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Can you live in a holiday lodge all year round?

No. A holiday park's planning permission and site licence make it a holiday site, which puts it outside the Mobile Homes Act and caps how long you can stay. Here is the law, what each operator publishes, and what happens if you live there anyway.

Published 2026-08-06 · updated 2026-08-06 · 10 min read · all figures sourced below

No. A holiday lodge or static caravan on a holiday park cannot lawfully be your only home, and that stays true on a park open twelve months of the year. The restriction sits in the park's planning permission and site licence, so the operator cannot waive it for you even if it wanted to.

Salespeople often explain this badly, talking about the season as though it were the only limit. A park can be open every day of the year and still be a holiday site where residence is unlawful.

Why can you not live on a holiday park?

Because the planning permission or site licence describes the land as holiday use, and that description takes the site out of the residential regime.

Section 5(1)(a) of the Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act 1960 lets a 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". That is where a park's closed season comes from.

Section 1(2) of the Caravan Sites Act 1968 then defines a protected site as land in England needing a licence under the 1960 Act, "not being land in respect of which the relevant planning permission or site licence, (a) is expressed to be granted for holiday use only; or (b) is otherwise so expressed or subject to such conditions that there are times of the year when no caravan may be stationed on the land for human habitation".

Section 5(1) of the Mobile Homes Act 1983 imports that same definition. So a holiday park is not a protected site, and the security of tenure in the 1983 Act does not reach you.

Wyre Council sets out the consequences on its council tax pages: on a holiday site "you have no right of permanent residence, you are not protected by the provisions in the Mobile Homes Act 2013, the site owners can give you notice to leave the site if they wish without going through the normal legal channels". Wyre's shorthand is the 2013 Act, which amended the 1983 Act. The agreement rights themselves sit in the 1983 Act.

Does a 12 month licence mean you can live there?

No, and this is the single most common misunderstanding in holiday park sales.

Park Holidays states it directly on its ownership guide: "A lot of people ask if they can live in a holiday home permanently. The simple answer is no. Most holiday parks have licenses that only allow them to be used for holidays, not as a main home. Even if a holiday park is open all year, it's still for holiday use only." Wyre Council says the same from the council's side: "Even if a holiday park is open for 12 months of the year, it still does not mean that you can live there permanently."

Darwin Escapes is the clearest of the operators, because it sells a genuinely year-round park and still says no. Of Aberconwy Resort and Spa, its ownership blog says the resort is "Open 12 months of the year, but this is not a residential resort, you must still have a primary address". Darwin publishes its own working test: "Our holiday home license is defined as an owner spending more time at their primary home address than on the resort over the course of a year." It also asks buyers for proof of a main registered address, a council tax bill or utility bill, and says owners are "required to provide proof every year".

A twelve month licence buys you access in February. It does not change what the land is for.

How long can you actually stay in one visit?

There is no single national limit, and the published operator limits disagree with each other by a wide margin.

Haven says "At Haven, it's not possible to live in your static caravan all-year-round" and that owners can "occupy your holiday home for up to 60 consecutive days at a time". Haven puts its standard season at "eight months of the year between March and November (the exact dates vary by park)", with a selection of extended season parks running March to January.

Shorefield publishes a shorter cap and adds a gap requirement: "Our parks are subject to a 56 day maximum length of stay, with at least 7 days where you will need to be off park prior to returning." Shorefield's parks run "10 to 11 months (depending on the park)" and are "typically closed early January to early February".

Hoburne publishes a season but no maximum stay. Its FAQs say "All of our parks have an 11 month season, meaning that you can use your holiday home every year from 7 February to 6 January. During the period from 7 January to 6 February, you are able to use your holiday home during the weekends (from 5pm Friday to 9am Monday)." Park Holidays publishes no maximum stay figure at all on the page that answers this question.

So the published rules are a 60 day cap, a 56 day cap with a 7 day break, no cap with an 11 month season, no published cap, and Darwin's ratio test. All five are described by their operators as the same restriction. Get the number for your park in writing before you buy, because it is a contract term on that park rather than a national rule, and none of these figures is the legal test.

What happens if you live in a holiday lodge anyway?

You become liable for council tax on the lodge and you stay in breach of planning control at the same time. The two are not alternatives.

Wyre Council states the liability test: "You are liable to pay council tax if your holiday home is: a caravan or lodge sited on a holiday caravan site; and it is your sole or main residence i.e. the place where you live, or spend the majority of your time. It does not matter whether the site is licensed for residential use, or for holiday use only; if you are living there, then you will be liable to pay council tax." That is the flip side of the rule in our article on council tax on a static caravan: a holiday pitch stays non-domestic precisely because nobody has made it their main residence.

Wyre also disposes of the workarounds. Post sent elsewhere does not help, and nor does a care of address: if you give someone else's address "because you have your post delivered there, or because you don't have a sole or main residence anywhere else, then you will be liable to pay council tax in respect of your holiday home".

On the planning side, Wyre says the council "may choose to take action to enforce those conditions, including serving you and the site owner with enforcement notices requiring you to cease residing there". The notice can go to both of you. The park has its own exposure, which is why operators police this.

Darwin Escapes contradicts the council position in passing. Its page says "Holiday home owners do not pay council tax as you pay this for your primary residence." That holds only while the lodge is not your main residence, which is the whole point at issue.

Has a council ever won this argument?

Yes, and recently. On 14 April 2026 a planning inspector dismissed an appeal that tried to establish residential use across a holiday park's season, brought by the park operator itself.

In appeal reference APP/B1415/X/25/3375929, Hastings Holidays Parks Ltd sought a certificate of lawful use for Spindlewood Country Holiday Park on Rock Lane, Hastings, for "the use of land as a caravan site for the siting of static caravans for use as a main place of residence between 1st March and 30th November in each year". Hastings Borough Council refused it on 21 October 2025, and Inspector R Satheesan dismissed the appeal.

The site has about 102 static caravans and runs on a 1985 permission varied in December 2002, which extended opening from eight months to nine. The reason given for that condition was that "Neither the site nor the individual chalets, tents or caravan pitches are suitable for permanent year-round occupation, and it is intended that they should continue to be used for holiday purposes only during the permitted period".

The important part for owners is what the permission did not contain. There was no holiday occupancy condition, and the appellant argued that residential use was therefore not prohibited. The inspector rejected that: "The fact that there is no condition preventing the use of the caravans for residential purposes does not mean that residential use is positively permitted." Switching 102 holiday caravans to main residences would be a material change of use needing its own permission, because of weekday commuting and school run traffic, more deliveries, and more demand on local GP surgeries, dentists and schools.

The absence of a holiday occupancy condition in your park's paperwork is not the loophole it looks like.

How long does a council have to take enforcement action?

Ten years, in England and in Wales, for this kind of breach.

Section 171B of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 sets three limits. Subsections (1) and (2) cover building operations and the change of use of a building to a single dwellinghouse. Both are ten years in England, raised from four on 25 April 2024, and both remain four years in Wales. Subsection (3) is the catch-all: "In the case of any other breach of planning control, no enforcement action may be taken after the end of the period of ten years beginning with the date of the breach."

Living in a caravan is a change of use of land, not the conversion of a building, so subsection (3) is the one that bites.

Is the rule different in Wales?

The effect is the same. The drafting is different, and the Welsh version is tighter in one respect.

Section 2 of the Mobile Homes (Wales) Act 2013 defines a regulated site as any land in Wales where a mobile home is stationed for human habitation, other than a Schedule 1 site or a holiday site. Section 2(3) defines a holiday site as one where the planning permission or site licence "(a) is expressed to be granted for holiday use only, or (b) requires that there are times of the year when no mobile home may be stationed on the site for human habitation".

Section 2(4) then adds something England leaves to guidance. Where a permission allows year-round habitation only for the site owner or an employee, that permission is ignored when deciding whether the site is a holiday site. In England the same point sits in the government's 2013 best practice guide for local authorities: permanent occupation by the site owner, their family or employees "does not make the site a relevant protected site". Wales put it in the statute. England left it in guidance. Our article on buying a holiday lodge in Wales covers the other differences.

What should you buy instead if you want to live there?

A residential park home on a protected site, which is a different product sold under different law.

Two of the operators quoted here sell both. Shorefield says its Merley Court park "now offers Residential Licences, so if you are looking for a park home that you can live in all year round". Hoburne says it has "some selected residential areas and parks". On those sites the Mobile Homes Act 1983 applies and you get a written agreement and security of tenure. Wyre Council notes one cost difference: VAT is payable on holiday pitch fees and "VAT is not payable in respect of residential site fees".

Do not assume a residential pitch fee maps onto a holiday one. If you are costing a holiday lodge across a season, the ownership cost calculator takes site fees, rates, insurance and depreciation together, and what a site fee actually pays for explains which of those charges the park controls.

Sources