Is it possible to find a self catering holiday in Wales without using Airbnb and without renting a cottage which is a second home ? As a matter of principle we don’t want to do either .
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Would somewhere like Llety Arall be a good fit? Self-catering, community enterprise and in perhaps the most Welsh-speaking town in Wales (Caernarfon). Lots of fabulous places to visit nearby as well. Accommodation and community space in Caernarfon, North Wales
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The Oakeley Arms Maentwrog is located between Blaenau Ffestiniog and Porthmadog. Located in the Snowdonia National Park, mountains, beaches, castles, narrow gauge railway and Portmeirion within easy reach. They have several self catering cottages, although for ease of booking these days I believe they have resorted to AirB&B. It is the heart of a Welsh speaking community. Hyfryd iawn, bob lwc 
Hi Richard
Many areas in Wales have static caravan parks, privately owned and ones which are part of larger companies.
As an alternative to the problems/issues you state above, many people create extra income by having glamping huts, bell tents, individual static caravans, shepherd’s huts and so on their private land.
Wales is also full of campsites, have you considered camping? I’ve heard that you can hire tents if you don’t want to buy.
Hiring motorhomes and campervans is also a thing - not always cheap, but fun and allowing you to travel from place to place, staying wherever you wish.
Many towns in Wales have traditional B&Bs - Caernarfon has many. Not self-catering but an alternative.
Otherwise, some private homeowners in Wales may decide to rent out annexes of their houses as holiday lets. Usually smaller in size and tend to be a part of the larger home, but may be an alternative?
There’s also https://www.bluestonewales.com/
Also worth looking at bunkhouses, hostels and places like Glanllyn and Llnagrannog
Hope some of these help!
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Many thanks to Sara, Catherine and Catrin for your suggestions about which I am stroking my chin thoughtfully. As it happens we have stayed in Caernarfon a couple of times and once in Porthmadog so maybe we will go for a different area next time.
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Hope you have a wonderful visit, wherever you choose. Report back!
Excellent!
If Ynys Môn is any good for you, I have friends who run this place -
It’s not a second home and although they do advertise on Airbnb, you can book directly via the website instead.
Have a look at The National Trust. They have holiday cottages to rent all over the UK. The Landmark Trust buys and restores historic buildings and lets them out for holidays. Expensive but not so bad if you go out of season. Working farms often have accommodation too. Look at farmholidays.co.uk.
Thanks to Siaron and Jennifer for your suggestions - very helpful
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We try not to stay in a house that could be someone’s home at some time.
We start by searching for Farm Stays or words like that.
Alternatively, use any filters in a company’s website to select Farm Stays.
Pob lwc!
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Thanks Mike
That should be a feature one can filter on on holiday search sites!
This isn’t that but might have starting points
And a mate of mine has this in his garden which is delightful https://cabanbrynarw.co.uk/
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Extra points, many, many extra points for them not describing it as being in the ‘heart of the Brecon Beacons’ when it’s in the Mynyddoedd Duon. 
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It’s a fab spot - they were JUST finishing refurbishing it during the Abergavenny steddfod when I went to have an eyeball. Camped on the rugby club field I was proper envious!
Another interesting initiative
I read that this morning. All a bit pointless if the end consumer Is unconcerned with the effect they are having, sadly.
One has to be pragmatic to make “caring” easy and cheap enough to benefit from the casual “mostly-decent-but-kinda-lazy” Default Human though.
If you want people to recycle you have to give them the bins not rely on them dragging litter home for example.
Ditto ethical tourism. The options have to BE there and be almost as easy and not much more expensive.
If FairBnB is already operating in other countries it does at least show Wales problems (and solutions) aren’t uniquely intractable!
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You’re only likely to make the good guys cheaper than the bad guys by clobbering the latter, really. Make them pay for the externalities they are responsible for. If you’re OK with killing a community, that’ll be an extra £100 a night, please, which the local authority can spend how it likes. Or you can join this other ethical scheme which may increase your prices by a lot less. It’s up to you.
I’m not, in principle, opposed to that, by the way. Bit of a bureaucratic nightmare, though.
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I am broadly in favour of the clobbering I can’t lie,
But there’s also some evidence that people WILL pay a small premium for the feel good cookies factor of “ethical consumptionl.
It’s how we market Wales instead of some elephant reserve to those people that’s the challenge!
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