Mooring/upkeep costs seem so expensive? Help a newbie out here.

[Avi1251]

Good afternoon folks,

 

I'm a newbie here, after too many years of working hard, I'm currently looking at getting a canal boat and living out my dream of living on the waterways.

 

However, I'm a bit agast at the costs of mooring/upkeep and just wanted some clarity from more seasoned vets..

 

Upon researching, I've been told that you can park up in one area only for 14 days rent free and then you are expected to move onto a new area all together. Can I firstly ask whether this is true?

 

The issue I have, is that I've been told that mooring costs can be upwards of 5k a year.. now that can be around £400 a month which seems absoutely insane! That's close to what I am paying in rent for a 2 bed house at the moment. Is that really right?

 

With fuel costs and everything else, this would end up being the same price as living in my current house and I am STILL paying the majority of that money in rent, which was one of the main reasons I wanted to buy a narrowboat in the first place, to avoid paying rent. Seems to me a bit absurd that you buy a home outright and yet still are paying the same sort of money in rent as you would do renting a house.

 

Am I being unreasonable here? Is there a way around paying so much to rent a boat your actually already own outright? Other than upping and moving every 14 days obviously.

 

Thanks in advance, apologies if the above sounds moany, that really isn't my intention. I'm just pretty shocked and worried by dream is possibly going to stay just that at this rate. Any help/advice will be hugely appreciated, even if you do just end up giving me a reality check..

 

Cheers,

 

Dave

[rusty69]

1 minute ago, Avi1251 said:

I'm currently looking at getting a canal boat and living out my dream of living on the waterways.

 

Are you looking to live your dream, or are you looking for a cheaper way of living than in a house? 

 

What price can you put on a dream?

[ditchcrawler]

4 minutes ago, Avi1251 said:

Good afternoon folks,

 

I'm a newbie here, after too many years of working hard, I'm currently looking at getting a canal boat and living out my dream of living on the waterways.

 

However, I'm a bit agast at the costs of mooring/upkeep and just wanted some clarity from more seasoned vets..

 

Upon researching, I've been told that you can park up in one area only for 14 days rent free and then you are expected to move onto a new area all together. Can I firstly ask whether this is true?

 

The issue I have, is that I've been told that mooring costs can be upwards of 5k a year.. now that can be around £400 a month which seems absoutely insane! That's close to what I am paying in rent for a 2 bed house at the moment. Is that really right?

 

With fuel costs and everything else, this would end up being the same price as living in my current house and I am STILL paying the majority of that money in rent, which was one of the main reasons I wanted to buy a narrowboat in the first place, to avoid paying rent. Seems to me a bit absurd that you buy a home outright and yet still are paying the same sort of money in rent as you would do renting a house.

 

Am I being unreasonable here? Is there a way around paying so much to rent a boat your actually already own outright? Other than upping and moving every 14 days obviously.

 

Thanks in advance, apologies if the above sounds moany, that really isn't my intention. I'm just pretty shocked and worried by dream is possibly going to stay just that at this rate. Any help/advice will be hugely appreciated, even if you do just end up giving me a reality check..

 

Cheers,

 

Dave

I think you have it all right, Its not a cheap option 

[mrsmelly]

It costs about the same to live in a house as on a boat, boating is not a cheap option. The reason to live on a boat is that you truly want the lifestyle, not to save money. Your initial post to me seems to mean that moving every 14 days is a pain, whereas I always loved moving about ( boating ) thats why we lived for many years aboard. If you think " Having " to move on is a pain then boating isnt for you.

[Arthur Marshall]

You can pay many thousands to park and live in a marina, or down to hundreds on a farm mooring, but probably without mains electric and instant access to water. My mooring fees and licences cost me about two and a half thou a year for a forty foot boat.

And it depends where you are, of course. And the costs are rising.

It's nicer than living in a house , and I found it significantly cheaper, and of course you own your boat. If you rent, you never own your house.

You have to work out how you want to live. If its just a house on the water, you might as well stay in your house or get a static caravan.

[MtB]

15 minutes ago, rusty69 said:

Are you looking to live your dream, or are you looking for a cheaper way of living than in a house? 

 

 

 

At the £400 a month the OP says he is paying for his two bed house, living isn't going to get much cheaper! 

 

A two bed house around here is £1300 a month, which is why living on a boat gets a reputation for being cheap. The £400 a month mooring he quotes IS cheap in comparison. 

 

The problem for the OP is he already has bargain basement accommodation.

 

 

25 minutes ago, Avi1251 said:

Am I being unreasonable here?

 

Absolutely you are. 

 

You say you want to live on a boat to avoid paying rent. This is not a good reason to live afloat. You will always pay rent in the form of a licence to the waterway authority. If living aboard was allowed to be much cheaper than living in a house the whole 60m population of the UK would be moving onto boats. 

 

[Avi1251]

5 minutes ago, mrsmelly said:

It costs about the same to live in a house as on a boat, boating is not a cheap option. The reason to live on a boat is that you truly want the lifestyle, not to save money. Your initial post to me seems to mean that moving every 14 days is a pain, whereas I always loved moving about ( boating ) thats why we lived for many years aboard. If you think " Having " to move on is a pain then boating isnt for you.

Oh no, absolutely not. The reason I want to live on a boat is due to the travel aspect and being in nature, so it isn't that moving every 2 weeks is a pain as such, I'm just thinking about if I am still working in the area etc. I just need all the info really.

[agg221]

There are two legitimate approaches. 1. Rent a mooring so you can stay in one location. 2. Continuously cruise, in which case you don't need a mooring because you are not staying in one area. Other approaches are currently used to bend/break the principles behind these rules but, with an increasing shortage of cash, it looks highly likely that CRT will make it increasingly expensive not to just rent a mooring.

 

Alec

[Avi1251]

4 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

 

At the £400 a month the OP says he is paying for his two bed house, living isn't going to get much cheaper! 

 

A two bed house around here is £1300 a month, which is why living on a boat gets a reputation for being cheap. The £400 a month mooring he quotes IS cheap in comparison. 

 

The problem for the OP is he already has bargain basement accommodation.

 

 

To be honest, I have lived all over. Where I'm living now (near Sheffield) is cheap but I lived in Stourbridge (my home town) and then Bath for many years. Bath is like London prices! I'm not after cheap accom, that isn't the reason for wanting my boat. I sure was shocked though when looking at the prices, money isn't everything but it sure helps and I did truly think it would be a fraction of the price it is to live on the canal.. Naive on my part? Probably. But I guess everyone starts their journey somewhere and I'm just at the very start of mine.

1 minute ago, agg221 said:

There are two legitimate approaches. 1. Rent a mooring so you can stay in one location. 2. Continuously cruise, in which case you don't need a mooring because you are not staying in one area. Other approaches are currently used to bend/break the principles behind these rules but, with an increasing shortage of cash, it looks highly likely that CRT will make it increasingly expensive not to just rent a mooring.

 

Alec

Thank you for the info. With the cruising option, how long do you have to vacate the area for after the 14 days? And when vacating the "area", what is the radius for this, e.g. can i just move half a mile down the canal and moor up there instead?

Thanks for all your replies so far, awesome to see such an active/helpful forum

[Rob-M]

We allow £5000 a year to cover the basic costs of license, insurance and mooring but this is probably about to increase if licenses get another massive hike.  On top of this is then annual maintenance, not so regular maintenance and then consumables like diesel, gas and coal.

[MtB]

1 minute ago, Avi1251 said:

Bath is like London prices!

 

 

No it isn't! You don't seem to have much of a grip on accommodation prices. 

 

Checking Rightmove, a two bed house in Bath is typically £1,350 a month. The cheapest two bed terraced house in Clapham, is £2,600 a month.

[Tony Brooks]

11 minutes ago, Avi1251 said:

Thank you for the info. With the cruising option, how long do you have to vacate the area for after the 14 days? And when vacating the "area", what is the radius for this, e.g. can i just move half a mile down the canal and moor up there instead?

 

First of all that 14 days is a general rule, there are 2 hour, 24 hour, and 3 day moorings in certain places.

 

Secondly, you seem to be trying to play the continuous cruising system. The only legal judgement on this that I have heard of say that you must be on a continuous journey so that rules out moving a mile or two and then coming back. This is a very grey area and if CaRT decide you are not playing fair then eventually you could lose the boat.

 

You say that you want to live on the boat. If you want to do that officially with all legal aspects covered, then not only are proper residential moorings difficult to find abut they are expensive - say £35000 a year in London. my guess is your £5000 is for a marina that turns a blind eye to live aboards but who can throw you out at a moment's notice.

 

Edited June 11, 2023 by Tony Brooks

[MtB]

7 minutes ago, Avi1251 said:

I'm not after cheap accom, that isn't the reason for wanting my boat. I sure was shocked though when looking at the prices, money isn't everything but it sure helps and I did truly think it would be a fraction of the price it is to live on the canal..

 

You've been reading too many articles in the Daily Telegraph and watching too many youtube videos, I reckon. Yes it can be cheap to live on a boat but you do it cheap by breaking the rules and living quite rough. Don't move around, this saves diesel. Remove the name and registration number from your boat, then CRT can't hassle you as they don't know who you are. No need for an expensive licence or safety certificate now, either. Cut down trees on the bank and burn them green for fuel. Lots of boaters do it and this is how it gets cheap. But do it legitimately, and costs begin to rival those of living on the bank. 

 

Further, the canals are not a freak of nature like rivers than just 'happen to be there'. People built them and they need maintaining which costs a fortune. License fees contribute to this, and so does the government. There is a license fee review under way at the moment and there is no certainty the canals will even survive as the finances are so dire. Factor this into any decision to buy a boat. 

 

 

[BoatinglifeupNorth]

7 minutes ago, Avi1251 said:

Oh no, absolutely not. The reason I want to live on a boat is due to the travel aspect and being in nature, so it isn't that moving every 2 weeks is a pain as such, I'm just thinking about if I am still working in the area etc. I just need all the info really.

So you want to travel, but you don’t want to move far from your place of work? So you won’t be moving far I take it, you can’t just go up and down the same piece of canal every 2 weeks especially on the Sheffield canal. You say you don’t want to pay for a residential Marina mooring £4K, if I was you I would stay where you are for £400 a month. Everything to do with boating is on the increase, Licence, moorings, running costs. Then you need to buy a decent livaboard boat £40K plus, look how much boats have gone up in the last few years as everyone is having the same idea as you. Your asking about costs and you sound that you really can’t afford it. Stay where you are and maybe “live the dream” when you can afford it and find an area that you can CC.

 

[MtB]

52 minutes ago, Avi1251 said:

I'm a newbie here

 

And as no-one else has said it, welcome to the forum!! 

 

This can be a brutal place with no punches pulled in answers as you've just seen, but don't be put off. People here are fundamentally helpful and will go the extra mile helping you out.

 

Keep asking the questions and an accurate picture will emerge for you.

 

 

 

[Tony Brooks]

24 minutes ago, Avi1251 said:

I'm just thinking about if I am still working in the area etc. I just need all the info really.

 

I must point out that CaRT have said in the past that CCing is not compatible with needing to be close to a place of work or a school. Subsequent utterings from CaRT have modified that stance to a degree, and in some areas it is possible to CC and travel to a place of work/school but I doubt it can be done everywhere. There also seems to be different advice/rulings in different CaRT areas

[agg221]

There are cheaper options which are legitimate, if you are prepared to accept the compromises. We don't live aboard, but we could where we are. We pay £1300 a year for an online farm mooring for a 38' boat. I pay a year in advance and the contract has a month's notice either way. There are no facilities beyond a single tap at the end of the moorings, but there is a winding hole 40mins one way and 20mins the other and the second one has full facilities including a boatyard which sells gas and diesel if you don't want to use the fuel boat. There are also no restrictions on working on your boat so we can do whatever we want that is practical in the water, just with due consideration to the 'neighbours' - this is of course a quid pro quo situation so when John next door wants to watch the football and runs his generator until 10pm that's fine with us (we do check with one another if doing something out of the ordinary). I reckon it would be possible to live with a 2hr cruise every week.

 

However, we are moored in deepest rural Shropshire in a location with no public transport and no taxis. The closer you want to live to a centre of population, the busier it gets and the more expensive moorings are likely to get (unless you want to live in Stoke on Trent, but who would...)

 

Alec

 

 

[MtB]

Just now, Tony Brooks said:

 

I must point out that CaRT have said in the past that CCing is not compatible with needing to be close to a place of work or a school. Subsequent utterings from CaRT have modified that stance to a degree, and in some areas it is possible to CC and travel to a place of work/school but I doubt it can be done everywhere. There also seems to be different advice/rulings in different CaRT areas

 

Even so, the OP will always be 'pushing the envelope' trying to CC and work in a fixed place, wherever they are. 

 

Living aboard whilst 'pushing the envelope' is never compatible with the 'relaxed lifestyle' often associated with living on a boat. 

 

 

 

[Annie cariad]

Threads like this all the time seen it on TV /had a holiday/me mates got one. Do your research,take your time,it's not a £5 quid life change to Dave you load of money .

 

Last year's outlay with winter mooring only was  £6500  all in 

[agg221]

14 minutes ago, MtB said:

Further, the canals are not a freak of nature like rivers than just 'happen to be there'. People built them and they need maintaining which costs a fortune. License fees contribute to this, and so does the government. There is a license fee review under way at the moment and there is no certainty the canals will even survive as the finances are so dire. Factor this into any decision to buy a boat. 

I think this may be overly pessimistic. I expect the canals to survive, but navigating them may well become increasingly difficult and costs are inevitably set to rise.

 

What I do expect to happen is that the licence fee structure will change so that paying CRT for the privilege of not having a home mooring will become as expensive as paying someone else to have one. I also anticipate a harder line being taken on overstaying and other forms of enforcement, partly as a direct response to the George Ward case and partly a more general response to the rise of shanty towns in London and the Kennet & Avon. Viable lifestyle choice? - probably. Cheap housing akin to squatting? - probably not.

 

Alec

[blackrose]

43 minutes ago, MtB said:

If living aboard was allowed to be much cheaper than living in a house the whole 60m population of the UK would be moving onto boats. 

 

 

Point of order m'lud. You're only about 9 million out.

 

The current population of the United Kingdom is 68,929,382 as of Friday, June 9, 2023, based on Worldometer elaboration of the latest United Nations data.

[MtB]

2 minutes ago, blackrose said:

 

Point of order m'lud. You're only about 9 million out.

 

The current population of the United Kingdom is 68,929,382 as of Friday, June 9, 2023, based on Worldometer elaboration of the latest United Nations data.

 

 

Yes but that includes overseas students studying here, of whom I reckon there are 9m at least! 

 

 

[peterboat]

1 hour ago, Avi1251 said:

Good afternoon folks,

 

I'm a newbie here, after too many years of working hard, I'm currently looking at getting a canal boat and living out my dream of living on the waterways.

 

However, I'm a bit agast at the costs of mooring/upkeep and just wanted some clarity from more seasoned vets..

 

Upon researching, I've been told that you can park up in one area only for 14 days rent free and then you are expected to move onto a new area all together. Can I firstly ask whether this is true?

 

The issue I have, is that I've been told that mooring costs can be upwards of 5k a year.. now that can be around £400 a month which seems absoutely insane! That's close to what I am paying in rent for a 2 bed house at the moment. Is that really right?

 

With fuel costs and everything else, this would end up being the same price as living in my current house and I am STILL paying the majority of that money in rent, which was one of the main reasons I wanted to buy a narrowboat in the first place, to avoid paying rent. Seems to me a bit absurd that you buy a home outright and yet still are paying the same sort of money in rent as you would do renting a house.

 

Am I being unreasonable here? Is there a way around paying so much to rent a boat your actually already own outright? Other than upping and moving every 14 days obviously.

 

Thanks in advance, apologies if the above sounds moany, that really isn't my intention. I'm just pretty shocked and worried by dream is possibly going to stay just that at this rate. Any help/advice will be hugely appreciated, even if you do just end up giving me a reality check..

 

Cheers,

 

Dave

You will have other costs as well ie licence, BSS and insurance, living in a boat is expensive and soon possibly going to get even more expensive when the results of licence consultation are announced!

[Avi1251]

40 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

 

No it isn't! You don't seem to have much of a grip on accommodation prices. 

 

Checking Rightmove, a two bed house in Bath is typically £1,350 a month. The cheapest two bed terraced house in Clapham, is £2,600 a month.

Right you are. Anyway, back to the boating issue..

24 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

And as no-one else has said it, welcome to the forum!! 

 

This can be a brutal place with no punches pulled in answers as you've just seen, but don't be put off. People here are fundamentally helpful and will go the extra mile helping you out.

 

Keep asking the questions and an accurate picture will emerge for you.

 

 

 

Thank you, I appreciate it! It's all good, most forums tend to be the same.

 

Generally everyone is being very helpful, I don't want anything sugarcoated and want a genuine picture from experienced people. Hence, why I am here!

[MtB]

1 minute ago, Avi1251 said:

Right you are. Anyway, back to the boating issue..

 

I take an unhealthy interest in property matters. It's what pays for my boating, much to the annoyance of the hard lefties on here!