What is accurate regarding cost?

[sailorboy1]

Originally Posted by Emouchet

Get the smallest boat you can afford. Not the largest one!

Maintenance cost increases exponentially with the length. Not linearly.

only in books and the internet

[Mithril Bham]

After you have sailed the boat for a while and fixed all the things that will break, added everything you need then 20% is reasonable. Of course if your diesel dies the first year it probably won't be enough. Impossible to answer definitively. When chartering cost plus yachts a 20% APA (advanced provisional allowance) is the number but I don't know if that relates. It seems it is a popular number. In the bareboat business we would recommend 20% to owners. Usually that worked. Sometimes it didn't.
Life is a crap shoot.

[flyingfin]

Originally Posted by jrbogie

there is no right answer here. if an answer to boat finances is necessary stay away from boats.

Tru dat, Tru dat!

[thomm225]

You can pretty much spend as much as you want for a boat or as little.

See this list of Water boats">Blue Water boats from about 27' on up. They basically start at $4,000 so 20% of that would be $800.00

Mahina Expeditions - Selecting A Boat for Offshore Cruising

[MartinR]

Originally Posted by ohdrinkboy

It really depends on the age, and condition of the vessel you buy. Just realize that if you buy a $50k boat and put another $30k fixing it up, it doesn't mean you have an $80k boat. It means you have a really nice $55k boat.

Or maybe a really nice $40k boat

[valhalla360]

Other than to acknowledge you need some money for the unexpected (and just because it's surveyed doesn't mean there won't still be unexpected issues), any percentage is meaningless.

Even if you buy an absolute gem that is perfectly maintained, you will still have maintenance crops up. Buy a fixer upper and you may need 200% just to get the boat in usable condition. If you can't fix things yourself it can quickly spiral into 2000% (and then usually becomes a wreck sitting in the back of the marina yard rotting away because you gave up and walked away).

[lamadriver]

20% is low, maybe doable if you know what your doing.

figure the first few years you'll spend a lot more than that. Trust me the learning curve can be steep.

Learn how to do as much as you can your self

advice I give everyone is go use the boat for a year or more and then spend money on upgrades. What you think you want / need now and in two years will be very different.

LD

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by lamadriver

20% is low, maybe doable if you know what your doing.

figure the first few years you'll spend a lot more than that. Trust me the learning curve can be steep.

Learn how to do as much as you can your self

advice I give everyone is go use the boat for a year or more and then spend money on upgrades. What you think you want / need now and in two years will be very different.

LD

True.. Buy a functioning vessel that you can sail as is for a coupla years before flashing cash for toys..
Prime concerns should be hull and deck, mast and rigging, engine and sails..
An old laptop and gps puck loaded with Opencpn and NOAA Charts is more than adequate while you sort out your needs and your wanna play withs.
Costs on boats are famously inaccurate.

[nortonscove]

Originally Posted by Southpaw72

I'm a complete greenhorn when it comes to sailing. I know what you can learn from YouTube. So my question comes from a video I saw. On Sailing Ruby Rose, Nick and Theresa talked about cost and spending for boats. There advice was to hold back 20% of what you have to spend for anything that may pop up. That sounds reasonable to me. Kind of like a house. With both houses and boats, you have an inspection done by someone reputable. Assuming you've already factored the inspection results in with your offer, is 20% a sound number? One day, I'd like to buy a bluewater cruiser and if I have a 100kUSD to spend for example and the boat is overall sound without any obvious major expenses, that leaves 80k for the boat and 20k for incidentals. If the boat is in the 42-45' range, is it better to have more than 20% set aside? Should that percentage grow with boat size? This will be the first of many questions I will be asking over the years while I gain more tangible experience. Thanks all.

I bought the boat I wanted and went sailing. If the boat is deemed sound by a reputable adviser it should be pretty much ready for use. After a few short years you will learn what is necessary for you. Met a young man some years ago that had purchased an aging 28 foot boat in Texas for 1800 bucks from a Marina attempting to recover money owed. He then proceeded to sail south for a few weeks before heading back up north to his home here in Newfoundland singlehanded. This guy had such limited resources and experience that it was inspirational.

My point is that what is necessary is so different from person to person that the question goes back to the proverbial length of a string. I don't buy electronic equipment that is interconnected because they don't need to talk to each other, just to me. And my concern has always been what happens when the get peaved at each other on the north coast of Labrador? Everyone has a comfy spot and the variety inherent in that spot is as big as the ocean. So at first you need to know where you are in that ocean before you go to the real ocean.

[Group9]

The other big issue is, are you going to learn to do the repairs yourself, or are you going to pay people to do them for you?

Hiring people to fix things is going to cost a whole lot more than learning to fix them yourself. Invest in a good tool set if you don't already own one. Buy some books. Nigel Calder puts out some great repair books for boats. We have them all.

The best thing that happened to me for boating, was growing up on a farm, where we fixed almost every broken thing ourselves, only calling for paid help after complete failure. That ethos has served me well when cruising.

[ilenart]

my rule of thumb for preparing a newly purchased 30-40 year old yacht for offshore cruising is 100% of the purchase price. And this assumes a yacht in good to excellent condition to start off with. This also assumes me doing all the basic / simple stuff and hired help for complex work like engine repair / replacement, fridge work, etc. This also allows money for the first 2-3 years when "the unexpected" happens.

If you think this estimate is too high, go price a new engine, then add the cost of installation, new sails, osmosis repairs, rudder replacement, fridge repairs, new dinghy and engine, new water and fuel tanks, knees and chainplates, wind vane, windlass, standing rigging, bimini, liferaft, etc, etc.

Happy budgeting

Ilenart

[Bill O]

Since everyone is throwing in their opinion, here's another.

Buy a smaller boat first (mid 20' range) and do some lake sailing in your area. Lake Winnipeg and Superior are very close. This will help you learn both sailing and maintenance skills. Try to sail on many other boats to get the feel of what you like and don't like in features/handling of specific designs. Also try to crew on some of the longer distance races in the Great Lakes area like either of the Mackinaw races to get a feel for more open water sailing.

Then after owning a few boats/working up skills, possibly go to the mid 40' range. Contrary to popular belief, the larger boat doesn't have to be that expensive if you have skills. If you let the yards take care of your boat and do all maintenance, then you'll need much deeper pockets.


Bill O.

[hellosailor]

Southpaw, your boat is maybe five years down the line, yes? Or at least two years?
In the meantime, become a dock rat, get your ass o on the water any way or time you can, including pick-up crewing on racing boats just to get some real-world experience on them, and that will help you to set your own priorities.

For instance, many used boat buyers will say the standing rigging isn't rusted, that's good enough. Others will say it is 15 years old...time to replace it and not waste money on having it surveyed, since their insurer may balk if it hits 20 years regardless of survey.

Ruby Rose I think mentioned that this winter they are getting new sails because the ones they have are good enough--but with the number of miles they plan to sail in the next couple of years, they will need new sails and they will take advantage of BETTER new sails. For heavy offshore cruising, maybe that means $15,000 in one shot, where someone else would just say "But these work fine".

One thing that a number of YT'ers have been very blunt about, is the amount and expense of surprises they've had on bargain boats. From holes in the hull (even in metal) to new engines, they've found surprises in the first months, or first year, of ownership, and with the rare exception of the folks who started with new boats, well even those folks sometimes get surprises. How well you tolerate the surprises, how much you are willing to "make do" versus hire out, a matter of personal choice.

[Somedayblue]

When I started looking at boats several years ago, I was thinking I wanted a boat somewhere in the 40-50 foot range. However, I just bought a 36' ketch. It's an older full-keel boat on the previously mentioned Mahina list. I anticipate that I will spend at least the purchase price in outfitting as I would like for long-distance sailing. Part of going with a smaller boat was cost - I don't need to buy the biggest boat I can afford to be happy. There are also handling issues: just sailing a 45' or so boat is a lot more work. You may need several people or motorized winches just to sail the boat. In my 36' ketch, it is possible for me to raise the main without even using the winch. In the marina where I am keeping my boat, there is a couple who bought a 47' boat, and, according to the marina owner, it is more than the couple can handle by themselves. If you are considering long-term cruising and you don't have a whole crew ready to go with you, I strongly recommend doing a passage on a 40-something foot boat before buying one. That (plus finding a smaller boat with nearly all my desired features) convinced me to buy a smaller boat that was easier to afford right now.

[mglonnro]

Originally Posted by MartinR

Or maybe a really nice $40k boat

It's an annoying equation, this! 50 + 30 = 40

Big price drops combined with fluctuating and a bit exotic second hand markets make boat ownership more expensive.

I wonder what would be good ways to improve this