Dovid Speaks: Boating on a Budget – Step One, Get a Boat!

We get asked a lot about how we can afford to do all this.  The thing is – it’s not terribly expensive to get your first boat.  You’ll need to put some work into it, but as long as you buy within your budget and your repair skill level – and frankly that is the more important – then it’s not difficult at all to start out.

MY STORY…
I was working in back office finance, doing chargebacks for small banks and credit unions, but I had decided it was time to buy a boat. I made ok money but nothing amazing, I worked  9-5,  I had a little extra money, I thought a project boat would be ideal.  So I poked around on Craigslist and found one.  And bought it – parking it in a garage shop to work on it over the winter.  Just after I bought the boat I was downsized, but that just seemed like the perfect time to work on changing how my life was going.  I paid $600 for the first one.

I actually lived in the garage and worked on the boat for 6 months, coming to the conlusion that it was just not the right boat while training myself to live in a smaller space.  And it so wasn’t – I had succumbed to boat fever rather than looking for the right boat.  But the living in a small space intentionally was very helpful and I highly recommend some form of it.  Thinking I had learned my lesson – I turned around determined to ignore boat fever – and promptly did it again.

Now this is not to say that the first Emuna isn’t without promise – but it was far beyond my skill capacity to rebuild.  A solid little CAL 25, she was the size and lay out I was comfortable with, having learned to sail on a Venture 25.  Along with good clean lines came a thick laid hull and keel, much better than the drop keel previous, which went to a new home.  I kept the mast, and for good reason – having succumbed to boat fever again, Emuna didn’t have one.

Emuna had been demasted in a serious winter storm, had water damage and no mast, no engine and no power system.  And yet.  Something about that little boat appealed to me in a way that other CALs in the marina in better shape for roughly the same price didn’t.  So I paid $1200 for a beat up boat with a lot of promise.  Honestly, I should have taken one of the other CALs, but I choose the little beat up one.  While I was never able to do the necessary repairs to make her sail – but I lived in her for several years quite comfortably as a single person and later with a cat.

Of course, I got a crazy idea in my head and put a truck top on it for more headroom.  I’d heard about it from a friend of another CAL 25 owner and when he brought me the top, I put it on the boat.  Excellent living space.  Not so much conducive to making the necessary repairs.  Emuna was gifted to a young man with dreams and skills with power tools.  I have high hopes for them both.

So we were cramped in Emuna, nowhere near able to do all the necessary work – and I still had a little money in the bank.  So we begain to search Craigslist, friends of friends, and wandering the docks from time to time.  A friend pointed out the Scotty to us – we hadn’t really noticed it, or that it was for sale.  After inspecting the boat and meeting up with the owner – she was ours the same day.  We paid $3600 for a boat we could actually work with and a lot of extras came with.  It doesn’t take a lot of money, as much as time spent researching and looking at boats themselves.  Emuna II was born.

It took us a couple of days to move everything from one boat to the other, to find places for it all and to get used to the new layout, but it was a happy change for us.  Emuna II is a Newport 28, and those 3 feet make a huge amount of difference.  More height, more width, more comfort.  It works well for us, gives us each our own space and ways to be “alone” when we need it – and of course sails well and holds our stuff.

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Naturally there have been things that have needed work from time to time – polishing the brightwork, swabbing, drain clearing, the bilge pump had to be replaced, new carpeting, installing the fridge and next up replacing the marine head.  But just like any other house, there are things that need to be done. It’s well worth it for us, not just in cost, but in potential.  Our house can take us not just beyond the horizon but beyond our dreams, and so can yours with the right amount of research and basic knowledge.