework, at under £3,000, and about £2,000 fitted for ten double glazed windows and two doors. Greenshield Leisure quotes full skirting from £1,200 plus VAT. West Coast Caravan Double Glazing puts external vinyl cladding with extra wall insulation on a 35ft by 12ft caravan at around £4,900 including VAT. Leisuredays does not date those quotes, so treat them as indicative.

Do you have to drain down on a 12 month park?

Yes, if you insure with Leisuredays, every time you leave the caravan unoccupied overnight between 1 November and 15 March.

Leisuredays states it as a policy condition: "It's a condition of a Leisuredays' static caravan insurance policy to drain down between November 1st and March 15th, every time you leave your holiday caravan unoccupied overnight or if your park is closed." Its winter weather page gives a lighter version for an open park, turn the water off at the stopcock and drain the taps, shower and toilet, and the full version when the park is closed: "Drain down and winterise all equipment in accordance with the manufacturer's recommendations".

This is the part people underestimate when they pay for a longer season. For four and a half months of the year, every departure means draining the caravan and every arrival means refilling it. Leisuredays says many parks sell a professional full drain-down service, which is a cost it does not price. Check your own insurer's wording before buying a longer season, because the condition sits in the insurance policy rather than the pitch agreement.

Can you use your holiday home when the park is closed?

Sometimes, and the two published answers are opposites.

Hoburne closes for a month and still lets owners in: "During the period from 7th January - 6th February, you are able to use your holiday home during the weekends (from 5pm Friday - 9am Monday)." That is around eight extra weekends on top of an 11 month season.

Northcliffe and Seaview takes the other line. During its closed season of 1 December to the end of February, "you may visit the parks to check your caravan but you will not be able to stay overnight".

So closed means no overnight stay at one park and most weekends at the other. Get your park's closed season rule in writing, because it is a term of that park's agreement rather than a national rule.

Does a longer season help if you let your holiday home?

Barely, because the letting thresholds are lower than the seasons the parks already publish.

Section 66(2B) of the Local Government Finance Act 1988 takes an English property out of council tax and into business rates when it will be available for commercial short term letting for 140 days or more. Section 66(2BB) sets the Welsh test at 252 days available and 182 days actually let. Our article on council tax on a static caravan works through how those tests apply to a pitch.

Every season named on this page clears both. The shortest is Northcliffe and Seaview's 1 March to 30 November, which is 275 days. Hillandale's shortest is 1 March to 9 January at Lincomb Lock and Morfa Bychan, 315 days. Hoburne's 7 February to 6 January is 334 days. A 12 month licence adds availability that a letting owner was not short of, and the number that actually binds in Wales is 182 nights let, which no licence helps with. What letting pays is covered in what you really earn renting out your lodge.

Before paying for a longer season, get the exact opening and closing dates in writing and ask whether the facilities and bar stay open through the winter, because a pitch being available does not mean the park is running. Hillandale is unusual in publishing the season and the fee together. Most operators publish neither. The ownership cost calculator puts site fees, rates, insurance and depreciation in one place, and what a site fee actually pays for sets out which of those charges the park controls.

Sources