Spending on "new" boats

lustyd

lustyd

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How much do you spend on a boat that's new to you after you've bought it? I'm curious to know if anyone has bought a boat and not spent anything at all on adding things, changing things, buying spares/safety gear?

I myself am a poor example and have spent the value of the boat again on new sail, shore power, painting etc. but then I quite like changing things :)
Dave
 
lustyd said:
How much do you spend on a boat that's new to you after you've bought it? I'm curious to know if anyone has bought a boat and not spent anything at all on adding things, changing things, buying spares/safety gear?

I myself am a poor example and have spent the value of the boat again on new sail, shore power, painting etc. but then I quite like changing things :)
Dave
Click to expand...

I have had to stagger the costs over a number of years, spending what I can afford to add safety first, back up items, (eg 2nd autohelm, kedge and rode etc) . These are now all in place and I can start on the rest now, new winter cradle, cooker and genoa. In the first year of ownership i spent about 2000 euro and since then around 400 pa on updating. Big expenses to come:eek:
 
I have bought 3 new boats for the charter market and put £20k to £30k on top of the headline price to get them on the water.

Main costs are Radar/chartplotter £8k, Heating £5k, MCA coding £10k, fenders , mooring ropes down to teaspoons make up the rest. On last boat also a bowthruster £6k.

Its difficult to be pecise as many boats come with packages included as boat show offers.

Compare it to buying a car, base model with options. Dependant on car bought the price can vary by 100%!!
 
On the last boat (cost £4k) I spent about £1k on new cushions, a new mainsail and a few odds and sods.

I'm resisting the urge to splash out on this one, as it was a huge amount of money in the first place, but still I've bought a few lifejackets, some maintenance items (anode, new furling line etc), some bedding, and before you know it, that's £500. I'll see how much we end up paying for winter storage and if we get any unexpected bills over the next couple of years or so before buying a new autopilot, next generation anchor (which one should I get?), etc, etc.
 
I know the answer down to the penny, but my lips are sealed.

Have had a lot of project boats before, and refurbished them to gleaming standard before moving on. Have been within sight of a profit on a couple, but mostly not.
 
lustyd said:
I myself am a poor example and have spent the value of the boat again on new sail, shore power, painting etc. but then I quite like changing things :)
Dave
Click to expand...

Aha, yes, but you own a Vivacity, and as such spending its value again would be a relatively easy task. You're not a poor example at all, you're just at one end of the boat owning spectrum. (The sensible one IMHO!) :) Personally, I would be pretty pee'd off if I spent the value of the boat again if she were worth anything over £5-10k. That's why I'm looking for a well maintained example around £10k: spending an extra 2 grand on a better example of a particualr marque should help me avoid the worst expenses associated with a "bargain" boat.
 
There are other choices - like stay with bargain sailing.

Who NEEDS a "new generation" anchor if the existing one works fine? Why not sail with old sails - if you don't race it may not make a huge difference really. many of our "upgrades" are self-indulgent rather than necessary if we were completely honest I suspect.

But I thought the OP was asking about new boats which are sometimes sold in a completely unseaworthy state & require significant equipping to use at all. Even basic personal & domestic stuff like bedding, crockery, cutlery etc soon mounts up.
 
On my new new boat the bill for extras up to commercial spec including all domestic equipment and delivery was just under 20% of ex factory cost.

On an old boat it is a big as the pocket allows. I have just replaced the engine in my nearly 50 year old boat for the second time and the net cost was about 40% of the value - but I will be keeping the boat for a long time!
 
Over the 6 years we have owned Galadriel, she has undergone a program of continuous improvement and replacement. Sails, Coppercoat, canvasses, upholstery, heating, plus much more, and there are still items needed to be done.
 
FullCircle said:
I know the answer down to the penny, but my lips are sealed.

Have had a lot of project boats before, and refurbished them to gleaming standard before moving on. Have been within sight of a profit on a couple, but mostly not.
Click to expand...

Ours wasn't a "project", but we spent about 10-15% of the purchase price over a couple of years, upgrading various things (not electronics ;-)) !
I know fairly closely what it "all" cost -buried in a spreadsheet discretely. SWMBO would probably blanch.
Having said that, as far as anybody knows, you only get one shot at being on earth. There are only so many sailing days to be had, and we get a good deal of fun from them.
You can't take it with you, so I'd rather do it now than X years down the line have a "wish I'd done Y when I could" moment.

Graeme

(still fancy a new mainsail...)
 
Bought my Jag 22 for £3400 in March and I had the boatyard do about £950 work before I picked it up. My spreadsheet is currently totalling £5654.87 all in (but I haven't closed the spreadsheet yet!)

Biggest items have been a new towbar for the car, insurance, a years storage and a outboard service. The rest is life jackets, fenders, mooring ropes, shackles, clevis pins, new keel winch, hatch seal, parts for a mast raising/lowering A-frame and other odds'n'sods.

The boat still needs all the electrics completely stripping out and re-wiring, needs a good clean and repaint inside, more work on sealing hatches, the mast step might need replacing, the trailer needs fixing and I'm quite keen to take the keel off to tidy it up and convince myself its in good shape. Faced with this list I just launched it on Coniston and will sail it for the summer before doing anything else :)

With a bit of luck this will all fit inside my original absolutely-go-no-higher budget of , errr, £4k.

If you see my wife please don't tell her about this post.
 
Isn't it weird how grown men justify throwing money at boats...

I was fortunate to get my boat for a very good price. On that basis I justify to myself that I can spend up to the going rate for an uptogether one, doing her up. I couldn't justify spending £x,000 up front but somehow, spending it in dribs and drabs doesn't seem so bad. I spent more getting the boat moved than it cost, then I bought a S/H engine, again for more that the boat cost.
I have spent more on paint and epoxy than the boat cost. I'm gradually fitting her out with kit, mostly, if not all from the for sale forum and I've collected what I believe to be some great bargains (including one today ;))

So far I've done all the work myself but have just reached the limit of my skill set so have arranged for someone to fit the S/H engine now that I've removed the original. Loads more work to do but I actually enjoy it and am learning new skills which will be useful in my longer term sailing plans.

There were a few nasty surprises, but in my mind, I'd allowed for that. It also helps that the yard storage doesn't cost a fortune, so she's not burning a hole in my pocket for a tenner a week.

When I'm done I will have a boat with up to date systems and known provenance, for about the right money.
 
OK here goes, boat (1972 Albin Vega) was £10k but came with newish (2003) engine, extensive sail wardrobe (newish main, no.1 & no.2, older main & furling genoa, cruising chute, spinnaker), newish upholstery so nowt to spend there.

I've so far spent:

2nd hand Navik Windvane Steering £400
Simrad TP22 Tillerpilot £400
SH CP180i Plotter/Charts £450
McMurdo Fastfind PLB £190
HH VHF £120
NASA AIS Engine £120
Mast Support Kit £120
Battery Charger £70
Sundry Items (blocks, bits of rope, etc.) £200 odd I'm guessing

Will be spending another £300 on Solar panels/regulator soon and in the next year or two will replace the standing rigging and fit aluminium window frames/new windows, another £1k. After all that I will have spent approx £3.5k on top of the purchase price, call it 1/3 again.

For me a couple of things soften the blow a bit, namely the fact that I live on the boat and that I made £5.5k on the last boat I which I kept for just a year. The intention is to have her ready for just about anything by the time I've finished...:)
 
My new mega-yacht (Leisure 17) is delivered tomorrow :cool: The delivery and annual mooring is way more than what I paid for her, and she's in good nick... but I think I might treat her to a roller reefing jib, and some electrics, a compass and a new chemical loo... oh, and maybe a small chartplotter... so there's at least a grand gone in a flash:o However, I've made a concious decision to downgrade to budget boating and it's quite liberating... even if my new bateau was stolen or lost, I'd only be a few grand in.
 
1200 quid so far- and I have yet to sail her. Still waiting for the replacement rudder, not included in this total- we bust one launching!
 
You will never stop spending money on your boat!.

There is always something to fix or clean or replace and many items have a shelf or storage life which guarantees annual or bi-annual expenditure.

Our exposure suits (HH) both need to have the neoprene cuffs replaced or throw them away.

Our auto-inflate life jackets needed new gas cartridges last year, only had them 12 years.

But then again we all new this before we started right?!

The picture of Manatee was much cheaper to look at but not nearly as much fun to sail.

Mark
 
All boats need a combination of routine day-to-day expenditure plus a series of 'one-offs' at regular intervals i.e refits.
The word 'Refit' surely means just that - re-fittting what was originally fitted as required.
The most common time for these items is either a) A sudden unexpected failure or b) at change of ownership.
If a boat is particularly 'up together' and 'well fitted out' (either new or used), then she is likely to be nearer he top end of her price range than one in need of expenditure - it probably balances out in the end.
And let's be honest, spending money on kit for the boat can actually be not only necessary, but fun too!

Steve
 
Sailfree said:
I have bought 3 new boats for the charter market and put £20k to £30k on top of the headline price to get them on the water.

Main costs are Radar/chartplotter £8k, Heating £5k, MCA coding £10k,
Click to expand...

I hope those costs were for all three boats, not each!
 
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