Bring
Out
Another
Thousand
boat: [boht] noun/ 1. a vessel of any size used to for navigation on water. 2. a hole in the water you throw money into.
The two best days in a boat owner's life: The day he buys a boat and the day he sells it.
These are the types of things that everyone likes to remind us of. There is always something to do, and it usually involves money. Lots of money.
When we talk to people about our adventure they love to hear all the juicy details and much of that includes costs. When you buy a house people don't immediately ask you how much you paid, it's impolite (that's what Zillow is for). They don't ask you what your electric bill is, or what setting you keep your heat/AC at. When you own a boat, especially one you live on, it's different. People somehow think there is a familiarity that goes with boats and that includes what it costs. We don't really mind, it isn't like we are super rich or super poor and are ashamed of what our income is, it's just odd that there isn't a buffer like when you live in a house.
Of course this works both ways too! We are never shy about letting people know how expensive marine gas is and about Cygnet's terribly lousy fuel economy. Hint hint! When we first got Two Wrights, our old Sea Ray, we used to ask people to chip in some gas money for a day on the water. We were both making dismal incomes at the jobs we could find after returning to Chicago in the Great Recession. We decided that no matter how house poor we were we wanted to be on the water and the twenty bucks that someone would throw down at the end of a day out helped us a lot. As we got back into our fields and got the jobs we have now and the income shot up to reasonable levels we stopped asking. At some point Kevin even stopped accepting gas money, but Colette would always take it, and Kevin knew that. It was a way to be proud and cheap at the same time.
So let's break it down, you all want to know what it cost and we are not afraid to share. Essentially it's equal to what it cost us to live in our modest fixer-upper house in a good neighborhood. Since we're doing so many updates the costs are higher for the first few months but should taper off and end up a bit lower. We have spent about the same amount of money on Cygnet as we did on the house when we first moved in just to make it livable.
The following costs are all rounded up. This is actually a bit more than we pay but you get the idea.
Purchase price of vessel including taxes, title transfer, etc:
$80,000
Let's forget about this number right now. We don't know at this point how long Cygnet will be in our possession and we can't figure out the depreciation since the boat is worth more now that when we bought it due to our long list of upgrades and fixes. Keep in mind a boat this size and age probably depreciates about $5,000 per year. It will never appreciate like a house or condo, however we know plenty of people who are "underwater" on their land based domiciles right now.
Slip (dock) fee for 1 year:
$11,200
Parking garage rental for 1 year:
$2,200
Expected "maintenance" costs per year:
$5,000
Utilities (electric, natural gas, sewer, water):
$0
Insurance:
$900
Gasoline for going out on the water/ generator:
$3,000
Total yearly:
$22,300
Total monthly:
$1,858
That's about a hundred bucks more than our old mortgage with taxes and insurance. Our utilities at the house were another couple hundred, we had no gasoline costs or garage rental. We'd say a house to boat comparison of maintenance costs is about equal. So essentially you could call it a wash, but if you'd ever been to our house you know it needed $150,000 in rehab work to be comparable to the other houses on the block - or even livable in the 21st century. We've dumped 1/10th of that in Cygnet and she's almost perfect (yeah, right).
So there you have it, what it actually costs to live aboard a boat in Chicago. It's not cheap, but it's not expensive either, relatively. It's certainly a smaller space than our house, but it's also a yacht, which is awesome. So Water We Thinking about the costs involved? We are good with the costs, and don't fret about paying the bills or breaking the bank.
Out
Another
Thousand
boat: [boht] noun/ 1. a vessel of any size used to for navigation on water. 2. a hole in the water you throw money into.
The two best days in a boat owner's life: The day he buys a boat and the day he sells it.
These are the types of things that everyone likes to remind us of. There is always something to do, and it usually involves money. Lots of money.
When we talk to people about our adventure they love to hear all the juicy details and much of that includes costs. When you buy a house people don't immediately ask you how much you paid, it's impolite (that's what Zillow is for). They don't ask you what your electric bill is, or what setting you keep your heat/AC at. When you own a boat, especially one you live on, it's different. People somehow think there is a familiarity that goes with boats and that includes what it costs. We don't really mind, it isn't like we are super rich or super poor and are ashamed of what our income is, it's just odd that there isn't a buffer like when you live in a house.
That old house
Of course this works both ways too! We are never shy about letting people know how expensive marine gas is and about Cygnet's terribly lousy fuel economy. Hint hint! When we first got Two Wrights, our old Sea Ray, we used to ask people to chip in some gas money for a day on the water. We were both making dismal incomes at the jobs we could find after returning to Chicago in the Great Recession. We decided that no matter how house poor we were we wanted to be on the water and the twenty bucks that someone would throw down at the end of a day out helped us a lot. As we got back into our fields and got the jobs we have now and the income shot up to reasonable levels we stopped asking. At some point Kevin even stopped accepting gas money, but Colette would always take it, and Kevin knew that. It was a way to be proud and cheap at the same time.
Franklins!
So let's break it down, you all want to know what it cost and we are not afraid to share. Essentially it's equal to what it cost us to live in our modest fixer-upper house in a good neighborhood. Since we're doing so many updates the costs are higher for the first few months but should taper off and end up a bit lower. We have spent about the same amount of money on Cygnet as we did on the house when we first moved in just to make it livable.
Cygnet
The following costs are all rounded up. This is actually a bit more than we pay but you get the idea.
Purchase price of vessel including taxes, title transfer, etc:
$80,000
Let's forget about this number right now. We don't know at this point how long Cygnet will be in our possession and we can't figure out the depreciation since the boat is worth more now that when we bought it due to our long list of upgrades and fixes. Keep in mind a boat this size and age probably depreciates about $5,000 per year. It will never appreciate like a house or condo, however we know plenty of people who are "underwater" on their land based domiciles right now.
Slip (dock) fee for 1 year:
$11,200
Parking garage rental for 1 year:
$2,200
Expected "maintenance" costs per year:
$5,000
Utilities (electric, natural gas, sewer, water):
$0
Insurance:
$900
Gasoline for going out on the water/ generator:
$3,000
Total yearly:
$22,300
Total monthly:
$1,858
That's about a hundred bucks more than our old mortgage with taxes and insurance. Our utilities at the house were another couple hundred, we had no gasoline costs or garage rental. We'd say a house to boat comparison of maintenance costs is about equal. So essentially you could call it a wash, but if you'd ever been to our house you know it needed $150,000 in rehab work to be comparable to the other houses on the block - or even livable in the 21st century. We've dumped 1/10th of that in Cygnet and she's almost perfect (yeah, right).
So there you have it, what it actually costs to live aboard a boat in Chicago. It's not cheap, but it's not expensive either, relatively. It's certainly a smaller space than our house, but it's also a yacht, which is awesome. So Water We Thinking about the costs involved? We are good with the costs, and don't fret about paying the bills or breaking the bank.
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