How To Protect Your Caravan From Theft In 7 Easy Steps

As with most holiday homes, both static and touring caravans are left unattended for large portions of the year, leaving them vulnerable to vandalism and break-ins. Even if your touring caravan sits in front of your house, sadly, this doesn't always necessarily deter potential thieves.

That's why you need to take all of the necessary precautions to protect your caravan from theft. Here are our 7 caravan theft prevention tips.

1. Secure your windows and doors

You should make sure the basics are covered before you do anything else. This means double-checking all the windows and doors are locked whenever you leave your caravan.

Additionally, you must regularly check the locks are in full working order and get them fixed as soon as possible if they’re not.

For added peace of mind, you can install additional over-locks such as the range from Lock-M-Out. These will further decrease the likelihood of a break-in.

2. Secure your towing hitch

For touring caravans, hitch locks are one of the most popular caravan security devices around – and with good reason. If you don’t have a hitch lock, anybody could hitch their car to your caravan and drive it away. As you can imagine, they’re an essential piece of kit.

Hitch locks are a minimum requirement for most caravan insurance companies. If you’re unsure as to whether yours is an approved lock, you should check this with your insurer. At Ripe Caravans, we accept Sold Secure approved locks, such as Bulldog's range of hitch locks.

Once you have one of these, always make sure it’s locked except when hitching to and from your car. Once you’ve unhitched or hitched, reattach it. You can never be too cautious.

Related: The 7 Best Hitch Locks For Caravans

3. Secure your wheels

Another obvious choice to prevent the theft of your beloved touring caravan is a wheel clamp. This does exactly what it says on the tin – it locks your wheel to prevent the caravan from being towed away.

As with hitch locks, wheel clamps are required by many insurers as a condition of your policy, and we are among them.

Milenco manufacture some excellent Sold Secure rated wheel clamps which are designed specifically for caravans. As you’re no doubt already aware, you need to properly secure any locks before using them.

Related: The 7 Best Wheel Clamps For Caravans

4. Get an alarm

There’s a fair amount of overlap between caravan security and general home security. After all, your caravan is your home from home. That’s why an alarm is just as essential for your caravan as it is for a house or flat.

The caravan industry has come up with some ingenious alarms, from internal motion sensor to tilt detection alarms. It's quite simple – the more sophisticated the alarm, the greater the chance of deterring a thief.

What's more, at Ripe Caravans we offer a special discount on your policy if you have an alarm fitted in your caravan.  

5. Store your caravan in a secure location

Given that your caravan is a holiday home and will be left vacant for most of the year, where and how you store it is crucial.

If you own a static caravan, the site where it’s located should always be locked to prevent access from non-residents or non-approved guests. In addition, the site should have CCTV around the grounds to deter and capture any potential thieves.

If you have a tourer, we recommend you take the following steps:

• Lock it to a security post at your home
• Park it nose-first to your house so that thieves can’t easily hitch it to their car
• Remove all valuables from the caravan to minimise the cost of a break-in
• Leave the curtains open with no contents in sight to show there is nothing worth stealing left inside
  
  

6. Discreet property marking

Although marking your caravan won’t prevent it from being stolen, it will increase the chances of it being recovered.

Investing in a VIN chip kit for your caravan means the police can identify you as the owner if it’s recovered after being stolen. A VIN chip uses markings containing a caravan’s unique CRiS number (Central Registration & Identification Scheme), to keep a centrally accessible record of your caravan ownership.

All caravans manufactured after 2016 come equipped with a VIN chip. However, if your caravan was manufactured before 2016, you can order one from CRiS here. We recommend putting a sticker in your window highlighting the fact your caravan is CRiS registered, as this again may deter potential thieves.

You could also look to register your caravan ownership on a general property registration website like Immobilise. This online checking service is used thousands of times each day by UK Police forces to trace owners of lost and stolen property.

7. Invest in a tracking device

Tracking devices are probably the most high-tech security measure on this list and are a great addition to your caravan’s defences.

Once fitted, a tracker allows you to pinpoint exactly where your caravan is at all times on a map, typically via a phone app or computer program. Some trackers even come equipped with alerts when they detect movement, so you’ll be informed the second something suspicious occurs. This means you can inform the police immediately.

Trackers drastically increase the chances of your caravan being recovered after being stolen. Therefore, it’s a good idea to display a sticker in the window of your caravan to notify potential thieves that your caravan has a tracker installed.

Specialist caravan insurance from Ripe Caravans

Following these caravan theft prevention tips will significantly reduce the likelihood of your caravan or its contents being stolen. However, even with these measures in place, theft is sometimes unpreventable, which is why you need specialist caravan insurance.

At Ripe Caravans, we offer a Best Price Guarantee for protection against theft, damage and public liability. We also provide contents, public liability and European cover. Better yet, our cover is totally customisable, so you only pay for what you need. Get an online quite in minutes today.