Yacht Club Membership Fees

doug748 said:
Our comrades in the Motor Boat section are discussing Yacht Clubs and one contributor suggests that the San Diego club manages to do rather well.
It's yearly fees seem to be in the order of 3,000 dollars but the good news is that that includes a set $600 of food or drink - thus making sure that the bar and restaurant are kept busy.

This is the clincher - there is a initiation charge, they don't put your head down the bog but do operate a sliding scale - from nothing if you are under 26 rising, by great big lumps, to $24,000 if you are over 60. :nonchalance:
There must be some serious high rollers there.

My club is 66 quid a year with £20 joining fee. But you do have to pay for your own pies, unless they run out of course.
Click to expand...

Cheep compared to the RVYC.
Clearly they would rather not have riffraff like me. Oh well.
 
I must be a serial club joiner - in fact I think I am with 2 ( was 3) yacht clubs and 2 car clubs plus 1 bike club!. But they perform an enjoyable social function as well as providing facilities in the case of the yacht clubs. One has membership of £100 or so and moorings are free as is winter storage and the use of facilities like the workshop. The other is £200 and has a full service marina costing £1500 for my 35 footer. And more to the point it provides racing.
 
I pay about €350 in Trieste. For that I get access to a very cheap berth, restaurant and bar at reduced rates, a gym, races and events, a magazine, lift-out and launch of my boat plus a week or so on the hard, and membership of the Italian Sailing Federation with some basic third-party insurance. Plus members who keep a look-out when the bora's blowing and fenders get blown on deck. Seems pretty good value
 
at the club im with (Erith YC) on the Thames, which is only 15-20 minutes drive from home.

its £275 membership a year and £500 mooring fees on top. The mooring fees are denoted by the PLA apparently, we maintain the moorings ourselves voluntarily. Each member has their own dedicated buoy. It can get a struggle for me finding the funds on top for boat funds.

each boat has its own trailer for launch, recovery and leaving on the hard. We dont have to pay for any launching or recovery or electricity or water. Launch is done with a winch and tractors. We have a nice bar with cheap drinks. There is regular races or trips organised and themed social events for like Halloween. The Club shed is free for anyone to use and store items, though i use my own tools as many go walkies or are old and knackered.

"
https://www.erithyachtclub.org.uk/index.php/how-to-join

"
 
Last edited:
birdseye said:
I must be a serial club joiner - in fact I think I am with 2 ( was 3) yacht clubs and 2 car clubs plus 1 bike club!. But they perform an enjoyable social function as well as providing facilities in the case of the yacht clubs. One has membership of £100 or so and moorings are free as is winter storage and the use of facilities like the workshop. The other is £200 and has a full service marina costing £1500 for my 35 footer. And more to the point it provides racing.
Click to expand...

It looks like you are getting your money's worth out of them. The clubs round here don't have any proper marina services, so we would still be paying many thousands of pounds to Premier or MDL in addition to close to £500 to the yacht club which, in our case, would just be paying for access to a private pub - that is a lot more difficult to justify!
 
LadyInBed said:
What distance do you have to travel to frequent these clubs?
YC's are normally on the coast, so for me it would be a 100 - 130 mile round trip!
Click to expand...

The delight of the yacht club mentioned earlier.......every members cockpit is a clubhouse.....works fine!

Oh and The Flagship, Marina Rubicon. ;)
 
capnsensible said:
The delight of the yacht club mentioned earlier.......every members cockpit is a clubhouse.....works fine!

Oh and The Flagship, Marina Rubicon. ;)
Click to expand...

Sometimes the service available in these multifarious "clubhouses" is very good. I know of one (mine as it happened) that once unwittingly provided a comfortable haven for an ancient alcoholic ex-Commander for an entire evening, during which the said Commander consumed the best part of a bottle of Scotch, ate all the nibbles on the boat, bored the staff into a state nearing catatonia, and was finally carried back semi-conscious to his own boat by the barman.

We had planned to spend an extra day or two in that French port but, fearful of being caught in a repeat performance, we made a "dawn departure". :(
 
"By offering to discount subs for the elderly many will just keep on paying long after their ability to come and enjoy the club has reduced almost to zero"


"Exactly: money for old rope.....the majority of elderly members place such little demand upon clubs’ resources that they effectively subsidize regular members."


UNTIL they descend en masse once a year to the AGM ....where they use their votes to prevent or frustrate anything that will bring the club into the 20th century, not the 21st , just the 20th. :)



Overheard not that long ago. " Now too many strangers in the clubhouse !
 
Last edited:
oldgit said:
"By offering to discount subs for the elderly many will just keep on paying long after their ability to come and enjoy the club has reduced almost to zero"





UNTIL they descend en masse once a year to the AGM ....where they use their votes to prevent or frustrate anything that will bring the club into the 20th century, not the 21st , just the 20th. :)

K
Overheard not that long ago. " Now too many strangers in the clubhouse !
Click to expand...

Not quite a bullseye, but still a relevant comment. Our club usually holds its AGM at six or six thirty on a weekday night. It is very noticeable that most of the attendees are , shall we say, of the more advanced age group. Younger members are noticeable by their near complete absence. Even with the promise of free drinks, which usually elicits a useful response!
However this is not as critical as you may think, because the agenda for an AGM is, under our articles, pretty much constrained to the customary resolutions to "accept" the annual accounts and to elect main committee members. The really juicy decisions have to come up at Extraordinary meetings. Judging by the infrequency of these, either we don't need to make big changes, or everyone is running scared!
 
Resolution said:
The whole subject of what does a yacht club offer to its members , and what does it charge for this, is fascinating and complex. Just as sailing boats range from small & low valued up to superyachts worth millions, yacht clubs range from modest to extraordinary. My own UK club is at the posher end of the UK scale (and a reciprocal of the San Diego) and seems to satisfy quite a lot of members that membership is worth paying a chunky subscription each year. It is a fine balance though - when we raised subs by a bit more than inflation recently quite a number of members headed for the exit.
Entry fees have always worried me. Are they there to cover administrative costs of joining or just another way of soaking some innocent enthusiast? Are they an attempt to put an asset value on the club? Many long-established clubs own real estate with a material resale value.
Click to expand...

What is the clubs constitution, is it RYA affiliated.
Members generally cant have a share out of the proceeds
 
oldgit said:
"By offering to discount subs for the elderly many will just keep on paying long after their ability to come and enjoy the club has reduced almost to zero"


"Exactly: money for old rope.....the majority of elderly members place such little demand upon clubs’ resources that they effectively subsidize regular members."


UNTIL they descend en masse once a year to the AGM ....where they use their votes to prevent or frustrate anything that will bring the club into the 20th century, not the 21st , just the 20th. :)



Overheard not that long ago. " Now too many strangers in the clubhouse !
Click to expand...

Whoops previous post when wrong.

Our club must be the exception that proves the rule, in general it has been the older club members that have proposed the most exciting and often radical suggestions for improvements and advances to the club. (not all of which have been accepted of course)
 
sailorman said:
What is the clubs constitution, is it RYA affiliated.
Members generally cant have a share out of the proceeds
Click to expand...
Yes that is the custom in the UK, and my club does have provisions in the articles that in the event of a winding up most of the assets should go to some charity. However I have heard from learned friends that these articles might be challenged by members in certain circumstances.......
And of course in other countries other customs can operate.
 
Around the Hamble: Royal Southern has a bosun launch, which makes having a cheaper river mooring much more accessible. RAF club also has a launch, but it only runs at weekends. Other clubs do dinghy storage at a fraction of the price of MDL (I am thinking Warsash is about £120 / year for your dinghy). I think that this added to excluding the social/racing/training options, makes the fees worthwhile.
 
Resolution said:
Our club usually holds its AGM at six or six thirty on a weekday night. It is very noticeable that most of the attendees are , shall we say, of the more advanced age group. Younger members are noticeable by their near complete absence. Even with the promise of free drinks, which usually elicits a useful response!
Click to expand...

At 6:30 on a weeknight I’d very likely still be at work.

Free drinks would be neither here nor there to me - nice gesture, but it wouldn’t influence whether I’d attend. And in any case not something I could use unless I could get to the club without driving, which in many sailing locations is not possible and in any case would probably make the timing even less feasible.

Pete
 
prv said:
At 6:30 on a weeknight I’d very likely still be at work.

Free drinks would be neither here nor there to me - nice gesture, but it wouldn’t influence whether I’d attend. And in any case not something I could use unless I could get to the club without driving, which in many sailing locations is not possible and in any case would probably make the timing even less feasible.

Pete
Click to expand...

OR drive and stay over on the boat?
 
prv said:
At 6:30 on a weeknight I’d very likely still be at work.


Pete
Click to expand...
You should start earlier!:)
Actually this is what I did for many years, catching a 6am train to be in time for the first meeting of the day, at 7.30am. Sadly, the working hours also extended the other end, so getting home before the kids had gone to bed was a rarity. Worth it in some ways, as work paid for some good things - like a Sigma 33!
Of course if I had had the good sense that you usually show in your posts then I could have done the work in half the time.

Back on subject, I think the choice of 6.30 for the start time for meetings is influenced by balancing 1.) those who leave work between 5 and 6 and would push off home if it were left much later; 2.) retirees who could start at any time but wish to move on to supper by 8pm; and 3.) longer workers (like yourself) who will just have to select priorities on the night.
Modern technology has a role to play here, but maybe not for a year or two.
Peter
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page

Top