Annual maintenance cost

Hi....in the process of buying a 55isf ft trawler which will serve as our home for the next five years as we explore the warmer waters of the Atlantic and Pacific. I have read a number of books regarding voyaging under power as well as Calder's M&E Manual. However, I can't find an overview or list of maintenance costs not including fuel and insurance. I realize a lot depends on living style....which I consider to be "average". I want to maintain the boat in a manner to keep it running efficiently and to enjoy the locales we visit. We plan on staying on the hook mostly and will have a water maker and solar/wind generators, staying a week to as much as a month at each location. Any suggestions as to how to develop or sources to find this "budget" will be very much appreciated!

Too many variables. Very general rule of thumb is annual operating cost between 10 and 30% of purchase price for everything. Some boats are more needy than others and have higher annual maintenance costs. Will you do some, all, or none of the maintenance work yourself? What condition is the boat in when you get it. Stuff on boats wears out. How old is the house battery bank, the refrigerator, electronics, and all the pumps (14 on my boat). Not to mention the genset and engine (s) and drive train (s). Think you get the idea how many variables there are.

Ted

Second too many variables. A lot depends on your skills in picking a boat and skills in maintaining it. If you are really mechanically inclined and can do most of the labor yourself and the boat is uncomplicated the cost goes way down and on the other hand if the boat is complex and you need skilled yard labor for everything cost goes way way up. Then there is a middle ground where you do what you can and yard only when its over your head. When I was younger and dealt with simpler boats there was little cost now I do little myself on complex boat and cost is astronomical.

A basic--- VERY basic--- rule of thumb for determining the annual ownership cost of a used boat is ten percent of the purchase price of the boat. This includes insurance, moorage, electricity, fuel, maintenance, repairs, and upgrades. it does not include finance payments as these eventually go away. The ten percent figure is what was being used 17 years ago when we bought our boat. Today with the increases in labor costs it might be more like fifteen percent.

Again, this is a VERY rough estimate designed only to give a prospective boat owner a sense of awareness about the ongoing cost of ownership. Every boat will be different, the condition of every boat will be different, the amount of work an owner is willing or able to do him or herself will be different.

So the ten or fifteen percent figure is an awareness figure, not an accurate one.

A big variable is who's doing the work? If you have to hire out the electrical/mechanical your budget will be much higher.

Your annual fuel can be estimated by the miles that you anticipate. Since you said the Atlantic and Pacific over a 5 year period, fuel will be a big part of your budget. That's a lot of miles.


Do you want to eat out 2-3 nights a week? Does the admiral want to go home regularly to see the grandkids or are there aging parents? Sit down with a pencil and a calculator.

Boat insurance will probably cost around 1.5 to 2% annually of your hull value based on the boat and your experience. You'll have to submit an itinerary and resume at time of application and renewal. Where you want to go and when will affect your rates.

First, The 10% rule makes no sense at all, how that myth is perpetuated is one of the great mysteries of boating to me. Implies that a crudded out boat is cheaper to maintain than the same boat in primo condition. That a brand new boat is much more expensive to maintain than the same boat seven years old that has systems wearing out.

The answer to the OP, which I have given in various threads here before goes something like this:

What are your standards for seaworthiness?
What are your standards for creature comforts?
What are your standards for cosmetics?

What condition is the boat in when you bought it, vis a vis the above?

How much of the work are you competent to perform to bring the boat up to and maintain, your standards? How much do you value your time?

For those things you can't or don't want to do, what does it cost in your area to have a competent tradesman do the work?

How much are you going to run the boat, and where?

Do you anchor or go on a mooring a lot or more marina-bound? The former puts more pressure on your generator and other electrical generation systems (batteries, inverters, wind, etc) and your freshwater pumps, watermaker if applicable, etc. Plus the tender. Of course, the marina cost itself offsets that to a large degree, if the affected equipment is not nearing replacement or rebuild time.

So, in my opinion, those are the big variables involved. Pretty much in order of cost variance magnitude.

Logically smaller, newer and mechanically simpler would be at the lower end of the scale. At least that's what I'm hoping!
I guess even that is quite a generalisation.
Grae

I don't believe a percentage of value is a good estimate of ownership costs. Compare similar, equal-sized boats, one purchased new for $250K compared to a used one acquired for $80K. Ownership costs wouldn't be three times higher for the newer boat (except for property taxes.) Berthing, fuel, and bottom painting would be the same, insurance and property taxes would be higher for the new boat, but the used boat would likely, but not necessarily, have higher maintenance costs because of replacement of components.


My bought-new, four-year-old boat is costing about $14K a year (berth, taxes, insurance, repairs, maintenance, fuel), nearly 6% of the purchase cost. The boat is professionally maintained, operated 125 hours. Berthing, taxes, and insurance are readily forecasted, maintenance and repair are more difficult.

The budget is seldom a hassle IF you can do the R&R work.

Stuff brakes , so what , the locals have water pumps , bilge pumps , everything you need , just different.

The BIG DEAL, is the budget for the DISASTER , a blown engine next to nowhere.

Insurance for this is PM and a good system of gauges .

For long passages the Murphy Switchgauge with their auto secure system cant be beat.

Well under a boat buck , better than a union engineer standing watch 24/7

If you have the skill set industrial or big truck engines can be rebuilt in place , with just tools and the parts kit.

Taxi , auto, farm implement engines will usually need to be removed for a big job.

I think you can get a basic idea by looking at your boating you do now and increase that by how much you are going to travel. For instance, if you change your oil once each season, you need to do that every 100 hours. If you travel 50 -75 miles each day you are moving, That's 6 - 10 hours. Ten days of moving may be an oil change. That's what I'm trying to do now. I want to throw off the bow lines in 3 years. How long I stay out depends on how it works. I can rent my condo until I want to come back. So far, I have come up with a budget of $5K per month and that's not looking too good. That doesn't include any boat payments or insurance. I plan on 2 nights per week at a marina to do laundry and provision. That's when I would do the maintenance. To me maintenance is, oil changes, impellers, filters, cleaning, waxing, stitching repairs in the canvas, chase leaks, things like that. Major mechanical issues get farmed out. Only you can figure out what you will do. All I know, for sure, I'm going. How long I stay out is the unknown question.

I have always interpreted "maintenance" as just the cost of maintaining the boat in top condition as dinstiinct from "lifestyle" choices (marina vs hook etc). The lifestyle part should be able to be individually budgeted?

All I can say from Year # 1 with my older trawler is you better have a pretty big reserve if you want to cruise. 10% annual isnt even close for the first year. Maybe after a couple years getting everything in line with your needs. Things break at the wrong time which means buying parts online or thru local service centers, which in-turn is time at a dock for repairs and labor costs. Expect previous owners to put off expensive maint items that arent obvious. You checkbook needs to float a big balance to cover such events unless you dont mind outragous credit card finance charges.

My basic annual boat expenses are roughly 30-40% of purchase price, this year will probably spend close to 70%. To put that into perspective my acquisition cost was far FAR south of any other regular contributors to this forum. Our boat is far from falling apart it's actually in great shape with a recent full refit. Just purchased at a fire sale price from a previous owner tired of sitting on two boats.

The ongoing expense is a real issue that does not go away with time. As others have said pursuit of a hard number as a percentage of purchase price is like trying to catch smoke in your bare hand.

For real world numbers price berths in your chosen marina and double or triple it. That number will likely be much closer to reality than any purchase price percentage IMO.

caltexflanc said:

First, The 10% rule makes no sense at all, how that myth is perpetuated is one of the great mysteries of boating to me.

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You miss the point entirely. It's a newbie number: it's intended solely to give inexperienced people contemplating buying a cruising boat a sense of reality. Boats cost money to buy, and then they keep costing money to own.

The newbie's first question after they're told that is, "How much does it cost to own?"

So what are you going to do? Flood them with the bazillion varisables that they don't have a clue how to relate to or even what half of them are? They'll be more confused than when they started.

The ten-percent number--- which has been shown to be at least in the ballpark of average ownership costs--- is a single number the prospective buyer can be given as way of a reality check. This gives them a number right off the bat that can help them determine if they are capable of affording a boat without biting off more than they can chew.

Of course there are tons of variables. Of course a newer boat may cost less per year than an older boat. Of course ownership costs vary with how much work a an owner can or is willing to do on his or her own. Even my dog knows all that.

But the person new to this kind of boating most likely does not. We certainly didn't. And when we seriously began contemplating buying our first cruising boat, the broker we enlisted gave us that figure as a "be aware a boat will cost you a lot more than the purchase price" reality check.

It was an extremely valuable piece of information for us to have at that time. We could have afforded a boat that cost twice as much as the one we bought. But knowing that a boat--- any boat--- never stops costing its owner money injected a sense or reality into our purchase and our decision. We bought a boat we could afford, and that we could afford to continue to own year after year after year.

THAT'S what the ten-percent figure is good for. People who've been in boating for decades don't need it. People who are contemplating getting into cruising for the first time but know nothing about the ongoing costs involved do.

Bombard them with all the details people with a lot of experiece tend to bombard them with and you get a deer-in-the-headlights look. I know: I've seen it happen many times and so has the fellow who was our broker and who is the lead broker at the GB dealership in our harbor.

Give them a nice easy, representative number they can understand right off the boat and tney will go into their first boat-buying experience with their eyes open.

As they gain experience or as they start asking more detailed questions about a specific boat they will soon learn the realities of owning that particular boat. But what won't happen (hopefully) is that they won't have buy a boat that costs the amount of their boat budget and then start to get whacked with expense after expense that puts them into the negative financial aspect of boat ownership.

For our boat, while we have not kept strict track of every expense, over the last seventeen years, the ten-percent figure has not been all that far off. It's getting higher these days because labor rates have gone up considerably. We do as much of or own work as we can, but when it comes to things like engine mounts, new exhaust systems, new cutless bearings, and so on, we hire that out.

But it's a very simple concept and from what I have experienced and what I have heard from acquaintences in the boat sales business and from individuals we have known over the years who decided to get into cruising as newbies, it is a very appreciated piece of information to have at the outset.

Its probably easier to define what a trawler is or is not than to find a specific or even ballpark figure for maintenance and for living costs on a boat too MANY variables. You can take the same boat and different owners and find a very wide spread.

A lot would depend on the owner's idea of proper maintenance. Also, I can easily imagine used boats' berthing costs alone could exceed ten percent of the boats' value.

In our 80's Taiwanese trawler, it was about 33% per year over 5 years.

caltexflanc said:

First, The 10% rule makes no sense at all, how that myth is perpetuated is one of the great mysteries of boating to me. .

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I'm not arguing in this post whether the number is reasonable or not, but like many "myths" the original statement ends up altered. The 10% number is based on original purchase price of the new boat, not a used boat price, and it is considered the average over the life of the boat. So, while year one is less, the assumption is you need to be setting money back from the start for rebuilds, etc. It also, in it's original usage, was operating costs, not maintenance.

But then as the rest of you are saying, it depends on how it's used, owner's ability, and many other factors, including what you're including in the definition of maintenance. A rule of thumb isn't going to be much help as we're all so different. There was an excellent calculator on a site I frequent but they took it off about a month ago.

Thinking about it, it costs about $120 an hour to operate my boat, not counting depreciation nor time on boat while not operating. Running the boat more would reduce the cost per hour as most costs have no relation to the hours operated. Each additional hour of operation would cost only $6.

"not counting depreciation nor time on boat while not operating."

Time on the boat while NOT operating is probably 90% of most boat use.

This is good time as little wears out just sitting.

That 10% rule is frequently cited, but in my experience it is nonesensical. For example, my cost may be twice what someone would pay today -- should my maintenance cost be twice? I doubt it. So, frequently the rule of thumb is adjusted to be 10% of current value, but that doesn't make any sense either -- why should maintaining a 5 year old boat be 1/2 the cost of maintaining the same boat when it was new?
Setting those issues aside, IMO and IME it is way high if you are only trying to maintain a boat. Conversely, if you are buying a boat that needs repair and replacement, those costs could easily exceed the 10%. Similarly, a lot of money can be spent on upgrades of otherwise functional systems, but I would not include those costs in maintenance since they are entirely elective. My annual maintenance costs (so, excluding dockage, insurance and fuel, but including bottom cleaning, washing and waxing and preventative maintenance and repair) are not 1% of my original cost.

I would say 10 -15% of purchase price would be close to the mark for a 20 year old boat in fairly good condition. A new boat would be a little less, and a 20 year old boat in poor condition might be 50% for a few years, due the both the lower purchase price and the required catch up maintenance & repairs.

I bought a low cost 30 year old boat in perhaps below average condition, and the first year was about 20%, the second year about 50%, but now hopefully expect to see the maintenance costs reduced significantly after replacing most of the big dollar items such as engine, gearbox, rigging, fuel tanks, windlass, prop and wiring upgrade.

I may even get to that 10% figure, but I probably just jinxed myself by posting this.

Here's where those numbers originated and why they really don't apply to most trawlers.

Just using this as an example to understand where they came from and why they're so misleading.

Take a 130' Yacht. Twin engines, twin gens. Purchase price $24 Million

Fuel $600,000
Engines and Gens Maintenance $60,000
Annual reserve for rebuilds $130,000
Maintenance, Paint, Deck, Interior $110,000
Maintenance, Tenders and Watermakers plus reserve for replacement $20,000
Hydraulics-Thrusters, Stabilizers $30,000
Dockage $170,000
Crew costs, including medical, fringes, food, travel, uniforms, and day help $700,000
Communications $75,000
Cost of entertaining guests $140,000
Insurance $160,000
Property Taxes (putting it in California) $300,000
Administrative costs $50,000

Total $2,550,000...Without California taxes $2,250,000

Now, that's where the old saying that it would cost 10% of the purchase price to operate it came from. Like passing any saying around the room, over time it became maintenance and it was applied to other type boats and people without crews and DIY maintenance and it's at that point terribly wrong. And boats like trawlers that use 4 to 15 gph versus the example above at 130-160 gph.

What I would suggest as the key elements of annual costs are those shown above but they must be calculated for each boat.

1. Fuel
2. Engine and Gen Maintenance
3. Reserve for major maintenance and rebuilds
4. Painting and any deck or interior maintenance
5. Cost of maintenance and replacement of tenders, watermakers, appliances.
6. Cost of maintaining stabilizers, thrusters, flopper stoppers.
7. Dockage
8. Crew costs (don't apply generally but could be cost of delivery captain or shipping)
9. Communications
10. Food and spending money while cruising
11. Insurance
12. Taxes and Fees

The most overlooked cost is major work such as rebuilds since that requirement is just every few years and some are lucky enough or use their boat little enough to never require.

Most overestimated I think is fuel. People estimate a lot more movement than they have in reality and at speeds they don't normally go.

I think 5% is more than most will encounter, but I'd advise anyone to just look at it category by category.

Band B - It also can apply to a 30 foot boat.
Now that I have addressed the major problems on my boat, this is a rough expectation of my costs for the next year.

1. Fuel $500
2. Engine and Gen Maintenance $300
3. Reserve for majors $1000
4. Painting etc $200
5. Tenders, watermakers, appliances. $250
6. Stabilizers, thrusters, flopper stoppers. & sail rigging $100
7. Dockage $2600
8. Crew costs $0
9. Communications $0
10. Food and spending money while cruising $0 (no more than staying at home)
11. Insurance $700
12. Taxes and Fees $0

Total $5650 (11.5% of purchase cost - $49,000)

I'll likely spend at least the same amount again on improvements, but these are discretionary costs. This is often where the cost of boat ownership blows out.

Citing a percentage of the price of a boat when it was new isn't of any benefit because of the changing value of the dollar. It's an apples to oranges comparison.

In 1998 we paid in dollars well over twice what our boat had cost new in dollars in 1973. Did that mean the boat had appreciated in value? Of course not. In 1998 the same make and model of boat sold new for over three times the number of dollars that we paid for our then-twenty five year old boat. Our boat had depreciated A LOT from the day American Marine loaded it new on the ship in Singapore for its journey to its buyer in SFO Bay.

If we had been led to believe that the ownership cost of our boat in 1998 dollars would be in the neighborhood of ten percent what the boat had cost new in 1973 dollars, we would have been horribly dismayed when the bills started to come in. In fact, had we budgeted our boat purchase based on this ownership cost, we would have quickly gotten underwater with the ownership cost and possibly have had to sell the boat or make severe adjustments to the rest of our living expenses.

Instead we were given as a VERY rough rule of thumb the figure of ten percent of the purchase price in 1998 dollars. Apples to apples.

And as it has turned out, over the years the ownership cost of our boat has proven to be in that ballpark with an upward creep to account for the increased cost of labor, parts, materials, fuel, moorage, and so forth. The one thing that hasn't gone up is insurance thanks, I believe, to our having an excellent broker (Anchor Marine).

So giving a prospective first-time boat buyer a ROUGH ownership cost figure to be aware of as he or she determines their boating budget is only meaningful and easy for them to grasp if it's in the "same money" their purchase price will be in.

Has the ownership cost been the same every year? Of course not. Some years not much happened outside of moorage, insurance, and routine maintenance stuff that we did ourselves. Other years we needed a new prop shaft and new cutless bearings on both shafts, or better, stronger shaft couplers, or new motor mounts on both engines, or new custom-fabricated exhaust systems on both engines, or the main deck regrooved and reseamed. This year we're having new cushions and backs made for the main cabin and we need the dinghy motor overhauled.

But on average, that ten-percent of the purchase price of the boat figure our broker gave us the day we walked in with a "we're considering getting a cruising boat of our own, what kind of cost would we be looking at?" question has been remarkably accurate.

And even if it hadn't been accurate, even if it had proven to be somewhat higher or somewhat lower, that's not the point. The point is that he let us know right off the bat that boats like these cost a fair amount to own, we immediately got a sense of what boats like this cost to own, and we immediately understood that we needed to be aware of this and allow for it in our boating budget.

So we did and as a result we bought a boat we liked that hasn't exceeded the amount of our disposable income we are willing to spend on boating.

As Marin says, the key is to be conservative in your expectations and prepared for costs on the high side. Then if it's better, great. Just don't underestimate what it costs to maintain a boat properly. If you do, you find yourself skipping or putting off needed maintenance and then ultimately all the needed work piles up and in an amount you just can't afford.

I know we go overboard as typical for me, but we maintain complete financial statement on our boats, just no income. However, we accrue rebuild expenses and show it as a liability building. We also depreciate just to remind ourselves of the fact it's losing value and to replace it one day down the road with a new boat would be expensive. It's whatever method helps you individually.

I hate to see when the cost of ownership suddenly becomes a shock. I look around at all the reclamation projects that are stopped along the way over finances and dreams unfulfilled.

If you make a good estimate of costs of ownership and find you can't afford it, then find another way. It can be a cheaper boat. We have friends for whom it became chartering as they only get a couple of weeks, a couple of times a year. If the cost of a boat is more than you anticipated then the boat can easily become a source of stress rather than pleasure.

BandB said:

As Marin says, the key is to be conservative in your expectations and prepared for costs on the high side. Then if it's better, great. Just don't underestimate what it costs to maintain a boat properly. If you do, you find yourself skipping or putting off needed maintenance and then ultimately all the needed work piles up and in an amount you just can't afford.

I know we go overboard as typical for me, but we maintain complete financial statement on our boats, just no income. However, we accrue rebuild expenses and show it as a liability building. We also depreciate just to remind ourselves of the fact it's losing value and to replace it one day down the road with a new boat would be expensive. It's whatever method helps you individually.

I hate to see when the cost of ownership suddenly becomes a shock. I look around at all the reclamation projects that are stopped along the way over finances and dreams unfulfilled.

If you make a good estimate of costs of ownership and find you can't afford it, then find another way. It can be a cheaper boat. We have friends for whom it became chartering as they only get a couple of weeks, a couple of times a year. If the cost of a boat is more than you anticipated then the boat can easily become a source of stress rather than pleasure.

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Well said, I've attempted to convey this exact thought in past years and got my butt flamed pretty good for it. Not by regular contributors but by new wannabe boat owners who took offense. There's no shame in smaller boats or chartering as an option. My brother charters a crewed vessel annually and gets great enjoyment without ongoing ownership costs. Picking locales, styles(motor yacht or sail), size etc is nice too.

We chose a small boat not because we could not afford larger, rather because it best fit our defined mission. We have started the initial baby steps in defining the mission for our next boat and it promises to be different but not necessarily bigger. The folks that spook me are the ones looking for maximum size at minimal cost which can too often be a recipe for disaster for a newbie to boating IMO. I've had plenty of face to face, PM, email and phone contact with folks expressing some form of regret over their current boat choice. "If we had only ______"(started smaller, chartered, shopped more, been more aware of ongoing costs) are all very popular themes.

CPseudonym said:

Well said, I've attempted to convey this exact thought in past years and got my butt flamed pretty good for it. Not by regular contributors but by new wannabe boat owners who took offense. There's no shame in smaller boats or chartering as an option.

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This is a common issue every boat purchaser faces too. Those who decide 160' vs 200', production or custom, face the same issues. For everyone there's a level that is beyond their needs and means.

We chartered for quite a while as part of our decision process. It's especially great if you can charter the same boat you're thinking of buying.

We lived on the lake before moving to Florida. The boats that were most frequently repossessed were bass boats. These were fishermen who started out thinking a nice $30,000 bass boat but ended up with an $80,000 one. Then left with none and destroyed credit.

Outside of a very few multi billionaires, there is no one who doesn't have financial limitations. We used those words saying, "We don't need it and honestly we can't afford it." Could we have afforded the boat in question? Yes, but...the but is something else we had in our plans would have had to be eliminated. Every sales person has a strong bias and incentive toward talking you up to something more expensive. The most honest and fair ones do a good job of tempering that, but it's still there. I laugh watching some of the home buyers on television shows. They give the realtor a range. Does the realtor ever start at the bottom end of that range? No. Always the upper end and often trying to stretch that higher.

I think these guys are being too careful with their advice. The annual budget is very simple to figure out. Only the owner knows his boat well. So pencil out, on the high side, what you think the cost will be. Take a few days to think about your list, then add what you may have missed. Got the number? Multiply that number by Five. There you have it.