30 Feet Springer for auction

[Flyboy]

I found this , someone may be interested. I have no connection with it.  Only 2 days left.

https://www.johnpyeauctions.co.uk/lot_details.asp?l=1&lotid=6100860&pageno=1

Edited February 10, 2020 by Flyboy

[ditchcrawler]

22% premium is a bit steep

[Flyboy]

2 hours ago, ditchcrawler said:

22% premium is a bit steep

Yes it is is but not unusual these days. Usually there is vat as well but not in this case.

Edited February 10, 2020 by Flyboy

[Alan de Enfield]

10 minutes ago, Flyboy said:

I found this , someone may be interested. I have no connection with it.  Only 2 days left.

https://www.johnpyeauctions.co.uk/lot_details.asp?l=1&lotid=6100860&pageno=1

I wonder if this is one of those seized by the Cam Conservators ?

Do I recall they were having a cull of 'dumpers' ?

 

No licence issued / displayed for the last couple of years.

Edited February 10, 2020 by Alan de Enfield

[Flyboy]

1 minute ago, Alan de Enfield said:

I wonder if this is one of those seized by the Cam Conservators ?

Probably.

[MtB]

21 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

I wonder if this is one of those seized by the Cam Conservators ?

Do I recall they were having a cull of 'dumpers' ?

 

In which case, I wonder what the basis of their entitlement to sell it happens to be. I'm sure there will be one, but just seizing a boat because it shouldn't be there then auctioning it doesn't seem very 'legal' at first sight.

 

 

[PaulJ]

18 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

I wonder if this is one of those seized by the Cam Conservators ?

Do I recall they were having a cull of 'dumpers' ?

 

No licence issued / displayed for the last couple of years.

Name rings a bell- have a feeling it may the boat that was moored up on the opposite bank for a long time outside the farm. So possible the owner has died or too unwell to use it.

Its on the Ouse anyhow.

[Alan de Enfield]

8 minutes ago, PaulJ said:

Its on the Ouse anyhow.

So it is - at the confluence with the Little Ouse.

 

Maybe its part of the EA 'round-up of non-registration boats.

 

 

[Peter X]

I guess he following might be helpful to anyone considering this boat?...

 

I see its current top bid is £2525, which with the "22% buyer's premium" on top makes it £3080.50 I think.

No photo of the engine or info about its general state?, and I'm not sure what chance a buyer would have to view the boat before the auction ends on (I reckon) Wed 12th at about 1pm.

I see the "winner" has to pay online by Fri 14th Feb and remove the boat by Mon 17th, so you'd have to be in a position to do those.

The ad says the boat is "To be collected directly from the salerooms by the bidder or their own couriers " ... Really?!!!, are they on the water? Where? That could be fun! Does the buyer have to turn up to some awkward  location with their own lorry and trailer?

 

So, any Springer (or Saab engine) fans out there, do you feel lucky?

 

 

I'm not in the market to buy a boat, at least for the time being, and may never be, but it's an interesting topic to follow.

[Peter X]

PS: The phone number they give seems to be the head office of John Pye Auctions in Nottingham, but where's the boat I wonder??? Clear as mud!!!

Anyone interested would need to call them and make some enquiries?

[Alan de Enfield]

10 minutes ago, Peter X said:

I see its current top bid is £2525, which with the "22% buyer's premium" on top makes it £3080.50 I think.

PLUS VAT

 

So add another £600 (ish)

 

The post code location is shown. (PE38 0PP)

See post #8

Edited February 10, 2020 by Alan de Enfield

[MtB]

3 minutes ago, Peter X said:

I guess he following might be helpful to anyone considering this boat?...

 

I see its current top bid is £2525, which with the "22% buyer's premium" on top makes it £3080.50 I think.

No photo of the engine or info about its general state?, and I'm not sure what chance a buyer would have to view the boat before the auction ends on (I reckon) Wed 12th at about 1pm.

I see the "winner" has to pay online by Fri 14th Feb and remove the boat by Mon 17th, so you'd have to be in a position to do those.

The ad says the boat is "To be collected directly from the salerooms by the bidder or their own couriers " ... Really?!!!, are they on the water? Where? That could be fun! Does the buyer have to turn up to some awkward  location with their own lorry and trailer?

 

So, any Springer (or Saab engine) fans out there, do you feel lucky?

 

 

I'm not in the market to buy a boat, at least for the time being, and may never be, but it's an interesting topic to follow.

 

In the light of all this I judged the current bid to represent what they call "fully priced", and decided not to bid. I was also concerned about the comment that VAT @  20% would be added 'if applicable' or some such term, making the potential price at the current bid #3,696.60. Plus the cost of immediate recovery, licencing, BSS probably, insurance, painting it and bringing it up generally to a decent standard, makes it look no longer much of a bargain to me. 

 

Top money for a Springer like that in tip-top nick is about 20K I'd say, so still a reasonable deal for someone with time to spare. 

 

 

 

[Alan de Enfield]

1 minute ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

In the light of all this I judged the current bid to represent what they call "fully priced", and decided not to bid. I was also concerned about the comment that VAT @  20% would be added 'if applicable' or some such term, making the potential price at the current bid #3,696.60. Plus the cost of immediate recovery, licencing, BSS probably, insurance, painting it and bringing it up generally to a decent standard, makes it look no longer much of a bargain to me. 

 

Top money for a Springer like that in tip-top nick is about 20K I'd say, so still a reasonable deal for someone with time to spare. 

 

 

 

As a 1974 boat it would be one of Sam's very early ones :

I reckon the greatest risk / potential expense would be the unknown condition of the hull.

 

Sam Springer spotted the growing market for purpose-built live-aboard boats in the late 1960s when he was working as a steel fabricator making water tanks in Market Harborough, close to the Grand Union and River Welland. He decided to move into boat-building later claiming “I used to build water tanks, building boats is the same thing but in reverse”. Although his boats were well constructed, Springer had a reputation for using whatever steel was available, meaning that his hulls weren’t always as thick as they could have been. His approach can be summarised by the popular yarn that early in his career, Springer acquired some scrap steel that had once formed an old gasometer and drove back and forwards over it with a truck to remove the bend so it was flat enough to use. Because of such shortcuts, his boats were recognised as providing great value for money and his yard was soon knocking out 400 a year, accounting for almost 50 per cent of the market and at a much lower price than any competition.

[Peter X]

9 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

PLUS VAT

 

So add another £600 (ish)

 

The post code location is shown. (PE38 0PP)

See post #8

Sorry, I'm confused here!

 

(1) MtB seems to have seen something about 20% VAT somewhere?

But the ad says "Vat: N" so is there to be VAT?

I'm not sure what VAT rate would apply to a boat sold in an online auction?

 

 

(2) Does post #8 give that location for the boat?

PE38 0PP is on the Great Ouse near Ely, which does sound more likely than in an auction house just north of Nottingham city centre!

The photos show the boat on the water somewhere; there?

 

This topic is a fun little one for us amateur detectives! It's one of those topics that could keep on giving.

[Alan de Enfield]

4 minutes ago, Peter X said:

But the ad says "Vat: N" so is there to be VAT?

I'm not sure what VAT rate would apply to a boat sold in an online auction?

It looks as if you are correct VAT is NOT applicable (my mistake)

VAT is USUALLY added to the buyers premium.

VAT can be added to an auction if the circumstances require it.

 

An auction I attend regularly has a 25% Buyers premium to which is added 20% VAT so the actual price you pay is 30% higher than the winning bid.

It does catch out newbies, particularly when bidding on items priced "into the £000's"

[MtB]

7 minutes ago, Peter X said:

(1) MtB seems to have seen something about 20% VAT somewhere?

 

Yes, the listing I read said VAT to be added "if appropriate" or some such term, leaving the reader to wonder how appropriateness would be determined. I concluded VAT would depend on whether the seller of the boat was VAT registered, the auctioneer being their agent. And the auction fee is almost bound to be subject to VAT.

 

9 minutes ago, Peter X said:

But the ad says "Vat: N" so is there to be VAT?

 

The listing didn't say that when I read it. It must have changed. 

 

 

 

[PaulJ]

19 minutes ago, Peter X said:

(2) Does post #8 give that location for the boat?

PE38 0PP is on the Great Ouse near Ely, which does sound more likely than in an auction house just north of Nottingham city centre!

The photos show the boat on the water somewhere; there?

 

This topic is a fun little one for us amateur detectives! It's one of those topics that could keep on giving.

Some of the pictures show the boat outside The Ship-which is the postcode Alan has given. Rest of the pics look to be taken on its mooring (which I think was on the opposite bank and where it used to be moored)

So if you buy it you get the chance to immediately either celebrate or commiserate at a decent pub too ?

[Peter X]

Aha, thank you Alan &MtB for clarifying thing about the VAT...

So if it applies to the "buyer's premium" but not to the money paid to the seller of the boat (sounds plausible to me), I think effectively the purchaser would (unless they are a VAT registered trader able to reclaim the VAT back off HMRC at the end of the quarter!) be paying 22 *1.2 =26.4% on top of their actual winning bid!

Thus the current top bidder of £2525 would end up paying that * 1.264, i.e.  £3500.76. If someone  just outbids them they might get the boat for under £4000; depends how much they like it and what it might cost to fix up (it's described as being a project!)...

Forgive me for going into this much detail, I'm a bit of a nerd about financial stuff like VAT!

 

I probably wouldn't be available as crew to help move it, at least this month, because I'm not yet ready to go boating again until the progress of my recovery from my operation last month becomes clearer. I'm due to see my doctors this morning actually, about some therapy starting on Thursday and lasting until early March! Couldn't do that if I was away boating up in East Anglia!

 

[Peter X]

Oops, mental arithmetic error there, £2525 * 1.264 is actually £3510.76 ... little different.

[Alan de Enfield]

1 hour ago, Peter X said:

Oops, mental arithmetic error there, £2525 * 1.264 is actually £3510.76 ... little different.

Are you bragging ?

 

I certainly couldn't work that out 'in my head'.

As the guy with constipation said, "I could work it out with a pencil and a piece of paper".

[WotEver]

1 hour ago, Peter X said:

So if it applies to the "buyer's premium" but not to the money paid to the seller of the boat (sounds plausible to me), I think effectively the purchaser would (unless they are a VAT registered trader able to reclaim the VAT back off HMRC at the end of the quarter!) be paying 22 *1.2 =26.4% on top of their actual winning bid!

Thus the current top bidder of £2525 would end up paying that * 1.264, i.e.  £3500.76.

 

1 hour ago, Peter X said:

Oops, mental arithmetic error there, £2525 * 1.264 is actually £3510.76 ... little different.

Nope, neither. 
 

£2525 x 1.264 = £3191.60 

1 minute ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Are you bragging ?

 

I certainly couldn't work that out 'in my head'.

Neither could Peter

 

I just did an approximation of 2525 plus a quarter (say 650) and knew his figures had to be wrong. 

[WotEver]

I was taught in my maffs class always to do a rough approximation in my head prior to performing the actual calculation. It’s a quick way of knowing if you’re in the right ball park. 

[Mike Jordan]

The original cost was less than the current bid! I'm always amused by the myths surrounding Springer boats. At about the time this one was built I visited his yard and met Sam, a rough diamond with a line in rougher language. He told me that he had specialised in making petrol storage tanks for the filling station boom in the 60s and had made his first boat shell for his own use, from that point he was asked to build more for other people and went into mass production. They were being made in conditions that can't have been legal from a H&S point of view even then. The (rusty) 3/16"steel plate was being dropped off a lorry at the factory gate and sliced up by a man with a gas axe and a few templates. The parts were then moved into the shop to be rolled, folded etc before being welded up by operatives working with multi position stick welder S. The welds were not chipped but simply spray painted over. I'm certain that the machinery in use would not have any chance of handling gas holder plate either folding ,rolling, or any other operations. Down the years I have seen two shells built very roughly out of gas holder plate. One was built in a farm yard and I think a tractor may have been used as suggested. Both were easily identifiable as having been made from very thick ( and not very flat) plate, but I'm sure they are still out there.I shudder to think of the long term results of underground petrol tanks made to the standard of a springer shell. His expertise in building tanks was supported by one he built that I think crossed the Atlantic? powered by a 1.5 BMC diesel.

[Alan de Enfield]

16 minutes ago, Mike Jordan said:

His expertise in building tanks was supported by one he built that I think crossed the Atlantic? powered by a 1.5 BMC diesel.

Belying their reputation, Springer boats also appear to be impressively hard-wearing with thousands still in use despite the fact the company closed down in the mid-1990s. And Springer boats aren’t just confined to the English waterways – in 1990, the boatyard built the Typhoo Atlantic Challenger, a 37-foot craft shaped like a bottle that crossed the Atlantic from New York to Falmouth. Not bad for a company whose first boats were made from a scrapped gasometer.

 

 

 

16 minutes ago, Mike Jordan said:

The original cost was less than the current bid!

No idea of the date of the advert but .........….

 

30 foot £6350 + VAT

38 foot £8920 + VAT

 

Edited February 11, 2020 by Alan de Enfield

[Flyboy]

12 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:

PLUS VAT

 

So add another £600 (ish)

 

The post code location is shown. (PE38 0PP)

See post #8

There's no VAT on this auction, just the buyers premium.