Houseboat?

lincroft1710

Magazines such as "Waterway World" and "Canal and Riverboat" often have articles about permanent living aboard as well as loads of ads of boats for sale and letters pages where you could ask similar questions and see if any liveaboards reply. Here in Bedford there were (possibly still are) twenty or so liveaboards who moored at marina during week, cruised River Ouse some weekends then returned to marina. If the mooring is a permanent residential one then Council Tax is payable - they circumvented this in the marina by returning to different mooring - you paid annual mooring fee but were not guaranteed same mooring after voyage. Boats will depreciate, engines require maintenance etc, but nothing in life is free and everything has advantages and disadvantages.

Whatever you decide, wish you well - were I 21, I'd probably be giving it serious consideration.

1sue23

I live in Skipton and moor my boat on the Leeds Liverpool canal and pay £2300 per year for the mooring excluding the licence.The most difficult thing was getting a mooring not many available and the one I have I had to tender for don't consider buying the boat until you have the mooring in place ,having said that it is a fun life and I prefer my boat to my house and am considering moving aboard in the next month just a few more things to sort out ,so good luck in your venture.

barnaby-bear

baibelle wrote: »

I'm hoping this is in the right Forum, I realise it's less of a House and more of a Home.

I've been working on saving a deposit for my first home for a few years now and at 21 have 25K in the bank :j

I'm somewhat single and have been renting very very cheap horrid rooms for the past few years and I'm looking forward to having my own home. In fact I'm pretty sure that over the next year I'm going to have to find somewhere or I'll go crazy!

After a lot of research I have decided to buy a houseboat. I'm still exploring a lot of my concerns and issues with this and I was wondering if any of you moneysavers have lived or are living on one!?

Moneysaving wise I think this will be a good option for me. As I'd have no rent etc, my outgoings will amount to about £300 a month (insurence, fuel, mooring, water rent, maintaining it etc), pretty much what I pay now for my my rent. And I'm guessing far less then I'd be spending on the interest, tax and bills I'd be loosing if I bought a flat?

I'm opting for either buying an older boat and gutting it inside to redo it, or buying a shell and doing all the inside. I have my dad who had done up a fair few houses to help me out and will be able to do it on a budget. Either way I'm hoping that I wont be loosing too much money over the years on it as it ages.

Any thoughts?

- N

There was this thread about it all:

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=958133&highlight=mooring

redcar_2

barnaby-bear wrote: »

There was this thread about it all:

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=958133&highlight=mooring

Just a warning really there are some seriously bad puns towards the end of that thread :rotfl:

Hunkerchuncker

I know a couple of people who live on the Kennet and Avon canal. They don't have a fixed mooring and have to move the boat pretty regularly but the distances aren't huge.

Apparently the winters can be a bit grim on a boat but with every downside ... the summers are great (OK no this summer). I dont think you'll ever get the appreciation in price that you would in a house but if you buy a boat do it up keep it in good condition I would have thought you could make a profit.

I think the real benefits for moneysavers though are the simple lifestyle. Cycle track by the boat so no need for a car. The small amount of space also puts serious limits on what you want to buy because you have to fit it in. Boaters also tend to be very resourceful people I frequently see them making, inventing or just generally conjuring things up out of nowt. Lots to recommend it.

hethmar

My son was thinking about this as a cheaper alternative to flat buying in London.

I think the negatives I see is that a boat is unlikely to appreciate much in value - in fact you could lose money if it develops real problems. I was also concerned about the cost of mooring and the cost of maintenance and insurance. Dont you have to have the boat lifted out of water or something for an inspection every year? Then there was the security aspect. It seems so much easier for intruders to walk on to a boat than to break into a house. And as silly as it may sound, what is the situation re loos and baths etc.?

teabelly

Boat living isn't for everyone. Some friends did it for a few years. Permanent moorings are often hard to find and expensive. You also have to watch the health and safety regulations as with boats when they change you are required to bring them up to the latest standard or you won't get your waterways licence thingy. You usually can't get mortgages on a boat so with 25k you'd get an older bath tub. To get a decent modern, reasonable boat you really need to spend around the 40k mark. Unless you buy a shell and fit it out for a song then you probably won't make a profit when you sell it. Often they go for less than what the owner paid for them. Think my friends paid about 45k for theirs then sold it for 40k a few years later which was actually a good price. This was about 10 years ago so there may have been boat price inflation They had spent a reasonable amount on doing it up and redoing a few things such as changing the layout to make it feel more spacious. It was still only 6 foot across so it felt quite cramped. If you are a little on the portly side or have fat friends then a boating life isn't for you as they literally won't fit down the narrow corridor. Think width of passage down the length of a minibus!

You'll also need to find lots of time for maintenance, dodgy diesel engines, electrical issues and having to spend a couple of hours getting your sewage pumped out every other week depending on how often you go! If there isn't an electricity supply where you are then you could have issues with your normal electrical items needing too much power to run off the inverter in the boat. It is best to get things designed for caravans. Normal low power washing machines can be run off separate generators and that is how my friends had to do their washing as the generator on the boat from the engine wasn't quite powerful enough. Fridges and freezers also present the same issue. You also have to be careful that if you are out all day and you leave things running that the batteries are topped up. Often they'd have to run the engine for a few hours in the evening to top up the batteries. It was noisy and some moorings won't let you run the engine after a certain time so if you are late home from work you can end up with flat batteries. They were also burgled which is quite common as it is difficult to secure a boat and moorings can be in out of the way places.

Basically living on a boat is like camping. If you like camping then you'll love living on a boat

GDB2222

How secure is the mooring, ie how easily can you be turfed off your patch of riverbank by the people who own it (and maybe want to redevelop the site)? When I researched this a while ago, there seemed to be horror stories about thsi happening. On the other hand, there may be thousands of happy boaters who keep quiet, because things are going swimmingly for them.


This looks like a useful link for finding moorings: http://www.bwml.co.uk/
It's the official British Waterways Board moorings site