Our Home Aboard

[Alastair]

Get a hull survey, be prepared to pay for the survey, and be prepared to walk away if there are serious problems.

 

If minor plating is required, it is quite normal to expect the seller to pay for this out of the sale price.

 

Look very carefully at the wood lining for any evidence of drips or moisture - it will show up as dark patches sometimes under the varnish.

 

Ask to be present when the engine is started from cold. Check that the engine is cold before you let them start it.

[Djuwenda]

that is only my leisure/pleasure boats i spent 25 years on barges, and so did my dad andmy brother spent 12 years

i also hired a narrowboat for the day, one of my friends has anarrowboat, me and my brother also went last year december 23rd on my grp boat dawncfta 22 to castleford rioughly 4 hours from where the boat is now, with my brother on the bow, breaking ice in the water with the boat hook, so know what it is like in winter, did the same the previous winter, my boat had blown air heating but obviously a stove gets a lot warmer , i have the pics somehwere if i find it i will try and scan it in to show yo the snow, hopefully whatever narrowboat i get will have a better back deck than one near us that day as the woman slipped on the back deck and went in to water -5 degress, rushed straigvht to hospital with suspected hypothermia

 

didnt know water could go that cold

[slowcoach]

well im raking over this old chestnut again, since last post was in november 2006 , anyway what i am saying is, my partner is leaning TOWARDS the idea of living on a boat and may get one sometime hopefully next year to live in, as you know we have a our narrowboat, and we are thinking wide beam, even though we are only looking at about £85,000 that should get us a good couple of years old wide beam boat or if there is one that takes our fancy that has the room we want may be a good sized narrowboat, but would prefer the wide beam for the more room , mostly the width, as i said before the width isnt really an issue, on the canal, as canal is mostly wide and no narrow locks round here, anyway, the only thing that worries my partner is the lifespan of a boat, she says they dont last as long as a house which they dont but was wondeirng how long in fact could one go on for before it got too old?, really what i am saying is what are the cold hard facts of cost, the water for our marina is free as it is taps on the jetties, electric is only 12p per unit, coal is only £5 a bag, we can get logs from my partners dad, who has his own trees, well did have before he cuts them down, so how much would council tax be, etc would £350 a month cover all the expenses, also if we sold our boat we would probably have about £100,00 which would leave us about £90,000 to sepnd on boat as we would leave some for the moorings etc, but our boat cannot be sold till we have paid finance off as it is owned by the finance company until paid , so can you answer my questions???

 

many thanks

 

Richard