Boat running costs!

[Guest]

Wotcha all,

 

Based on my year on my rental boat, I'm working on a spreadsheet to figure out costs of running my boat-to-be so I know what I'm getting into. I've made a spreadsheet which I've set to be shareable at https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mHl7Q2EfA9WzUFXm0p7hov4W3PK6MHPau297UitVTS4/edit?usp=sharing

 

I'm pretty sure I've missed a load of expenses but certainly the monthly expenses should be pretty much right, which again is based on my experience of living on my old boat. I didn't incur any maintenance costs as the guys who I rented it from covered all that, and luckily any maintenance issues were pretty rare - I had to get the guy out about two or three times in the year and once was because the solar panel stopped working.

 

This is based on a 58ft boat (manufactured after 1990 so hoping it's going to be fairly reliable!) that I'll be living on as a continuous cruiser. I'm thinking I might actually budget in a couple of months of a CRT winter mooring because that moving the boat over the winter was a pain in the arse. I think my coal estimate is about right as I used none during the summer and a few bags a week during the winter. But anyway, those are sundries. I'm trying to get the actual "must have" costs nailed, ie. insurance, BSC, blacking etc. What have I missed? What have I underestimated? Because I'm pretty sure I'll have missed/underestimated something. Is there a cost in transferring ownership of a boat? Other than purchasing a boat license and insurance, when I first buy a boat are there any additional costs that I'm unaware of?

 

Thanks all for your help/tips so far! I'll apologise in advance for the questions forthcoming over the next few months but I promise it'll be over by March!

[Martin Megson]

Your list looks to cover all the normal running costs and you have clearly done your homework. Obviously there will be unexpected maintenance costs as things wear and I see you've sensibly made a contingency for them. There should be no unexpected costs related to the transfer of ownership. Although you may want to check there is no outstanding finance on the boat for which I expect there will be a charge. Good luck with your purchase and don't worry about asking questions on the forum. I started as a newby 5 years ago and found the forum members to be very helpful.

[Bettie Boo]

Hi & welcome to the forum

 

I would suggest you could significantly lower the cost of your cooking gas, a bottle cost £27 from the coal boats currently and lasts us over 2 months, I'd also say you can lower your costs on coal/wood for the stove unless you plan on keeping the windows open all winter and like it over 25 degrees inside

 

Also, if you need to have a pump out every 2 weeks, you'll either have a Very small tank or your need to flush is FAR greater amount than the two of us do

 

Best of luck, looks like your taking a sensible approach so far. Can't think of anything you've missed off, other than maybe some tools & solar (which in the long run is a massive savings on engine wear & tear as well as fuel.

[cuthound]

I would increase the survey costs to £800. Mine, back in 2014, cost £500 for the survey and £300 for the hire of the dry dock.

 

Fuel costs obviously vary with engine running time, but based on an average of 1.5 litres per hour only allow 20 hours running per month. I tend to cruise for 4-6 hours per day, other more or less.

 

Other than that you seem to have included everything.

 

Edited to remove autokorrect induced gobbledygook.

Edited September 24, 2016 by cuthound

[MoominPapa]

Living aboard, unless you're going to adopt the "no fridge, two lights and water pump" lifestyle, then batteries are definitely a consumable, and will be costing around £1 per day, on average. You may not consider it a boat cost, but decent (ie home broadband replacement) internet access it about the same.

 

MP.

[Alan de Enfield]

Fair summary, but I think that you may need to amend a little :

 

1) The Survey may cost £500, but you will also have the cost of the hoist out / drop back in which could be another £xxx. I would allow a total of £1000 per survey, and remember that you may not buy the 1st boat you survey, you may need to have several surveyed.

 

2) Diesel at £30 per month is low. That is only about 40 litres, at 1.5 litres per hour that is only about 25 hours engine running. As you look to be CCing then I'd suggest that that is not enough, and to keep your batteries charged (if you don't have solar) you would need to do something like 25 hours per week.

 

3) Heating - you quote Gas for cooking and heating - if you have an alde gas heater system, in cold weather you could be using 2+ bottles per week, however you may offset some of this with the 'coal' costs. How will you get hot water ? Either you will be running the engine (using diesel), running the gas heating or running the solid fuel stove, hence you will be using some form of 'fuel' everyday.

 

4) I know you have taken into account the licence fee - but this is an 'immediate on purchase cost' as when you buy a boat the existing licence is cancelled and you have to buy your own.

 

5) With 'Blacking' it is doubtful if you could do it "quadrennially" - normally 3 years max and often 2 years, the more you 'travel' the sooner you will need to do it. It is worth viewing 'blacking' as an up-front purchase cost and having it done whilst the boat is out of the water, following the survey, this saves the cost of having it taken out and put back in a couple of days after you have purchased it, During the survey the surveyor will scrape off some blacking in around 200+ places so if you do buy the boat it will need doing anyway.

 

6) With any boat, but particularly with a more elderly one (1990 = 26 years old) the possibility of mechanical breakdown increase, the two major components are gearbox and engine and both are expensive to replace - keep at least £2000 in an 'untouched' bank account for 'emergencies'.

 

7) Engine maintenance - this may be a little low. If you are running the engine daily (either cruising or just battery charging) then you will soon 'rack up the hours', depending on the engine type than the servicing could be every 100 / 200 hours. I was doing about 30 hours per week and had to service the engine (oil & filters) every 3-4 weeks (Lister LPWS4 engine at 100 hour servicing)

 

8) Allow for the installation of a solar system, prices are coming down and you should be able to get a good 'liveaboard system' for under £1000.

 

9) Budget for batteries - they are consumable and will PROBABLY need replacing every 2 years (it may be 1 year, it may be 3 years) as an example I have 6 x 230Ah batteries which when replaced will cost about £1200 so I'd allow £1 per day 'depreciation', or £400 annual. Batteries have a finite number of cycles (charges / discharges) so if you have a 'smaller number', or 'smaller sizes' they will be cheaper to replace, but you will replace them more often as they will be working 'harder'.

 

Edit to add :

 

10) The boat will need externally painting at some time - depending on if you want a 'shiny boat' or a 'scruffy' boat this could be done at 5 years or 10 years - cost will depend on who does it (you are a boat yard) but via a boat yard could easily run at over £5000 (£1000 per year)

Edited September 24, 2016 by Alan de Enfield

[Guest]

Fair summary, but I think that you may need to amend a little :

 

1) The Survey may cost £500, but you will also have the cost of the hoist out / drop back in which could be another £xxx. I would allow a total of £1000 per survey, and remember that you may not buy the 1st boat you survey, you may need to have several surveyed.

 

2) Diesel at £30 per month is low. That is only about 40 litres, at 1.5 litres per hour that is only about 25 hours engine running. As you look to be CCing then I'd suggest that that is not enough, and to keep your batteries charged (if you don't have solar) you would need to do something like 25 hours per week.

 

3) Heating - you quote Gas for cooking and heating - if you have an alde gas heater system, in cold weather you could be using 2+ bottles per week, however you may offset some of this with the 'coal' costs. How will you get hot water ? Either you will be running the engine (using diesel), running the gas heating or running the solid fuel stove, hence you will be using some form of 'fuel' everyday.

 

4) I know you have taken into account the licence fee - but this is an 'immediate on purchase cost' as when you buy a boat the existing licence is cancelled and you have to buy your own.

 

5) With 'Blacking' it is doubtful if you could do it "quadrennially" - normally 3 years max and often 2 years, the more you 'travel' the sooner you will need to do it. It is worth viewing 'blacking' as an up-front purchase cost and having it done whilst the boat is out of the water, following the survey, this saves the cost of having it taken out and put back in a couple of days after you have purchased it, During the survey the surveyor will scrape off some blacking in around 200+ places so if you do buy the boat it will need doing anyway.

 

6) With any boat, but particularly with a more elderly one (1990 = 26 years old) the possibility of mechanical breakdown increase, the two major components are gearbox and engine and both are expensive to replace - keep at least £2000 in an 'untouched' bank account for 'emergencies'.

 

7) Engine maintenance - this may be a little low. If you are running the engine daily (either cruising or just battery charging) then you will soon 'rack up the hours', depending on the engine type than the servicing could be every 100 / 200 hours. I was doing about 30 hours per week and had to service the engine (oil & filters) every 3-4 weeks (Lister LPWS4 engine at 100 hour servicing)

 

8) Allow for the installation of a solar system, prices are coming down and you should be able to get a good 'liveaboard system' for under £1000.

 

9) Budget for batteries - they are consumable and will PROBABLY need replacing every 2 years (it may be 1 year, it may be 3 years) as an example I have 6 x 230Ah batteries which when replaced will cost about £1200 so I'd allow £1 per day 'depreciation', or £400 annual. Batteries have a finite number of cycles (charges / discharges) so if you have a 'smaller number', or 'smaller sizes' they will be cheaper to replace, but you will replace them more often as they will be working 'harder'.

 

Edit to add :

 

10) The boat will need externally painting at some time - depending on if you want a 'shiny boat' or a 'scruffy' boat this could be done at 5 years or 10 years - cost will depend on who does it (you are a boat yard) but via a boat yard could easily run at over £5000 (£1000 per year)

 

Alan, thanks very much for your critical eye over my estimates, much appreciated!

 

1. That's a fair point and I suspect you're right. I'll amend that cost.

 

2. Yeah, I think I might have been underestimating that a little bit. While only a couple of years ago when I was on my boat, some details are a little misty! I did have solar on my rental boat and I think I'll definitely be getting solar on whatever boat I end up buying, if it doesn't have it already. It made a huge difference over summer and most weeks I never needed to run the engine at all. I'll bump that up to £50 a month and add solar in as an additional cost.

 

3. The heating in the gas section was in reference to heating water (amended my spreadsheet!). The boat I was on last time had a gas water heater, I forget the name of the brand but it began with a P. It was excellent. The I had two pretty large gas cylinders one of which lasted me for about 4 or 5 months, not sure if I was using it sparingly or not but I seem to recall only having to swap one of them before returning the boat.

 

5. I'll update my spreadsheet with your suggestions on blacking the hull. Thank you!

 

Some great advice, thanks so much. I'll be doing some updates on my spreadsheet to account for your suggestions.

 

Cheers!

[Alan de Enfield]

 

 

 

3. The heating in the gas section was in reference to heating water (amended my spreadsheet!). The boat I was on last time had a gas water heater, I forget the name of the brand but it began with a P. It was excellent. The I had two pretty large gas cylinders one of which lasted me for about 4 or 5 months, not sure if I was using it sparingly or not but I seem to recall only having to swap one of them before returning the boat.

 

 

 

Good point - I had totally forgotten about (Paloma) instant water heaters (other brands available) and was just thinking about calorifiers and central heating.

[Boat&Bikes]

I can see £1,000 that you haven't budgeted for...

[Guest]

I can see £1,000 that you haven't budgeted for...

 

Go on..

 

Ah!

Edited September 24, 2016 by Guest

[Alan de Enfield]

I can see £1,000 that you haven't budgeted for...

 

No - I provided my suggestions FoC, but its kind of you to suggest it.

[Penfold]

Did you miss a £1k off item 7?

[Jrtm]

Fuel wise i use around 100-130L every 4 months ive gone from rick to braunstone and back. With some odd running for an hour at shows a day but thats on an old national but give you an idea of usage.

[Seti-Yeti]

Penfold, on 24 Sept 2016 - 1:35 PM, said:

Did you miss a £1k off item 7?

Yep, I concur. Error in sum.

 

I'd annualise the quadrennial costs as well and factor in Alan's painting advise.

[Guest]

Yep, I concur. Error in sum.

 

I'd annualise the quadrennial costs as well and factor in Alan's painting advise.

 

Yep, fixed it! And that's actually a good idea. I shall do this.

[Gareth E]

Some of your costs will vary depending on how you plan to cruise, and how you plan to live.

 

For example: if you move a few miles every 2 weeks, as allowed by the law, your diesel costs will come right down. I cruise for 10 months a year, I use around 10 litres of diesel a month. I only have a little engine, it runs for 2 hours on a litre. Central to this saving is having a gas fridge rather than electric, low energy lights, tv and computer. This enables me have one leisure battery rather than several so when it needs replacing after 2 years the cost is 70p a week rather than 1 pound a day. I have a decent solar array.

 

Further to this, you'll only need to service the engine once a year. Get someone to show you, it's very easy, the cost will come down to £30 a year.

 

You might prefer not to live like this, but the choice is yours.

[Horace42]

Are you looking at the price you might it for.. if so important routine repair work if neglected will reduce the value.

I'm at fault by not having my boat dry-docked and blacked or new anodes fitted..

When moored at home to a permanent 240vac shore supply - via earth leakage device.

My basic fear is minor leakage through ruty pinholes at the water line

. In this respect I have mad the bilge entirely dry

 

Fingers crossed.

 

edited for grammar.

Edited September 27, 2016 by Horace42

[Keeping Up]

In the past couple of years I've spent about £37k in maintenance and repair costs (in addition to the usual fuel, oil, filters, gas, and blacking) and despite that the value of the boat has dropped by nearly £10k. Factor that into your business plan!

[lesrollins]

Well coming up the shroppy I doubt some of the boats are worth 37k it all depends on how frugal you want to live and what colour beer mats you can use for a licence in the window ?

[Alan de Enfield]

Well coming up the shroppy I doubt some of the boats are worth 37k it all depends on how frugal you want to live and what colour beer mats you can use for a licence in the window

 

Presumably you have not read the thread explaining the need for the £37k repair bill

[Guest]

Well, it's been a little while since my initial post and while I'm still not on my own boat, I will be in 3 weeks time. I put the deposit down on a 55ft narrowboat and am just waiting for the survey - with a bit of luck, all should be clear and I'll move on at the start of July. Made an offer of 35k for the boat, which was accepted. I'm really chuffed and have my fingers and toes crossed re the survey.

[cuthound]

Let's hope the survey doesn't show anything of major concern NDY the sales process completes quickly.

[cuthound]

3 hours ago, cuthound said:

"and", not "NDY", (who are a firm of consultants I used to use). Can't imagine why the autocorrect through that in 

 

Edited June 14, 2017 by cuthound
To unmangle the effects of autocorrect.

[Starcoaster]

You should have seen my face last week when I gave a 5k-word article a final read through before submitting it to the client, and saw that "prostatitis" had auto-corrected itself to "prostitutes" in an article in which I had used the word about 40 times...

[Jak]

22 hours ago, welly said:

Well, it's been a little while since my initial post and while I'm still not on my own boat, I will be in 3 weeks time. I put the deposit down on a 55ft narrowboat and am just waiting for the survey - with a bit of luck, all should be clear and I'll move on at the start of July. Made an offer of 35k for the boat, which was accepted. I'm really chuffed and have my fingers and toes crossed re the survey.

Best of luck.  I was relieved when the survey showed my cheapish 1980s hull to be solid.  Bear in mind as my surveyor said - if you are buying "subject to survey" there may well be room for negotiation if faults are found...  Let us know how it goes