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Opinions on a 60' trad for sale?


jetzi

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4 minutes ago, TheBiscuits said:

I see that, a bit further down the list, a "127 foot semi-trad" is advertised for sale. That should provide ample space, though its cruising area would be rather restricted.

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1 hour ago, ivan&alice said:

Thanks for all the advice everyone, it's a moot point as we just got a call to say the boat was just sold for cash. She's been on the market for a week. Gutted. So much for being difficult to sell on, eh? I think the market may have moved on considerably since many of you bought your boats!

At least this means we'll be able to get to see some boats inland now...

It's like I said in an earlier post, it was a good price for what the advert showed (although no engine or electric pictures) and certainly in line with typical prices we are seeing in the Midlands .....so no London premium. I am not surprised it went in a week. Most good boats (not overpriced) are going very quickly. It was like that a year ago when we got ours and has probably speeded up rather than slowing down since then. People seem willing to pay these 'high' prices to get a boat. A lot of peeps on here will always tell you a boat is worth less than the current inflated rate as that is what they would expect to pay for a boat. Unfortunately a lot of peeps are out of touch with the 'going rate'.

The more boats you see, the more you will understand the current market pricing and hopefully make the right decision of when to jump in and offer ...subject to survey.

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8 hours ago, ivan&alice said:

I just don't see it! It would be really really helpful if you guys could explain what respects Kastaway is better than the London boat?

Much higher quality fitout. Loads of storage space (London boat didn’t appear to have any). Quality shell by well known builder. 5 years younger.  Bigger engine. Washing machine (presumably working happily with the inverter). Overall it shouts “I’m a comfortable liveaboard boat” as opposed to the London boat’s “I’m an impractical show home”. 

Edited by WotEver
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5 hours ago, Neil2 said:

Solar is so cheap these days it really isn't a consideration.  

 

3 hours ago, ivan&alice said:

I don't buy this, either.

You should. 

 

Check out Bimble (and they’re not necessarily the cheapest) https://www.bimblesolar.com/solar/individual 

 

A Couple of used 250W panels £120.

20A MPPT Tracer controller £105.  

Cable maybe £50.

Mounts for panels (tilting) £127.

That’s a total of about £500. 

 

You wouldnt need new batteries nor a new inverter just because you’re fitting some Solar. 

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25 minutes ago, WotEver said:

 

You should. 

 

Check out Bimble (and they’re not necessarily the cheapest) https://www.bimblesolar.com/solar/individual 

 

A Couple of used 250W panels £120.

20A MPPT Tracer controller £105.  

Cable maybe £50.

Mounts for panels (tilting) £127.

That’s a total of about £500. 

 

You wouldnt need new batteries nor a new inverter just because you’re fitting some Solar

Those are in line with the prices I found less the inverter and batteries (didn't see that the Colecraft came with those - my apologies). Still, 500 quid, and that's not including the hassles and possible expense of installation.

Fair enough though, I should take more care when comparing the equipment on the boats I look at. Solar might not be the most expensive bit of kit on a boat, but I don't think it's not a consideration.

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6 hours ago, ivan&alice said:

Thanks for all the advice everyone, it's a moot point as we just got a call to say the boat was just sold for cash. She's been on the market for a week. Gutted. So much for being difficult to sell on, eh? I think the market may have moved on considerably since many of you bought your boats!

 

You do appear to keep asking people for their views, but not really want to hear them, if they don't align with where your thinking now seems to be firmly stuck.

 

If you have genuinely convinced yourselves that there is no premium in price for buying a boat in London versus much further afield then I believe you are very mistaken.

 

That's not to say that there might not be the odd relative bargain in London, and certainly not to say there are not vastly overpriced boats esewhere.
 

But as a general principal, what people are telling you is correct, even if you think your own attempts at data gathering say otherwise.  The problem I feel is you are trying to reduce it to a spreadsheet calculation, but your "data" or your assumptions are often flawed.  You believe for some things you are comparing like with like, and in fact you are not.

Edited by alan_fincher
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2 hours ago, alan_fincher said:

You do appear to keep asking people for their views, but not really want to hear them, if they don't align with where your thinking now seems to be firmly stuck.

Noted, but that may be a little uncharitable. If you have seen any of my other threads, I have carefully considered the points that forum folks have raised, which are often pretty contradictory. I'm still pretty open minded on these points, I'm just exploring them - I'd really like to unstick my thinking if it is wrong.

I accept that the perception is that London commands a premium and that it may be true to some degree. I'm definitely taking it under advisement when I'm looking at the boats in London, and I look forward to comparing them with boats up country.

 

However at the moment I'm unconvinced that London boats are that much more dear. Firstly, because it isn't logical - why aren't people buying boats in Nottingham, sailing them down to London and selling them for a cool 10K profit? Why would people sell their boats in Nottingham when they could make more money selling them in London?

 

Second, the data doesn't agree with the theory. Below is a plot of the asking prices of all 300 of the 48' to 72' narrowboats currently up for sale on Apollo Duck right now, against the distance the boat is from London. As you can see the trend is for boats to slightly increase in price the further they get from London. I'm aware that there are other factors, it could just be that the boats for sale in London are generally inferior, but averaged out over 300 boats you should see at least somewhat of a downward trend if the London premium theory was correct.

 

image.png.f503bd911ff8b89f4efc86cc19d9aea4.png

 

Put even more simply, a narrowboat within the M25 will cost you an average of 47100 GBP while a narrowboat without the M25 costs an average of  55544 GBP. Averaged out over three hundred boats currently for sale, London boats are eight grand cheaper.

So I apologise for my stubbornness on this point but at present, I don't buy it.

Edited by ivan&alice
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1 hour ago, ivan&alice said:

However at the moment I'm unconvinced that London boats are that much more dear. Firstly, because it isn't logical - why aren't people buying boats in Nottingham, sailing them down to London and selling them for a cool 10K profit? Why would people sell their boats in Nottingham when they could make more money selling them in London?

Many people do buy boats in the north and sail them to London (often while painting them white inside!)  It's a running joke around all the boatyards I know.  Other people pay for cranes and road transport to get them there quickly, adding a few grand to the purchase costs.

 

The reason not everyone does this is much the same reason why you can't travel to the midlands to look at boats for sale - time and money.

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7 hours ago, ivan&alice said:

Put even more simply, a narrowboat within the M25 will cost you an average of 47100 GBP while a narrowboat without the M25 costs an average of  55544 GBP. Averaged out over three hundred boats currently for sale, London boats are eight grand cheaper.

 

That doesn't surprise me at all.

 

The whole nature of boat ownership in London, and the much higher proportion of real duffers than anywhere else in the country,  means that the average true value of boats for sale will inevitably be far lower.

 

Put it another way. There are brokerages like ABNB that only seem to accept sales of boats of some quality and in good repair.  There are other outfits like the one just outside Leighton Buzzard tht acquire near sinking boats for peanuts, do a bit of welding on them, black over it, and then offer them for sale.

 

The latter yard is closer to London, and the average price of boats sold from there will inevitably be far lower than that of those sold by ABNB.

So does that mean the Leighton Buzzard baots are a better buy?  I don't think so!

 

As I said before, your comparisons are not of like with like.

 

 

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5 hours ago, TheBiscuits said:

The reason not everyone does this is much the same reason why you can't travel to the midlands to look at boats for sale - time and money.

 

I bought two of my boats from ‘up north’ and paid to have them transported down here. Both we being sold ‘up north’ because they were both liveaboards and up north is where the sellers worked. It would have been totally impractical for either to have cruised their boats down south and cc here for an indeterminate period in order to try to sell for an extra £10k. Both would have had to resign from their paid employment. So there’s another reason sellers don’t just cruise down south to sell for more. 

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7 hours ago, ivan&alice said:

Noted, but that may be a little uncharitable. If you have seen any of my other threads, I have carefully considered the points that forum folks have raised, which are often pretty contradictory. I'm still pretty open minded on these points, I'm just exploring them - I'd really like to unstick my thinking if it is wrong.

I accept that the perception is that London commands a premium and that it may be true to some degree. I'm definitely taking it under advisement when I'm looking at the boats in London, and I look forward to comparing them with boats up country.

 

However at the moment I'm unconvinced that London boats are that much more dear. Firstly, because it isn't logical - why aren't people buying boats in Nottingham, sailing them down to London and selling them for a cool 10K profit? Why would people sell their boats in Nottingham when they could make more money selling them in London?

 

Second, the data doesn't agree with the theory. Below is a plot of the asking prices of all 300 of the 48' to 72' narrowboats currently up for sale on Apollo Duck right now, against the distance the boat is from London. As you can see the trend is for boats to slightly increase in price the further they get from London. I'm aware that there are other factors, it could just be that the boats for sale in London are generally inferior, but averaged out over 300 boats you should see at least somewhat of a downward trend if the London premium theory was correct.

 

image.png.f503bd911ff8b89f4efc86cc19d9aea4.png

 

Put even more simply, a narrowboat within the M25 will cost you an average of 47100 GBP while a narrowboat without the M25 costs an average of  55544 GBP. Averaged out over three hundred boats currently for sale, London boats are eight grand cheaper.

So I apologise for my stubbornness on this point but at present, I don't buy it.

 

The same could be produced for cars - however you are failing to differentiate between a Lada, a Mondeo, a Mercedes, a Rolls Royce or a Maserati.

 

Some 'new boats' started life at £50k, some at £250k.

Different boats may have £1000's of difference in equipment levels.

Historically it is the 'end of life boats' (as sold by a well known Northampton marina) that end up in London, as that is all that the 'low-paid service sector' employees can afford.

 

I'd suggest that you try your spreadsheets with criteria that actually compares 'apples with apples'

Edited by Alan de Enfield
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16 hours ago, ivan&alice said:

Thanks for all the advice everyone, it's a moot point as we just got a call to say the boat was just sold for cash. She's been on the market for a week. Gutted. So much for being difficult to sell on, eh? I think the market may have moved on considerably since many of you bought your boats!

At least this means we'll be able to get to see some boats inland now...

I'm not surprised it sold quick.  I bet it went for close to asking price too.  I'd agree that many forum members really don't have their finger on the pulse with regard to what buyers are looking for.

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Having said that, London prices are a real thing (the one you found was a bargain by London standards - which is why it sold so quick).  You have have to understand that in London, most boaters are liveaboards who have taken to the canals because they can't afford to rent a flat or even a bedsit.  So they buy a cheap boat instead.  They haven't actually chosen a boating life, it's been forced on them.  (many London liveaboards deny this - but they would, wouldn't they?)

 

Elsewhere, being a liveaboard is a proper choice made by people who have always wanted to live on a boat.  In the rest of the country, being a liveaboard is probably not the cheapest way to live.  Getting a little bedsit or house share is cheaper.  So boats tend to be better and more expensive.

 

That explains why your data analysis is flawed.

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7 hours ago, ivan&alice said:

Noted, but that may be a little uncharitable. If you have seen any of my other threads, I have carefully considered the points that forum folks have raised, which are often pretty contradictory. I'm still pretty open minded on these points, I'm just exploring them - I'd really like to unstick my thinking if it is wrong.

I accept that the perception is that London commands a premium and that it may be true to some degree. I'm definitely taking it under advisement when I'm looking at the boats in London, and I look forward to comparing them with boats up country.

 

However at the moment I'm unconvinced that London boats are that much more dear. Firstly, because it isn't logical - why aren't people buying boats in Nottingham, sailing them down to London and selling them for a cool 10K profit? Why would people sell their boats in Nottingham when they could make more money selling them in London?

 

Second, the data doesn't agree with the theory. Below is a plot of the asking prices of all 300 of the 48' to 72' narrowboats currently up for sale on Apollo Duck right now, against the distance the boat is from London. As you can see the trend is for boats to slightly increase in price the further they get from London. I'm aware that there are other factors, it could just be that the boats for sale in London are generally inferior, but averaged out over 300 boats you should see at least somewhat of a downward trend if the London premium theory was correct.

 

image.png.f503bd911ff8b89f4efc86cc19d9aea4.png

 

Put even more simply, a narrowboat within the M25 will cost you an average of 47100 GBP while a narrowboat without the M25 costs an average of  55544 GBP. Averaged out over three hundred boats currently for sale, London boats are eight grand cheaper.

So I apologise for my stubbornness on this point but at present, I don't buy it.

I think if you were analysing sales of houses, or cars, this might have some validity, but there are simply too many variables at work with narrowboats.  You might, for example, compare a three bed semi in Nottingham with a three bed semi in Chelsea and rightly conclude houses in Chelsea are generally more expensive.  But it's rarely possible to do a like for like comparison with narrowboats and throwing more examples into the analysis just creates more confusion.  For a start, as Alan F points out, there's probably more "sheds" for sale in the London area which would distort any analysis.   To do a proper study you would need to isolate examples of near identical boats but it would take so long I doubt the results would have much validity. 

 

As for the point about moving boats nearer London, if you had spent any time on the cut over the last few years you would know there are certain operators doing just that.  There is a big market down there populated by folk who have neither the experience, knowledge, time or inclination to journey further north and move a boat back down south, and these buyers are fair game for anyone who has the time and resources to exploit them.

 

Getting back to the boat in question, though you say someone (presumably the seller..?) has told you it has been sold, I note it's still an active advert on AD in fact it seem to have been renewed yesterday which is a bit odd.  I may have a nasty suspicious mind but just beware this isn't some sort of selling ploy where the seller makes you feel "gutted" about missing out then miraculously the boat reappears on the market after the "sale" falls through.  It's an old trick.  If the boat has genuinely sold, please don't feel any regret about it there is one golden rule in boating and it is never have any regrets over a boat you didn't buy.  

 

And, by the way, if that boat did genuinely sell within a week, and at close to the asking price, it still doesn't persuade me that it was worth it or that there aren't much better buys out there.   If one person has decided that the boat was worth £45k it proves nothing at all, and certainly doesn't undermine all the good advice you have been offered, as some are suggesting. 

 

  

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11 hours ago, ivan&alice said:

Noted, but that may be a little uncharitable. If you have seen any of my other threads, I have carefully considered the points that forum folks have raised, which are often pretty contradictory. I'm still pretty open minded on these points, I'm just exploring them - I'd really like to unstick my thinking if it is wrong.

I accept that the perception is that London commands a premium and that it may be true to some degree. I'm definitely taking it under advisement when I'm looking at the boats in London, and I look forward to comparing them with boats up country.

 

However at the moment I'm unconvinced that London boats are that much more dear. Firstly, because it isn't logical - why aren't people buying boats in Nottingham, sailing them down to London and selling them for a cool 10K profit? Why would people sell their boats in Nottingham when they could make more money selling them in London?

 

Second, the data doesn't agree with the theory. Below is a plot of the asking prices of all 300 of the 48' to 72' narrowboats currently up for sale on Apollo Duck right now, against the distance the boat is from London. As you can see the trend is for boats to slightly increase in price the further they get from London. I'm aware that there are other factors, it could just be that the boats for sale in London are generally inferior, but averaged out over 300 boats you should see at least somewhat of a downward trend if the London premium theory was correct.

 

image.png.f503bd911ff8b89f4efc86cc19d9aea4.png

 

Put even more simply, a narrowboat within the M25 will cost you an average of 47100 GBP while a narrowboat without the M25 costs an average of  55544 GBP. Averaged out over three hundred boats currently for sale, London boats are eight grand cheaper.

So I apologise for my stubbornness on this point but at present, I don't buy it.

It is an interesting set of data. Can you factor in age and length of boat as well?

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12 hours ago, TheBiscuits said:

Many people do buy boats in the north and sail them to London (often while painting them white inside!)

 

6 hours ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

I bought two of my boats from ‘up north’ and paid to have them transported down here. Both we being sold ‘up north’ because they were both liveaboards and up north is where the sellers worked. It would have been totally impractical for either to have cruised their boats down south and cc here for an indeterminate period in order to try to sell for an extra £10k. Both would have had to resign from their paid employment. So there’s another reason sellers don’t just cruise down south to sell for more. 

 

5 hours ago, Neil2 said:

As for the point about moving boats nearer London, if you had spent any time on the cut over the last few years you would know there are certain operators doing just that.  There is a big market down there populated by folk who have neither the experience, knowledge, time or inclination to journey further north and move a boat back down south, and these buyers are fair game for anyone who has the time and resources to exploit them.

 

This is great info, thanks. I humbly accept that I didn't know anything about this before. These are the kind of insights that make the data analysis worth it!

 

 

5 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:

The same could be produced for cars - however you are failing to differentiate between a Lada, a Mondeo, a Mercedes, a Rolls Royce or a Maserati.

I'm trying to. Elsewhere we've had lengthy discussions about boat manufacturers, and people then complain that I'm not looking at the impact being in London makes!! I just can't win :)

 

5 hours ago, Neil2 said:

I may have a nasty suspicious mind but just beware this isn't some sort of selling ploy where the seller makes you feel "gutted" about missing out then miraculously the boat reappears on the market after the "sale" falls through.  It's an old trick. 

Also noted!! We will be very careful there. We were as you can imagine not the easiest customers with our questions and surveys!
 

 

1 hour ago, Stilllearning said:

It is an interesting set of data. Can you factor in age and length of boat as well?

Thanks! Here's an average of London boats (inside M25) vs country boats:

image.png.4e2a436f510322ac1b02d866078689ff.png

 

Notice that although the mean price is lower, the median is a bit higher, so it's possible that it's just that there are some really higher-end boats up country. Also, country boats are on average 7 years newer. So that does support the idea that people may be selling the pigs down south for a lot more than they'd get elsewhere.

6 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:

I'd suggest that you try your spreadsheets with criteria that actually compares 'apples with apples'

I am trying, it isn't too easy, especially when we are only talking about a sample of 300 boats. I've tried grouping them by manufacturer, like you suggest, as well as by age and length. How would you suggest making sure to boats are the same kind of apple?

 



 

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2 minutes ago, ivan&alice said:

How would you suggest making sure to boats are the same kind of apple?

I'm a 'spreadsheet sort of guy' & I cannot see how to work in the number of variables

 

Irrespective of length I would use Liveaboard compatible or not.

 

Define liveaboard requirements - If you ask 5 people you'll get 10 different answers.

For me the main criteria would be :

Electrical 'set-up' (I have 6x 230Ah batteries) Can you run / supply everything (cooking, heating,  electric blanket, etc etc) you want for a minimum of 3 days without running the engine ?

Laundry equipment - washing machine - Twin tub as a minimum

Water tank - big enough to last a minimum of 1 week and preferably two weeks

Fuel tank - big enough to last a couple of months (you can get iced in)

Toilet - cassette toilets (others may disagree) which you can take to be emptied if the boat breaks down or gets iced in. Minimum 3 cassettes (1 in + 2 spares)

Furnishing - do you want 'open plan' with luxury recliners, or built in furniture ?

Bed - a bed big enough with a comfortable mattress (you can put up with a lot if you have a good nights sleep)

Two-ways of heating (Solid fuel stove & back boiler, & Eberspacher diesel heater)

Built in marine generator is nice but not common on NBs

 

The hull should be sound.

The engine in good condition, irrespective of hours - as long as it doesn't rattle or use oil)

Length - varies.

 

We were adamant we wanted a 57-58 footer for out last NB and went out with a carrier bag full of cash and the idea we would buy a boat that day. Planned a route taking in most of the midland brokers & marinas. Got to the 1st broker - all the boats were 'minging', smelly and dilapidated (and we were looking at up to £50k and the layouts were not ideal.

Went past a marina (not on the planned list) called in and although they didn't have a 57-58; for sale they said have a look at this 45 footer. Long story short, it was ideal, much better layout giving more usable room than any 57-58 we had looked at. Made an offer, the broker contacted the seller who was local, he accepted. Handed over the cash and the seller came down and removed his goods & chattels. Filled up with fuel, I set off in the boat and the wife drove the car home.

I was then caught in the floods stuck on the river for two weeks unable to move, wife got a lift back to where I was 'stuck' brought clothes and food and there we stayed. 

 

Anyway - all the spreadsheets in the world would not have found that boat for me, it was completely outside my search parameters. Get out and about and look at some boats, 'THEY' always say the boat will find you, and they really do. I tend to change my boats every 18 months - 2 years and the one I buy is rarely what I set out to buy.

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16 hours ago, ivan&alice said:

Noted, but that may be a little uncharitable. If you have seen any of my other threads, I have carefully considered the points that forum folks have raised, which are often pretty contradictory. I'm still pretty open minded on these points, I'm just exploring them - I'd really like to unstick my thinking if it is wrong.

I accept that the perception is that London commands a premium and that it may be true to some degree. I'm definitely taking it under advisement when I'm looking at the boats in London, and I look forward to comparing them with boats up country.

 

However at the moment I'm unconvinced that London boats are that much more dear. Firstly, because it isn't logical - why aren't people buying boats in Nottingham, sailing them down to London and selling them for a cool 10K profit? Why would people sell their boats in Nottingham when they could make more money selling them in London?

 

Second, the data doesn't agree with the theory. Below is a plot of the asking prices of all 300 of the 48' to 72' narrowboats currently up for sale on Apollo Duck right now, against the distance the boat is from London. As you can see the trend is for boats to slightly increase in price the further they get from London. I'm aware that there are other factors, it could just be that the boats for sale in London are generally inferior, but averaged out over 300 boats you should see at least somewhat of a downward trend if the London premium theory was correct.

 

image.png.f503bd911ff8b89f4efc86cc19d9aea4.png

 

Put even more simply, a narrowboat within the M25 will cost you an average of 47100 GBP while a narrowboat without the M25 costs an average of  55544 GBP. Averaged out over three hundred boats currently for sale, London boats are eight grand cheaper.

So I apologise for my stubbornness on this point but at present, I don't buy it.

I think data can be presented to give a biased result! I agree with Alan above that you need to compare apples to apples.

If you look at the data presented, the 'London' results are skewed by two vertical lines, the one near 0 miles and the one at 48 miles. I guess this is one 'seller' at that distance. At 0 miles, you have 13 boats, only 30% are above £50K. At 48 miles you have only 20% of boats over £50K. Compare that to the populated vertical lines at 160 miles and 270 miles where the majority of boats are over £50K. That says to me the sellers are focussing on different types of boats, maybe older ones or maybe plastic ones in the London area, hence it is not apples for apples.

It would be surprising to me if there wasnt a 'London' premium as things are usually more expensive down there and boat prices are high due to a sellers market. Prices will be higher therefore where there are more buyers, or buyers with more money.

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1 hour ago, Dr Bob said:

I think data can be presented to give a biased result! I agree with Alan above that you need to compare apples to apples.

If you look at the data presented, the 'London' results are skewed by two vertical lines, the one near 0 miles and the one at 48 miles. I guess this is one 'seller' at that distance. At 0 miles, you have 13 boats, only 30% are above £50K. At 48 miles you have only 20% of boats over £50K. Compare that to the populated vertical lines at 160 miles and 270 miles where the majority of boats are over £50K. That says to me the sellers are focussing on different types of boats, maybe older ones or maybe plastic ones in the London area, hence it is not apples for apples.

It would be surprising to me if there wasnt a 'London' premium as things are usually more expensive down there and boat prices are high due to a sellers market. Prices will be higher therefore where there are more buyers, or buyers with more money.

I used the M25 as the boundary - Its radius varies from 13 to 22 miles from Charing Cross so I considered a 35km radius from Charing Cross.

 

Also in many cases the best location available was the county, so I used the center of the county in those cases - that's the reason for the vertically arranged points. Some may be at the same marina, but not all. These are simply all the narrowboats > 49' and > 10K on Apollo Duck, any bias is not intentional. Not sure if you meant plastic metaphorically, but all these boats are all steel-hulled narrowboats without moorings.

It's difficult to compare apples for apples when I don't know enough to know that two narrowboats are equivalent. It's almost never that you will find two boats in identical condition, same size, same age, same builder, same equipment, with in different locations. So I'd have to find some way of judging two similar boats to both be apples, which is why I'm looking at the effect of the builder, age and so on as well.

@Alan de Enfield your criteria sound good, although some of those things can always be purchased if they are missing from the boat you buy at a fair enough price to take that into account.

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11 minutes ago, ivan&alice said:

 


@Alan de Enfield your criteria sound good, although some of those things can always be purchased if they are missing from the boat you buy at a fair enough price to take that into account.

Indeed they can be purchased, but there has to be room for them ;

eg  a leisure boat may typically have 2x domestic batteries, a typical liveaboard would have 4 or 5. If the battery 'area' is not geared up and built for 4 or 5 then you are into money to alter the arrangements.

Water tank size may well be smaller on a leisure boat - nothing you can do about that.

If there is no space built in for a washing machine / tumble drier and no water supply and waste outlet then you are into serious work to remove / rebuild existing structures.

 

Yes it can be done, but its easier to buy a sail-away and start with a 'clean slate' than an old boat, have to rip out stuff to replace them with 'your design'.

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32 minutes ago, ivan&alice said:

t's difficult to compare apples for apples when I don't know enough to know that two narrowboats are equivalent.

 

And the more you learn, the more you will come to realise there are NEVER two narrowboats that are equivalent. 

 

Keep taking the tablets.  

 

 

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I think that you will struggle to find enough boats that are in the main similar to enable you to make a comparison.

Narrow boats are very individual both in their fit out, services and equipment, apart from hire fleets you would be lucky to find 2 boats almost the same.

They are not a mass produced item, there is no basic specification and after alterations by the previous owners they are a bag of apples, oranges, grapes and lemons.

The lemons get tarted up and sold to individuals that just want a boat to drag off to the south east and be lived on without ever going anywhere again. The whitewash, minimalist and new paint is all part of the flash finishing.

The boat you buy is the one you see with a informed eye which gives you most of what you need and want, it has nothing to do with who made the hull, fitted it out or modified it provided it was not a dog in the first place.

Yes, there are better shell builders than some, there are also plenty of worse ones. The fit out may be fashionable but whitewashed MDF is not going to be any good on a boat after a short time and a winter or two.

  • Greenie 2
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6 hours ago, ivan&alice said:

I've tried grouping them by manufacturer, like you suggest, as well as by age and length.

Almost pointless grouping them by ‘manufacturer’, as you call it.  The big shell builders will supply lots of different fitters, so the end results will be different.  The top name fitters will be building bespoke and every single boat will be different.  Boat’s are not like cars with a range of models nd a range of trims.  The majority of boat’s are one offs, depending on the decisions made by whoever commissioned them.

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20 hours ago, ivan&alice said:

why aren't people buying boats in Nottingham, sailing them down to London and selling them for a cool 10K profit? Why would people sell their boats in Nottingham when they could make more money selling them in London?

Because it’s way too much hassle. We bought WotEver in The Midlands and several years later sold her through the same brokerage because it was convenient. 

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