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How far in advance should you start looking for a narrowboat?


Alexis Gkantiragas

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Hey folks, 

 

I am aware this may be a bit of a 'how long is a piece of string' question but roughly how far in advance should you start looking for a narrowboat? 

 

For context I am looking to purchase a roughly 30ft narrowboat in roughly one years time. How long does it usually take for a sale to be agreed upon? Will any boats I look at now actually be on the market by the time I am ready to buy? 

 

Thanks in advance! 

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1 minute ago, Alexis Gkantiragas said:

Hey folks, 

 

I am aware this may be a bit of a 'how long is a piece of string' question but roughly how far in advance should you start looking for a narrowboat? 

 

For context I am looking to purchase a roughly 30ft narrowboat in roughly one years time. How long does it usually take for a sale to be agreed upon? Will any boats I look at now actually be on the market by the time I am ready to buy? 

 

Thanks in advance! 

If the boats are any good they will be long sold.  If they are still on sale they will be a definite no-no to buy, wrecks.

 

What you need to start looking for NOW is a mooring, much more difficult to find than a boat.

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The market is so active at the moment that a good boat will have a sale agreed in days. If you see a boat you like you need to offer on it straight away otherwise someone else will pick it up. This is the Covid effect. It was a sellers market before Covid hit but it has only magnified since the lockdown ended. I am not sure though about the 30 ft end of the market. 30ft is short for a narrowboat so maybe not so much in demand...but what do I know.

Normally you agree a sale there and then .....subject to survey, test sail, the way the winds blowing....and then it can take 3-5 weeks to sort out the detail .....usually the time taken to get a survey done is the main delay. Maybe say a week to organise the survey, a week to wait for the results and a week to sort out transfer. Buyers do drop out during the process and not just for the survey results so boats that have a 'sale agreed' may come back on the market.

We sold a boat this year. Sale agreed on 20th March. Surveyed on 22nd March. Sale completed 7th June......but the lockdown go it the way. That was a long wait.

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7 minutes ago, Tracy D'arth said:

If the boats are any good they will be long sold.  If they are still on sale they will be a definite no-no to buy, wrecks.

 

What you need to start looking for NOW is a mooring, much more difficult to find than a boat.

Agree with the first statement.

On the mooring, it all depends where you want to moor.

If its not London, then there are loads of marina berths to be had so finding a spot is no problem. When we bought our first canal boat, we bought it via a broker and one condition was that he find us a berth in the marina they were based in. The boat we have just sold was sold via a different broker to a couple new to the canals and that deal was done offering a berth to the buyers in the brokers marina.

If however you want a nice canalside mooring then I agree. Start looking now.

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You can buy a boat within 30 minutes - roll up , look at it, hand over the cash (an Aldi carrier bag is the recommended packaging) and drive away.

 

Alternatively :

 

Roll up, look at boat, umm and arr a bit go home, think about it, phone the seller and put in an offer, seller comes back with a counter offer, back & forth a few times and finally agree on a price. Pay a deposit and then try and find a surveyor, surveyor may be busy and can only come in 3 weeks.

Have survey, surveyor finds faults and you try and renegotiate the price with the seller, seller refuses to move so you either pay the price or pull out (possibly losing your deposit)

 

Find another boat and start the process again.

You have Ummed & Arred too long and the boat has been sold.

 

Find another boat and start the process again.

 

Buying a boat can be as simple and quick as you want it to be, or it can take 6 months and be very stressful.

 

Everyone has different ideas of the 'best way' so its really up to you as to how you want to do it.

Edited by Alan de Enfield
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It may be worth looking at a few boats so you can get an idea of the market and to refine what you're actually looking for. Beyond that, it's pointless to look in earnest before you're in a position to buy. Use the time before then to do your research so that when you do buy you don't join the massed ranks of those who buy badly.

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36 minutes ago, manicpb said:

I'm just going to echo the above opinions. Worth dipping your toe in for some market research but you'll be gutted if you find the boat you dreamed of and don't have the money ready...cause it will probably won't be there when you have!

 

It's all cosmetics and emotion, without understanding what you may be buying. Research is important. 

 

 

Edited by Higgs
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Agree with all of a above. I followed the market for a couple of years to get a feel for prices etc, but then I do the same with houses. The important thing, after securing a mooring, is to have the funds sorted when you are ready so you can act quickly on your chosen boat. Best of luck. 

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2 hours ago, Alexis Gkantiragas said:

Hey folks, 

 

I am aware this may be a bit of a 'how long is a piece of string' question but roughly how far in advance should you start looking for a narrowboat? 

 

For context I am looking to purchase a roughly 30ft narrowboat in roughly one years time. How long does it usually take for a sale to be agreed upon? Will any boats I look at now actually be on the market by the time I am ready to buy? 

 

Thanks in advance! 

I first saw this boat at 1100 and paid fully for it at 1120. I have done several quickly in say an hour but twenty minutes is my record. Muck the seller of a good boat about and you will lose it they sell pretty much immediately at normal times and its even hotter at present.

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A boat that is on the market for a year sounds very risky.

You should have at least £2K in cash after buying the boat.

In my opinion 30 foot bow to stern NB is too short, you need 6ft bed, 8ft galley, Shower is 3ft, loo and wh basin 3f, saloon 8 foot. Yes you can get a boat with snub nose and trad stern, but I would not ve looking at trad sterns under 40ft if you are going to liveaboard. Making up a sofabed is camping.

Sometimes a good little boatt omes up on here, 

 

 

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15 minutes ago, LadyG said:

A boat that is on the market for a year sounds very risky.

You should have at least £2K in cash after buying the boat.

In my opinion 30 foot bow to stern NB is too short, you need 6ft bed, 8ft galley, Shower is 3ft, loo and wh basin 3f, saloon 8 foot. Yes you can get a boat with snub nose and trad stern, but I would not ve looking at trad sterns under 40ft if you are going to liveaboard. Making up a sofabed is camping.

Sometimes a good little boatt omes up on here, 

 

 

 

It may help to also have some space (6 foot ?) allocated to an engine, gearbox and shaft.

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4 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

That's a bit norty (but nice) - you mean allowing space for a metre wide switch-panel ?

 

4 minutes ago, TheBiscuits said:

Just over 3 foot for those if you're using a 1000mm switch panel ;)

 

I'm sticking with "Great minds think alike" ...

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There are very few 30ft narrowboats around now.Loads of 50+ footers,so finding a 30 footer might be difficult.I have recently sold my 30ft narrowboat which took me nearly a year to find when I bought it.

The smaller narrow boats were more popular in the 70s and 80s,but with more people wanting to live aboard few builders are bothering with them now.

When you find a 30 footer it is likely to be pretty old.Mine was built in 1978.

A survey will be essential (even on a newer boat) so be careful.

There are plenty of Springers around but they were mostly built of thinner steel than modern boats,and any you find will most likely have been overplated.If it has been done properly then it's not a problem.Only a survey can establish this.

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5 hours ago, Alexis Gkantiragas said:

Hey folks, 

 

I am aware this may be a bit of a 'how long is a piece of string' question but roughly how far in advance should you start looking for a narrowboat? 

 

For context I am looking to purchase a roughly 30ft narrowboat in roughly one years time. How long does it usually take for a sale to be agreed upon? Will any boats I look at now actually be on the market by the time I am ready to buy? 

 

Thanks in advance! 

There are one or two new builds around 30ft, so you could plan your delivery date to coincide with having the funds.

Of course it won't be cheap.  If you say what your likely budget is then you may get more helpful replies, but without a doubt if a boat is half decent then it won't be on the market for long.

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It's a good idea to know you have the money to close a deal before looking seriously.

 

Because it may take a while to find what you want, if you are going to live aboard it also seems wise to be looking six to twelve months ahead of when your other accommodation options aren't available any more. 

 

Transaction timescale may vary from same day of viewing (for cash or bank transfer without a survey) through to two or three months if you want a survey and have to wait for a surveyor and dry dock. 

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2 hours ago, LadyG said:

A boat that is on the market for a year sounds very risky.

You should have at least £2K in cash after buying the boat.

In my opinion 30 foot bow to stern NB is too short, you need 6ft bed, 8ft galley, Shower is 3ft, loo and wh basin 3f, saloon 8 foot. Yes you can get a boat with snub nose and trad stern, but I would not ve looking at trad sterns under 40ft if you are going to liveaboard. Making up a sofabed is camping.

Sometimes a good little boatt omes up on here, 

 

 

 

!7' saloon - mine.

 

I worked on over 100 boats, it always struck me as odd that many boats were very short on space, in the area in which most time was going to be spent. 

 

 

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5 hours ago, Tracy D'arth said:

If the boats are any good they will be long sold.  If they are still on sale they will be a definite no-no to buy, wrecks.

 

What you need to start looking for NOW is a mooring, much more difficult to find than a boat.

Our boat must be an exception. It had been on brokerage at  Calcutt Boatyard for approximately 3 years. We  knew this by adverts in the boating press. The boat was somewhat tatty on the outside but the inside had been well looked after and was clean and tidy. 

We had a survey which turned up nothing of major consequence. This and the items found in the survey was a wonderful bargaining chip to get the price down. We also got the boat blacked too as part of the deal. 
We spent some 18 months looking for a boat but always came back to this one.

After back to metal repaint and a "few" grand we still have her.

Picture was when being surveyed.

Reeves Hull and a Weltonfield fit out, similar to a boat Alan De Enfield had.

 

DSCF1912.jpg

 

 

Edited by Ray T
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To answer your question I would say when you have the money start looking . If you see a boat you like and you have the money you can start negotiating but without the funds you are wasting your own and the sellers time. Some idea of what your budget will be would help as many on this Forum like searching out suitable boats for others . 

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Some people say you don't find a boat, the boat finds you.

 

My advice is to spend time looking and figure out what kind of boat you need, they all have different layouts, different quirks. Some are designed and suitable for liveaboard, others not so. Work out what your priorities are for a boat and aim to find one which ticks most boxes, while also remembering you will probably have to make some compromises/sacrifices somewhere unless you have one built to your specification. (££££££££) 

 

Some boat brokers will give you the keys and let you look at boats on your own which may help give you an idea as to what would suit most. 

 

There's also many useful Youtube channels which share some insight but be mindful that not all are experienced boaters.

 

 

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