Donkey
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Posts posted by Donkey
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25% is ridiculously high, it's normlly around 10% for a fully mananged service....
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All though not a great believer in BTL for purely investment purposes, I think in the OP case it may well be worth considering the rental option, particularly as there seem to be a lot of people who have sold a property prior to buying another one who are looking for "short term" / 6 month rentals. If you are not local (or living in Wales which requires registration / exams to be a landlord), then an agent is essential. Even if you did not make any money, (unlikely), you would still be retaining the value of the property should you ever change your mind, and potentially any rental income could go towards paying off a loan if you need one to fund a boat purchase?
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...hope it goes well for you...good luck, and do keep us informed, it would make a great thread!!
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On some of the areas of our newly painted boat that had started to lift I just sanded them back, primed and topcoated with a brush and those areas were still sound 3 years later...OK the finish was not as good, but perfectly acceptable.
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..a few years ago we had our boat painted by a "professional" boat painter at significant cost and in some areas the paint started to lift within 3 months.....painter not interested...
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After several years of hiring for the odd week we considered this as an option, or at least spending 6 months full time crusing the canals when retired, but after due consideration we decided to join a syndicate boat instead to see how we would get on with more frequent / longer cruises. (Prior to this we had only hired a boat for a week at a time but we wanted to experience spending longer on a boat).
We really enjoyed the opportunity to have "longer" cruises, but after a few 2 week long cruises we realised that was probably the most time we would want to spend on a boat in one go and shelved any thoughts we had about "longer term" cruising.
If it's something you really want to do then go for it, but initially I would suggest trying out a longer period of boating before commiting to the "full time" option?
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6 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:
It is ~30 miles end to end.
10 hours (not a particularly long day in the Summer) at 3mph and there you have it.
..you have forgotten to add in all the extra time for the locks
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...it actually says "Lister Dursley" on the cover....?
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..a few years ago we "borrowed" a boat for a week of a friend who was a resident / permanently moored at the "Herons Nest" marina near Llangatock / Crickhowell...
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..probably the best thread on this forum....keep going chaps!!!!
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Today - 22nd March 2022 - hope nobody has a holiday booked on the Brecon canal this week....
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..ta for the replies, I have checked the website and the awards are thro'/ from Towergate insurers, so probably not a true reflection of actual customer feedback?
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In our years of boating we have had the (mainly) pleasure of mooring up at a variety of marinas. More recently we moved to a Marina that has been "voted" Marina of the year on several occasions. We were "happy" to pay the premium prices they seemd to charge at every slight opportunity, but we had assumed "reasurringly expensive" would also be indicative of a "premium service"? How wrong could we have been! A catalogue of general incompetance and a complete failure of even basic communications when dealing with anything from servicing, boat safety checks and an inability to match invoices with any work actually carried out. (To be fair any engineering work that was carried out was fine, it was the "system" supporting this that seems to have major problems).
I am not sure whether it was a general lack of resources, training or management or a combination of all of them, but a Company that clearly puts profit ahead of customer service, and nothing was actually achieved when these concerns were raised directly with "the management".
I fully understand the need for any commercial organisation to make a profit, but I would also expect at least a reasonable level of customer service to go with this, particularly in what is essentially a customer focused business?
Perhaps we were just "unlucky"?? (Although speaking to some of the other "locals" suggested that we were not alone with some of our issues).
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..some nice properties, not sure whether I would prefer a canalside or a riverside property.....ideally on a hill with a nice view
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..great thread...I now look at this every day....keep'em coming!!
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33 minutes ago, MtB said:
The problem with winter I find (if there is one at all), is the dark and the mud. The cold is not a problem.
Trudging across a waterlogged field, then a muddy, slippery towpath for 1/4 mile in the pitch dark is a major disincentive to living on the boat in winter, I find. Totally different if you moor in a marina!
..very much. When you are "casual/holiday cruising your days are (weather permiting), normally filled with "moving / going somewhere", ie always something to do. Probably a different kettel of fish when you are essentially moored up for days on end during inclement weather.....but I fully accept each to their own..
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16 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:
This is happening to more and more boaters (us included). It is not the boating that we give up, just getting off C&RT waters because of their poor management & maintenance of the canals. It used to be fun, its now becoming just 'hard work'.
..yes we have certainly noticed a difference in the relatively short time we have been boating, from initially hiring boats to buying into one a few years ago.
Particulalrly as age takes it toll and SWMBO was really struggling with some of the locks. (..never able to get the hang of steering the thing otherwise I would have done them instead..)
..may also be worth the OP checking out some of the (many) Youtube vids by those people who are actually doing it for real, my current favourite is "Country House gent"..
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As above, you really need to hire for a week or more, (and ideally during a "cold" season?)
We used to rent and ended up buying into a boat as we really wanted to spend "serious" time on a narrow boat once we retired. However we actually found our "natural limit" was only about 2 weeks! (We had dreams of spending 6 months aboard!) For us Winter on a narrow boat would not be an option.
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We recently sold our boat through a broker, it was 2007 and had no bill of sale and no RCD documentation. (The broker never queried it?)
The buyer had a survey carried out and knocked the price down, but we still got more than we paid for it 6 years ago, so generally happy..
Any recommendations for boat painters on or near the Trent & Mersey?
in Boat Building & Maintenance
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..not sure about good ones, but I would not recommend "Oxon Boat painters"...no guarantee, paint starts to peel after 3 months, (probably because they painted it in an unheated polly tunnel over Winter)...