Residents who have been staying year-round at a holiday park in Argyll say they are facing eviction.
Some of the 28 private owners who stay at Loch Awe Holiday Park, near Taynuilt, Oban, have been there for as long as 20 years.
But now new owner Cove UK, which bought Argyll Holidays from the Campbell family last year, is sticking to rules which residents say were never enforced before.
To comply with the site licence, private owners of chalets and vans must be able to prove that they have a permanent address elsewhere.
The park shut for a month in November and will close again in February. This allows it to comply with regulations that owners can only stay for up to 10 months of the year.
Residents have a meeting with the owners next week. But Cove UK say they must ensure no residents are permanent because it breaches their licence.
‘I have been here 19 years’
May Clayton, 66, who works in Oban, has stayed there for 19 years. She is one of around 20 private owners to receive an eviction letter.
She faces going on the local housing association homeless list. May said: “I’ve had to put my name down for a council house.
“I’m totally devastated. I have been here 19 years, I enjoy the quiet and I like being out of town. That’s why I stayed here for so long.
“People are really upset and worried. They can’t eat, can’t sleep.”
Retired couple Sandy and Christine Nicol, both 62, who moved to the park after selling their Oban house two years ago, are also facing eviction.
The eviction letter states: “It has come to our attention that you are residing at Loch Awe Holiday Park which is in breach of the pitch agreement.
“This in turn is causing a breach of our site licence. Holiday homes at Loch Awe Holiday Park are for holiday and recreational purposes only and must not be used as a permanent address.
“Please accept this letter as confirmation that your pitch agreement will terminate of March 31. We will not be offering you a further agreement.”
An ideal retirement solution
Sandy and Christine thought they had found the ideal solution when they sold their house and retired as a result of Christine’s painful condition fibromyalgia.
She could no longer use the stairs in the house, so she took early retirement from her council job with Sandy, a former fisherman.
They spent much of the year touring in their motorhome, using the park as a base.
Their son and daughter-in-law live in nearby Taynuilt. When they work early shifts, the grandparents babysit. They use the house in Taynuilt as a postal address.
Sandy said: “That’s the whole point of retirement. It’s supposed to be a holiday.”
He added that the salesman for the previous owners knew their situation. Now they have spent a total of £155,000 on the caravan and two-bedroom lodge.
Christine said: “They think we stay here permanently. We’ve got a list of dates and photographs proving we have been away in our motorhome.
“We have barely been here longer than four weeks. It says in the pitch agreement we can come here any time.
“This stress is making us ill. We thought this was us set for life. Now we are facing eviction.”
The park was previously a locally-owned family business. A number of years ago it was sold to Argyll Holidays, which has eight parks in Argyll.
Last year American-owned Cove UK bought the site.
Some caravans are owned privately and others are let out to holiday makers.
What the site owners say
Representatives from Cove UK will meet with residents on Tuesday.
A spokesman for Loch Awe Holiday Park said: “In keeping with the conditions of the site licence issued by the local authority, our business operates only as a holiday park and not for residential use. That means guests and caravan owners are unable to use the holiday park as their primary residence.
“From June 2022, we started to contact a number of caravan owners to ensure that they were not using their accommodation as their main residence in accordance with the site agreement they entered into.”
The company hopes all owners will be able to satisfy the site agreements. But if they cannot, pitch agreements won’t be renewed from April 1 onwards.
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