Advice on Living Aboard as a Student

[Tam & Di]

Hi Particularly useful would be information about moorings near universities of Warwick (Coventry), York, Bristol, Oxford, Birmingham, Nottingham, Durham and Lancaster,

 

Brunel at Uxbridge used to run excellent Social Science courses if that is your interest. I think you'd find a mooring in the Stink Hole at at Springwell, but you have the Grand Union running more or less north-south there and there are probably a lot more options within cycling distance.

 

Tam

[sal garfi]

I know, quite well, a student who lives on board at Sawley. His boat is 40' and he is on a leisure mooring. Technically, he has to leave or take the boat out every four weeks, but this is easy to do: he only has to take the boat a short distance away. His total costs, as he's told me are considerably less than staying in student digs or residence halls, and he's adamant about this. Also, he can go home during university term breaks so this shortens his overall stay at the marina, and of course, it reduces his utility costs. I should think that a 30' boat could be just right for you, and that could give you a mooring fee of ca £1500 p/a. I'm a research fellow at Nottingham and I stay at Sawley on a leisure mooring, but I'm only there for ca two weeks at a time, followed by two weeks at home in Wales and so on. I live on a Norman 22, and I've found it comfortable (the electricity for an oil filled radiator is quite cheap!). In fact, if you want inspiration on living in small places, I recommend that you google sites on van living, tiny houses, and shanty boat living; also sites that deal with living aboard sailing boats. At these types of sites you'll find a very broad range of people's experiences dealing with 'small space' living.

 

I recommend that you go down the boat route, it will be cheaper than digs. If I had to take a room in a house in Nottingham/Beeston, it would cost me about £60 per week (before utilities). That's more than £3k p/a and three times my annual mooring fee. Go for it, it's totally doable!!

Edited August 11, 2016 by sal garfi

[Lady Muck]

On the positive side, a couple of things which might make life easier for a liveaboard boater at Uni: a pigeonhole address for mail, and a health service that you can register with.

the students I know that live onboard say that uni libraries (often open 24 hours) are useful for a warm place to study with plenty of electricity, too.

[Chewbacka]

the students I know that live onboard say that uni libraries (often open 24 hours) are useful for a warm place to study with plenty of electricity, too.

Many years ago when I was a student we found pubs were very warm in the winter........

[David Mack]

Have we put RosiePig off? She hasn't visited since 3rd August.

[Sir Percy]

the students I know that live onboard say that uni libraries (often open 24 hours) are useful for a warm place to study sleep with plenty of electricity, too.

 

Pretty much like the local public library, where the librarians have been for some time, unofficially offering Internet 101, shelter, benefits advice and mobile/laptop recharging services to the local homeless.

[Sir Percy]

Have we put RosiePig off? She hasn't visited since 3rd August.

 

Maybe having a bit of a think. If this:

 

...I am really something of a recluse and the idea of having a kitchen and living space and in some places a bathroom and bedroom shared with strangers frightens me.

 

is true, I don't know that shutting yourself away on a boat (or elsewhere) is necessarily the best solution.

Edited August 10, 2016 by Sir Percy

[chris667]

I did, for a couple of years, study with the Open University whilst living on a boat. I used libraries for Internet access and printing, and went to tutorials at wherever was local.

 

But then, I'd been living on a boat for several years before I started.

 

I think it's too much change in one go. Yes, you might be able to stay on a leisure mooring, but it's a fiddle and you can be told to leave without any notice. Cruising around an area is possible, but it eats into your free time.

 

You will constantly have to think about fuel, electricity, and water. And breakdowns can run to thousands. Anyone that says it's cheap is lying or hasn't had a boat long enough to experience an expensive breakdown.

 

Sorry to sound like a pessimist. Sometimes people do exactly what you are doing and make a great success of it. However if you are depending on the degree to get on in the rest of your career, it needs to come first.

[sueb]

If you are going home for the holidays you don't need a residential mooring. You would be able to have a leisure mooring. Cheaper and more easily available.

[RichM]

I'd love to do something like that when I was at uni. Would have sailed through it with that lifestyle!

As with all things there are hurdles but if you find out what they are as you have done, often they can be overcome.

[RosiePig]

Hello everyone! Not scared off; I was in France.

 

Thank for the advice ValAndPete about moorings. Thank you to everyone for the well-meaning advice about not being a recluse, but I really am quite a contented, self-confident loner with an albeit unusual disposition but no interest in developing a social life when I go to university. David Mack said if I was a mature student I might recoil in horror at living with all those students, but although I'm only 18 I really do anyway! With no social life and no part-time work (the loan, grant and gap-year savings will very comfortably cover everything), I don't think i'll be short of time for boat maintenance as well.

 

Thanks Dave_P: once I've got the offers through, I'll definitely get in touch if Birmingham is still in the running!

 

That's useful sueb; I would be going home for the holidays so a leisure mooring could work nicely.

 

Thank you chris667 and sal garfi and everyone else for all of your information and advice!

 

Sir Percy - that is very true about libraries and librarians. I worked in my local library at one point and much of my time was spent helping people work the computers and giving them a surreptitious extra half hour free for asylum applications, benefit forms and job applications. Libraries are pretty awesome and necessary spaces; quite frightening to think of what will happen as their budgets are cut.

[IanM]

but I really am quite a contented, self-confident loner with an albeit unusual disposition but no interest in developing a social life when I go to university.

A bit off topic but as someone who was much like you before going to university I suggest grabbing the experience with both hands and enjoy the social life too. University is much more than just the academic side of things.

[Sir Percy]

Hello everyone! Not scared off; I was in France.

 

Tres bien. Have you thought about what you'd do out of term - live on, or back home?

[Neil Smith]

If you live in bath could you get in at Bristol uni then commute from home.

 

Neil

[Arthur Brown]

The big thing to remember is that Uni is there to fit you into well paid employment, at a senior level. You will need experience of working with people as well as working in your specialist subject. Teaching yourself to become a hermit will be self defeating. Every employer who interviewed me for the first few times had to ask about non work things because I left uni with little work experience, remember to give them something to start the interview with.

[magictime]

If you can get the funds together for a little boat that's suitably equipped for living aboard and in good condition (any sort of 'project' boat can be a real money pit) I don't see why you shouldn't make it work. I'd be very surprised if your costs for moorings, licence, fuel, routine maintenance etc. added up to more than the £5-6000 you might otherwise expect to pay for typical uni accommodation plus bills; plausibly you could be looking at saving a couple of grand a year.

 

But it does all depend on finding the right boat. Yes, you can find small (often 25ft-ish) boats for only £6,000 or £8,000, but they're typically in need of expensive work. Once you get into the £10,000, £12,000 bracket, you're starting to see some nice, well-looked-after little boats that shouldn't give you any trouble for a few years. £15,000 and you might be talking about a decent 30-35ft boat with a proper bed. I'd urge you to spend a bit more up front if you can, to avoid extra expense and hassle as you go along.

[chris667]

Any boat, at any price, can be a money pit. The genuinely good ones at low prices tend not to be advertised, or go by the time the adverts go on. My boat sold on its second day of brokerage.

 

I reckon to get a real bargain you need to be a boater already, or at least know a lot of boaters.

[chris667]

Incidentally, sueb, I would suggest it is not true to say going home for holidays allows you to live on a leisure mooring.

 

Leisure moorings have whatever terms and conditions they want; depending on the site, you can be asked to leave without notice.

[Alan de Enfield]

Incidentally, sueb, I would suggest it is not true to say going home for holidays allows you to live on a leisure mooring.

 

Leisure moorings have whatever terms and conditions they want; depending on the site, you can be asked to leave without notice.

 

Very true - our marina rules are "no more than 28 consecutive nights on leisure moorings", and to get a leisure mooring you have to provide a council tax bill in your name to prove the boat is not your 'primary residence'.

 

It is 'their bat & ball' they can make whatever rules they like, you either agree or go elsewhere.