Boat price register comparing advertised/realized prices

[Momac]

The price boat sold at  may be misleading .

My present boat had defects found at survey and I negotiated a price reduction. The price I paid might look low but then I immediately spent a significant sum making good the defects .

I  think brokers and owners will not reveal actual sale prices .

[MtB]

4 hours ago, rusty69 said:

Put me down for four. 

 

I've been trying to sell my 1993 narrowboat for ages now, asking price £8m.

I'd happily accept an offer of £2m from either of you. Bargain!

[Athy]

16 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

I've been trying to sell my 1993 narrowboat for ages now, asking price £8m.

I'd happily accept an offer of £2m from either of you. Bargain!

Your point, though made with a degree of levity, is a good one: some sellers build in a discount when pricing their boats, so that they can cheerily reduce it by £5,000 and the eager buyer thinks that he has a bargain, while the seller walks smugly away with the price which he wanted in the first place.

[rusty69]

25 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

I've been trying to sell my 1993 narrowboat for ages now, asking price £8m.

I'd happily accept an offer of £2m from either of you. Bargain!

Does it include a working Smartgauge? 

[Alan de Enfield]

7 minutes ago, rusty69 said:

Does it include a working Smartgauge? 

Probably not so just deduct £10

[rusty69]

7 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Probably not so just deduct £10

I need a boat with at least two faulty Smartgauge though. 

[magictime]

1 hour ago, Athy said:

Your point, though made with a degree of levity, is a good one: some sellers build in a discount when pricing their boats, so that they can cheerily reduce it by £5,000 and the eager buyer thinks that he has a bargain, while the seller walks smugly away with the price which he wanted in the first place.

Only 'some'? I assumed it was par for the course, as it is with houses, to start out with a somewhat 'aspirational' price in the expectation of being knocked down a bit. Who wants to be the awkward sod insisting on full asking price when other sellers are open to offers?

[Athy]

6 minutes ago, magictime said:

Only 'some'? I assumed it was par for the course, as it is with houses, to start out with a somewhat 'aspirational' price in the expectation of being knocked down a bit. Who wants to be the awkward sod insisting on full asking price when other sellers are open to offers?

Yes, only some. The last house I sold went for the price which I initially asked, and so did the last boat I sold. I don't think I was awkward, and neither (as far as I know) did the buyers. It's a question of determining a realistic price.

On the other hand, when I'm doing the record fairs, I often price discs at more than I expect to get, and then make reductions for customers if I like the look of their face or of their money. I guess it's a different environment; it's customary for a collector to look at a £12 record and say "Will you take ten for this?"

 

[David Mack]

8 hours ago, Neil2 said:

Well Magictime's poll wasn't very helpful was it?  All it tells me is that it's quite possible to buy a boat for 25% of its asking price

 

25% of or 25% off?

8 hours ago, alan_fincher said:

 

And do you think all brokers will freely and honestly supply that information, (particularly if you as each one every time a boat is sold!)

And alert every buyer in the market how much off the askimg price to offer? No way would they do that!

[magictime]

52 minutes ago, Athy said:

Yes, only some. The last house I sold went for the price which I initially asked, and so did the last boat I sold. I don't think I was awkward, and neither (as far as I know) did the buyers. It's a question of determining a realistic price.

Fair enough, but I think I'd be left wondering if I could have got a bit more!

54 minutes ago, Athy said:

On the other hand, when I'm doing the record fairs, I often price discs at more than I expect to get, and then make reductions for customers if I like the look of their face or of their money. I guess it's a different environment; it's customary for a collector to look at a £12 record and say "Will you take ten for this?"

No more customary than it is to offer five or ten percent below asking price for a house or boat, though, surely?

[Athy]

4 hours ago, magictime said:

Fair enough, but I think I'd be left wondering if I could have got a bit more!

No more customary than it is to offer five or ten percent below asking price for a house or boat, though, surely?

In my personal experience, as I have just shown, yes.

[Neil2]

On 9/11/2017 at 17:38, Athy said:

Yes, only some. The last house I sold went for the price which I initially asked, and so did the last boat I sold. I don't think I was awkward, and neither (as far as I know) did the buyers. It's a question of determining a realistic price.

On the other hand, when I'm doing the record fairs, I often price discs at more than I expect to get, and then make reductions for customers if I like the look of their face or of their money. I guess it's a different environment; it's customary for a collector to look at a £12 record and say "Will you take ten for this?"

 

I agree.  Much as I like a bit of horse trading the common practice of overpricing boats, and houses, just wastes everyone's time in the long run.  OTOH there are marketplaces where it's almost accepted that you haggle, where it's part of the fun of the trade.   I once haggled over the price of a pint but that is probably going a bit far... 

[matty40s]

On 11/09/2017 at 15:50, rusty69 said:

I need a boat with at least two faulty Smartgauge though. 

Add  a.couple of grand and I am sure someone will find some for you.

 

[MtB]

On 11/09/2017 at 15:33, rusty69 said:

Does it include a working Smartgauge? 

 

Nope. Two!

[TheBiscuits]

On 11/09/2017 at 10:10, Alan de Enfield said:

Pure speculation but I would hazard a guess that of the 30,000+  boats licenced/registered by C&RT considerably less than 1% are what could be called 'vintage engined' or 'historic' boats

I'm sure someone will have a register of historic / vintage, ex-working, craft.

Discounts -  No. of licences applied to.
Prompt Payment  22,861
Historic 266
Disconnected Waterway 401
Electric 88
Avon 11
Witham Sailing Club 9
Historic Unpowered Butty 51
Portable Powered Boat 88
Table 4. Number of licences to which different discounts applied.

 

Taken from the stage 2 report on the licensing consultation, and I suspect that most owners of ex-working boats would be aware of the discount available.

 

Edited September 14, 2017 by TheBiscuits

[Alan de Enfield]

1 hour ago, TheBiscuits said:

Discounts -  No. of licences applied to.
Prompt Payment  22,861
Historic 266
Disconnected Waterway 401
Electric 88
Avon 11
Witham Sailing Club 9
Historic Unpowered Butty 51
Portable Powered Boat 88
Table 4. Number of licences to which different discounts applied.

 

Taken from the stage 2 report on the licensing consultation, and I suspect that most owners of ex-working boats would be aware of the discount available.

 

Many thanks - "worse" than I thought (or better depending on your point of view)

[Athy]

1 hour ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Many thanks - "worse" than I thought (or better depending on your point of view)

But take into account the more modern boats, built for leisure, which have vintage engines - these will far outnumber the actual historic craft, though I have no idea by what ratio.

[Alan de Enfield]

6 minutes ago, Athy said:

But take into account the more modern boats, built for leisure, which have vintage engines - these will far outnumber the actual historic craft, though I have no idea by what ratio.

Indeed - but in view of the numbers of 'new' NBs built per annum, and the percentage of those that have 'vintage engines' I'm doubting that the total vintage engine boats exceeds 1000 (no evidence, just gut feeling) with only 266 'originals'  - way below what I expected.

[Athy]

8 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Indeed - but in view of the numbers of 'new' NBs built per annum, and the percentage of those that have 'vintage engines' I'm doubting that the total vintage engine boats exceeds 1000 (no evidence, just gut feeling) with only 266 'originals'  - way below what I expected.

I of course have no evidence either, but your figure sounds far too low.

[Alan de Enfield]

20 minutes ago, Athy said:

I of course have no evidence either, but your figure sounds far too low.

Its an interesting discussion :

C&RT are the largest (by far) Inland waterways licencing authority.

The number of licences C&RT are issuing has fallen from about 33,000 3 years ago to about 30,000 now

How many 'old boats' are actually scrapped ? - most seem to get a second life being for sale at Whilton, and then onto London as Liveaboards.

How many new boats are being built annually, I know there are a good number of builders building a 'couple or three' per annum a few 'middle sized' builders and a small number of 'production line' builders. What would your estimate of annual build rate be ? (1,000 - 2,000 or more)

 

If new boats are being built at the rate of 2000 per annum, and C&RTs registrations are falling by similar figures that must mean that 4000 boat per annum are being scrapped'

I know there are other 'authorities' with the main one being the EA.

The last detailed breakdown of figures I have was for 2008 where :

BW (C&RT) reported 32,604 total boats registered (Leisure, business, powered and unpowered)

EA reported 23,300 of which 16,600 were on the Thames - I would suggest that very few of those would be NBs.

The Lake District reported 10,400 - I would suggest that very few of these would be NBs.

Loch Lomond reported 5700 - I would suggest that very few of these would be NBs.

[Athy]

There are more questions than answers!

I can't imagine that 1,000 + new narrowboats are built per year, though I can imagine that figure being met or exceeded if one counts cabin cruisers and such in the total.

It is indeed true that few narrowboats appear to meet a sudden death, most of them just gradually fade away (and by no means all of these pass through that large Midlands marina during this process). I can recall seeing n/b's being actually scrapped on only two occasions. That does not mean, of course, that many more aren't scrapped whilst I'm not looking!

 

[WotEver]

 

2 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Many thanks - "worse" than I thought (or better depending on your point of view)

Well, you said "considerably less than 1%" and it's around 0.8% so I'd say you were bang on the money. 

[David Mack]

On 14/09/2017 at 12:14, TheBiscuits said:

I suspect that most owners of ex-working boats would be aware of the discount available.

 

Aware - yes, but not necessarily eligible. For example boats with full length conversions are not eligible for the discount.

[alan_fincher]

On 9/14/2017 at 13:18, Alan de Enfield said:

Many thanks - "worse" than I thought (or better depending on your point of view)

 

On 9/14/2017 at 14:47, Alan de Enfield said:

Indeed - but in view of the numbers of 'new' NBs built per annum, and the percentage of those that have 'vintage engines' I'm doubting that the total vintage engine boats exceeds 1000 (no evidence, just gut feeling) with only 266 'originals'  - way below what I expected.

 

13 hours ago, David Mack said:

Aware - yes, but not necessarily eligible. For example boats with full length conversions are not eligible for the discount.

Yes quite,

I don't think you can read too much into the number of licences where the "historic" discount is applied, because there is great inconsistency in who bothers to apply, and particularly whether BW and now CRT grant it.

Flamingo is a very historically significant boat, and was one of the very last in regular trade.  It is in very original condition apart from a full length cabin conversion.  Theoretically this should disqualify it for the discount, so I have never applied for it.  However owners of other "eqully converted" ex working boats have said on here that they have fought for and got it.

I have no idea how many "historics" that don't strictly meet the CRT criteria get it, (and indeed how many do not that could).

I also suspect that the description "historic unpowered butty" in the above breakdown is wrong.  The "butty" discount" does not require the boat to be "historic".  It is also not clear if the "Historic" number already includes the "historic butties", but I think it would.  You could not, I think, add all these numbers together to get total discounted licences issued.  A single boat could qualify for (say) "historic", "butty" and "disconnected waterway", I think.

Finally not all "historics" have a vintage engine.

Edited September 16, 2017 by alan_fincher

[MtB]

On 16/09/2017 at 09:22, alan_fincher said:

 

Finally not all "historics" have a vintage engine.

 

And finally finally, what counts as a 'vintage engine'?

A Gardner 2LW made in 1993 with enclosed flywheel and electric start?

A 1975 BMC 1.8?

My Chinese Kingfisher KD36?

A Lister SR2?

A Beta Marine BD3?

 

 

Or any diesel engine without turbocharger, common rail injection and computer control perhaps?