How did you fund your trip?

[Stillraining]

Being self employed and not overly disciplined either I will have no retirement to speak of...my goal is to work 6 play 6 also...and for me thats untill I die.
In about 8 years the house will be paid for... kids through collage and hopefully a rental or two to provide some income on land already owned.
But I can easly make enough in 6 months to sustain another 6 months cruising if were careful once the house/collage bills are gone.
The wife has informed me she needs some terraferma...a place to come home to and is more then likely not cut out for full time cruising anyway..who knows I might not be either...wont know till we try...We plan to also give someone we know and trust a killer deal to rent and care for our house when were gone which will maybe at least pay the taxes and Ins. on the place at least, and keep the place with the all inportant lived in look.

I will be almost 60 by then and the wife 52 but thats the plan and I dont see it comming any faster..Family first... just the way it is for me.

[jbthehut]

It is really interesting to read all the different approaches people take to reach the same goal. When we get our boat paid off, that's when we both retire and go sailing. We are going to do it on around $1600.00 a month, as long as we are careful I think we can do it. I'm very lucky that my wife is just as motivated as I am to do this, so it is truly a shared dream.I figure it will take us about 5 years to pay off the boat and have it ready to go. If I can find a way to pay it off sooner, than we leave sooner, pretty good motivation would'nt you all agree..... Oh yea one more thing, in a couple of months we will be moving onto our boat for good. I can hardly wait....

[tennis4789]

Originally Posted by jbthehut

When we get our boat paid off, that's when we both retire and go sailing. I'm very lucky that my wife is just as motivated as I am to do this, so it is truly a shared dream. If I can find a way to pay it off sooner, than we leave sooner, pretty good motivation would'nt you all agree..... Oh yea one more thing, in a couple of months we will be moving onto our boat for good. I can hardly wait....

JB - Must be nice to have a wife that is motivated. I can see quite a few women not thinking of a boat as the ideal nest. Must be alot easier also to make the decision to skip on a few expenses if it goes right to the boat freedom fund. Care to elaborate on the kinds of jobs/professions you and your wife have?

On Thursday I put in my paper work to the state to start a residential contractor business and am still a Realtor/property investor. How the government charges me a fee to start a business so I can pay more taxes grrr. If that doesn't work I'm going back to the JOB grind most likely in project management, if there are any JOBs left in this market.

Oct 09, I want to take the plunge and buy a small boat and start outfitting it to be ready to sail down IL riv, MS riv, around FL up the Atlantic, through the Great Lakes and back to home starting maybe in Oct 10. I think if I wait too much longer, I might end up finding a woman that has other priorities besides sailing.

I was reading tennis magazine the other day. I got motivated when it showed a gorgeous South Carolina tennis club that was right by a marina. Anyone ever used their boat for lodging while going to a tennis camp/clinic?

[Minggat]

Since I'm afraid of outliving my money, I really didn't think about posting on this thread. But since I'm on my boat and in the cruising grounds, I guess I've done something right.

So let's see...

I started with.... no plan.
Blundered into a job that paid well enough, But I had to travel and I hated it.
Bought a condo, got married, sold the condo and came away with enough cash to start a business and quit traveling.
Wrong wife, hated me being my own boss. 4 kids/8 years later, got divorced and went back on the road, very very broke.
Got married ... for some reason. I fell in lust I think. 1 more kid and 8 years later got divorced. Very very broke.
Decided to quit hating the travel work and started long term overseas work, same industry.
Came back from Asian job with enough cash to buy a fixer upper boat, a car and still had cash leftover. Went back to Asia and married a little brown sweetie (9 years ago) who could travel with me. We were in Malaysia when 911 happened.
Things changed. Thanx Homeland Security.
Now I'm on the boat in the cruising community of Mexico, and trying to figure out how to bring my Indonesian wife here.

But aside from that little mud puddle in my life, if it were not for a pair of divorces, I would not be here. I would be living hand to mouth and hating life. Yes, I have lost the nest egg, more than once. But life is good.

I will say that I see boats here that are rough. And I see cruisers here that don't have much. Most seem to be financially secure. Some are not. EVERY boat seems to be some kind of "work in progress".

It's OK, or normal I think to be afraid of outliving your money. It's a good idea to have a healthy respect for the sea too.

So now (finally) I have a "plan". I leave the boat and accept an assignment to some foreign country, take my wife with me and we spend months making good money. And when that job is finished we come back to where the boat is. The only part that doesn't seem to work is getting my wife’s visas in order. Can't keep up with the rules.

[jbthehut]

Tennis

Yea it's great that my wife and I share the dream. I am an office manager and my wife is a nurse. The timing for us is getting the boat paid off, once that is done than we will be free to pull up stakes and go where we want. We are not going to have a bunch of money to do it with, but if we are carefull we should be ok. the key is being debt free, as long as you are not strapped into payments to anyone it free's you up to take a chance. Worst case is we run out of money somewhere in the south pacific, if that happens, find a good place to drop anchor and sit for a couple of months. That would be hard to take.....LOL

[tennis4789]

Originally Posted by Minggat

Since I'm afraid of outliving my money, I really didn't think about posting on this thread. But since I'm on my boat and in the cruising grounds, I guess I've done something right.
Now I'm on the boat in the cruising community of Mexico, and trying to figure out how to bring my Indonesian wife here.

I will say that I see boats here that are rough. And I see cruisers here that don't have much. Most seem to be financially secure. Some are not. EVERY boat seems to be some kind of "work in progress".

It's OK, or normal I think to be afraid of outliving your money.

The only part that doesn't seem to work is getting my wife’s visas in order. Can't keep up with the rules.

Minggat,

Great post. Your post emphasized that I can probably save/plan and never do it or make the decision to leap before looking too long. One of my buddies goes you never see a Brinks armored truck behind a funeral procession.

How are things in Mexico (Scenery/prices/diving/eating etc.)? I've traveled to TJ and Los Mochis - I live in central IL (which is pretty inexpensive to live) - the price of goods didn't seem that much less expensive in Mexico?

Best luck bringing your wife to this country. I know that can be a big hassle from what one of my buddies went through - he was just trying to get a green card to work here.

JB - I agree w/ you on living debt free. Although sometimes seems like have to take on some debt to get started in business. That would be terrible to be stranded in the South Pacific soaking up the rays and enjoying the sunsets.

[slomotion]

Sometimes even I get lucky. In 1999 I had a good job with great benefits plus a small consulting business and I taught a graduate course occasionally. We had two boys in the military and another in college on full scholarship. We also had some mutual funds that were skyrocketing. We weren’t rich, but at least on paper we had a nice little nest egg. My wife and I had also just turned 50, and for reasons which now seem trivial, I was fed up. One day I announced: "Let’s buy a boat and go."

I had been sailing off and on since I was a kid - mostly on other people’s boats. I hadn’t owned a sailboat since the early 80's (27 footer) and I had little real cruising experience. My wife had been on a sailboat exactly once. Three weeks later we bought the 3rd boat we looked at, and 4 months later we were cruising the Bahamas with few worries other than weather. I had to sell funds to buy and refit the boat and for no good reason other than not wanting to keep track of the market (which was going to go up forever), I decided to liquidate everything. When the market crashed 6 months later, everything was in money markets, checking/savings accounts, and CDs. If we hadn’t done it exactly how and when we did, it either wouldn’t have happened or it would have ended with us broke. Luck? Fate? Destiny? Dunno, but sometimes the dumbest things you do (and everyone we knew thought we were making a mistake), pay off anyway. Advice? How about: Go Now:

http://www.boatus.com/cruising/littl.../200608-24.asp

[jbthehut]

I would love to hear from some people that are currently living the dream and are cruising full time. I would like to ask what it is costing them, and just much they do or don't splurge? I have what I have and am going to give it a try regardless, it may be the biggest mistake weve ever made, but I have a feeling not. I think an even larger mistake would be to have never tried.....

[tennis4789]

Originally Posted by jbthehut

I would love to hear from some people that are currently living the dream and are cruising full time. I would like to ask what it is costing them, and just much they do or don't splurge? I have what I have and am going to give it a try regardless, it may be the biggest mistake weve ever made, but I have a feeling not. I think an even larger mistake would be to have never tried.....

Hi JB -

The link below talks about live aboard budgets. I started this thread to see if there were any patterns in how live aboards raised/funded living aboard. Seems like $10k to sky's the limit per year budget is the range.

http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...dget-4296.html


slomotion -

I really enjoyed the link from your post. I've been considering/investigating the big loop route in the US.

http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...ase-20892.html

Before I read your post/link, I had a thought might just be more fun to hang out in florida/Key West than to see how many miles I could go. After reading your link, really making me think. Although it would stroke the ego a bit to tell people I sailed from IL around FL through the Great Lakes and back to IL. Is 6 months enough to ENJOY making the loop?
Is the average speed on a decent trip about 4 knots/hour? Thinking the trip would be 4000 miles. Each day maybe sailing 10 hours would be 40 miles per day. This would be a total of 100 10 hour sailing days leaving 80 days free.

[jbthehut]

Tennis

Thanks for the link, regaring live aboard income. That really helps, I have been looking for some info to support my feeling that we could do this on 20k a year and it seems that I am right. The key is not to owe a dime to anyone.

[Stillraining]

Originally Posted by jbthehut

Tennis

Thanks for the link, regaring live aboard income. That really helps, I have been looking for some info to support my feeling that we could do this on 20k a year and it seems that I am right. The key is not to owe a dime to anyone.

Without a doubt that could be done..we have done that owning a 2 bedroom house with a 600.00 mortgage with 2 kids as little as 15 years ago...it wasent a fun year but its doabal. and with zero bills would be way simpler and not to bad at all.

[Agur's Wish]

In the 30 some years I've been a nurse and the 40+ the capn's been employed there has always been a shortage and your always in demand. Go work for a few months or better yet, take a job in St. Thomas and take your boat and have the agency pay for your dockage.