Becoming demoralised...

Jim4244

Jim4244

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I'm starting to become a little demoralised.

We have an upcoming move down to the South Coast (between Ringwood and Poole) and after boating for most of my life on small powerboats, RIB's and sailing boats I finally thought that I would be able to scratch the itch for a "Big Boat"

My wife has no interest in sails whatsoever so I started looking at flybridge / aft cabin motor cruisers up to the 44ft mark. A boat this big would allow us to spend weekends onboard with our grown daughters and grandson, and all in relative comfort with the option of popping across the Channel or to Guernsey/Jersey once or twice per year. So with a budget and a good idea of what we would like we have viewed a selection of boats such as Sealine F44, Sealine F43, Fairline Phantom 42 etc. All older boats from the late 1990's / early 2000's but still all hovering around the £100k mark. So a good choice of boats that would meet our needs and that I could comfortably handle.

The problem comes when looking for a berth around the Poole area. Anything over 13m and the price jumps to the next bracket. Even sub 13m some of the annual quotes I have received are eye watering. In my mind I had set aside circa £12,000 - £13,000 per year to berth, fuel and insure a boat with routine services being carried out by myself. However when receiving quotes of £16k for a Sealine F37 (sub 13m) just for the berth alone it blows my man math's out of the water! Then comes the challenge of finding a berth for a 44ft boat, with many of the providers around Poole and Christchurch saying that they can't take a boat that big.

I have now accepted that anything I now consider needs to be sub 40ft just so that I can increase the places where I can find a berth. Even then the costs make me question my big boat bucket list dream.

I guess that boating in the UK really is becoming a very wealthy mans game? Are my experiences one of the reasons why its taking years and large price reductions to sell larger boats?

Low morale moan over. Onwards and upwards, onwards and upwards..
 
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I daresay a lot of us compromise, both boat wise and mooring wise. Our mooring is non walk ashore, it’s less than 1/3 the cost of a finger berth. No water, no electricity, but on the other hand, it's like living in a wildlife hide. We can’t really buy a bigger boat because it wouldn’t fit. Basically, you’re far from alone. We have a baby RIB to run up to the mooring with, if that idea could work for you? We don’t take it with us when we go out, but it’s great to tool around the harbour in, see our friends, go to the club, the showers, and keeping the on board number 2s to a minimum🤣 We find Poole Harbour to be the most expensive place on the south coast for a marina visitor berth. Beats even Lymington and Beaulieu by a short head.
 
Hmmm... Maybe a swing mooring is the way to go? Most of the boats we have been considering are fitted with generators, so power wouldn't be a problem, It would just be the faff of getting onboard / offboard at the beginning and end of the day. I guess that I had the romantic idea of just parking the car, walking along the pontoon and slipping the lines whenever I wanted to take the boat out. You really do pay a premium for that dream / convenience eh?
 
We’ve got an all tide swinging mooring at a club with a trot boat, not had to use a dinghy for years. 38ft all in cost including lifting, storage ashore is a little under £4k.

The figures you quote are eye watering!

There’s a couple of motor boats on fore and aft moorings at our club, it’s quite unusual to have any on swinging moorings, only because of the logistics of how they move in the tide and wind compared to fin keeled yachts around them.

If you’re not tied to weekends would it really matter if it took a little longer to get onboard rather than walk on and off access?
 
Poole was the most expensive place we stopped this year by a long way. Portland is cheaper as is the Solent. Unfortunately both require driving from where you’ll be.
 
ridgy said:
You should repost,.or have this moved,.in the motorboat forum where you will get much better advice. This one is mostly for tight sailors.
Click to expand...
Yes, This needs moving to MoBo forum.
Hint you cannot take it with you.
Another hint, a motorboat is actually capable of going somewhere when you want it to, it does not need to be located in the most expensive marina in the most expensive part of the UK.
Any decent motorboat will have a spacious interior ,unlike the usual "Hobbit" holes found on yachts, 40ft might be enough.
 
Jim4244 said:
Hmmm... Maybe a swing mooring is the way to go? Most of the boats we have been considering are fitted with generators, so power wouldn't be a problem, It would just be the faff of getting onboard / offboard at the beginning and end of the day. I guess that I had the romantic idea of just parking the car, walking along the pontoon and slipping the lines whenever I wanted to take the boat out. You really do pay a premium for that dream / convenience eh?
Click to expand...
Have a look at your options, for sure. Check out thr price for a dry stack for a RIB plus a swinging mooring. That might be some more fun to be had, the youngster would love it for sure.
 
Jim4244 said:
I'm starting to become a little demoralised.

We have an upcoming move down to the South Coast (between Ringwood and Poole) and after boating for most of my life on small powerboats, RIB's and sailing boats I finally thought that I would be able to scratch the itch for a "Big Boat"

My wife has no interest in sails whatsoever so I started looking at flybridge / aft cabin motor cruisers up to the 44ft mark. A boat this big would allow us to spend weekends onboard with our grown daughters and grandson, and all in relative comfort with the option of popping across the Channel or to Guernsey/Jersey once or twice per year. So with a budget and a good idea of what we would like we have viewed a selection of boats such as Sealine F44, Sealine F43, Fairline Phantom 42 etc. All older boats from the late 1990's / early 2000's but still all hovering around the £100k mark. So a good choice of boats that would meet our needs and that I could comfortably handle.

The problem comes when looking for a berth around the Poole area. Anything over 13m and the price jumps to the next bracket. Even sub 13m some of the annual quotes I have received are eye watering. In my mind I had set aside circa £12,000 - £13,000 per year to berth, fuel and insure a boat with routine services being carried out by myself. However when receiving quotes of £16k for a Sealine F37 (sub 13m) just for the berth alone it blows my man math's out of the water! Then comes the challenge of finding a berth for a 44ft boat, with many of the providers around Poole and Christchurch saying that they can't take a boat that big.

I have now accepted that anything I now consider needs to be sub 40ft just so that I can increase the places where I can find a berth. Even then the costs make me question my big boat bucket list dream.

I guess that boating in the UK really is becoming a very wealthy mans game? Are my experiences one of the reasons why its taking years and large price reductions to sell larger boats?

Low morale moan over. Onwards and upwards, onwards and upwards..
Click to expand...

You could put it in many of the most expensive places in the South of France or Balearic Islands and have plenty of change left over for flights 😳

I really struggle to see the attraction of “big boat” ownership in the UK in an expensive marina when it’ll probably rain every time you want to use it.
 
jakew009 said:
You could put it in many of the most expensive places in the South of France or Balearic Islands and have plenty of change left over for flights 😳

I really struggle to see the attraction of “big boat” ownership in the UK in an expensive marina when it’ll probably rain every time you want to use it.
Click to expand...
A rather more exciting proposition for rather less money:
Pardon our interruption...
 
£16K for 13M is nuts. On the East coast we pay £6600 for 14M, but that's obviously to far for the OP to travel. The IOW would be similar to what we pay.
 
Unfortunately, you started with the dream and then looked at the costs!
If you want a south coast marina, adding in likely repairs, maintenance, etc etc. you will be hard pressed to run 35ft on your budget if you actually want to use the boat.
In fact, I dont think that budget is enough for 35ft unless you are wonderfully lucky with your engines! Something will fail, and with two engines, the other will fail not long after!
Why not do the house move and try what you are familiar with for a season and have another think?
The sea will still be there!
 
Stemar said:
I suspect it would be cheaper to drive to the E coast than to get the ferry to the IoW. Red Funnel & their ilk ought to provide masks and blunderbusses for their ticket sellers
Click to expand...
You could buy a weekend appartment in maldon, have your boat in bradwell marina and still have change.
 
If you got a berth a Christchurch a 44 foot motor boat would have seriously restricted tidal access plus you would need to factor in propellor repairs each year. The bar has quite often less than 1.9m depth at HW.

I've just recently purchased a new to me sailing boat, and nearly purchased a 10.5 m cat. Weighing up the mooring costs, etc I ended up purchasing a 9m cat for nearly the same money. The savings will realise in mooring and general running costs over the years. The condition of both boats were very similar.

Walk ashore boating and south coast isn't going to be cheap.
 
My 14.8m boat berthing contract is 15k/year at Swanwick, one of the more expensive places on the Hamble. I could shave 6k off that by going somewhere I don’t like so much and that’s much less accessible by road. But I like it there so I choose to pay.

The price the OP quoted does seem high even by Hamble standards.
 
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