Why Marinas Hate Liveaboards - Part II

[Blue Crab]

Originally Posted by katsailing

Does it cost you much money to live aboard your boat?

Cap, of course it does. Their boat is 100K give or take. Nothing is free. Please make an effort to do yer own research. Read. Search. When you know enough to ask a legitimate question, ask away.

[Hudson Force]

Originally Posted by katsailing

Does it cost you much money to live aboard your boat?

I interpreted this question a little differently than including the cost of the boat. Of course, the boat itself can be very expensive, but beyond that, the cost of living aboard can be quite modest.

Houses are expensive too, but lets just compare some features of the two:

Boats require mantainence with more specific skills and the marine equipment is relatively more expensive than most household mehanisms.
The materials on a vessel are usually subject to more harsh envionments than household items. Boats require hualouts and slip fees (usually). Onboard a boat you are not able to store volumes than allow you to buy in bulk at a lower rate.

Homes are subject to property taxes that are often not present with a vessel. Even Modest property taxes can be as much as a yearly slip fee. Some events such as roof repair, plumbing and electrical service can be more expensive with home ownership. Typical household utility bills can be about 70% of the entire monthly slip fee. Lawn care has associated expenses.

Both home dwellers and liveaboards can develop frugal habits, but it's been apparent to me, with over forty years of living aboard, that I have fewer costs than my friends ashore.

[Sailor g]

Our Marina loved us. The liveaboard price is regular + 50%. Expensive for a slip but reasonable for ocean front property.

We kept our boat/dock clean and kept watch on the dock. Kept sea lions and vagrants from making someone else's boat their home. We also helped the marina owner (in our neighboring slip) in and out numerous times. Saving his boat when he tried sailing out or lost power coming in. It was always exciting-he loved to sail but not enough experience. He was nice and it always gave us something to watch!

[Dulcesuenos]

Originally Posted by IdoraKeeper

When I think of fat people as live aboards, I am put in mind of a marina with a sea lion issue. Big fat noisy stinky sea lions wallowing on the dock, yelling, obstructing foot traffic, biting each other, pushing and shoving......not the most optimum situation.

People can lose weight, but being a douc#e bag is pretty much irreversible.....flowers

Sent from my LG-LS980 using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

[rwidman]

I don't think marinas hate livaboards, it's a guaranteed rented and paid slip. If liveaboards are doing things the marina doesn't like (installing things on the dock, etc.), it's a simple matter to outlaw these things in the lease agreement.

My marina's permit does not permit "livaboards". We can "stay aboard" for a few days but our boat can't be our home. Some slip neighbors will stay aboard for a week or so, then go back home (and to work). The permit also restricts boats to a 14' air draft to minimize opening of a bridge on a busy road.

[Suijin]

It's a matter of culture. The marina which I call my "home base" has an exceedingly large live aboard community...around 20% of the +250 slips. The marina cultivates it, or at least embraces it, with many of the employees themselves being live aboards. No one piles crap up on the docks, dog owners clean up after their dogs. In fact, you'd be hard pressed to figure out which boats are live aboards and which are not, other than the woman with 40 plants on her deck.

But I've been to other marinas where there is a different culture, where the live aboards are on vessels that never ever leave the dock, where noise is a problem, as well as the "creeping dock stuff" and other disruptions.

It's not just a cost or locale thing. I've seen it cut both ways at tony marinas and ragged backwaters. Marinas are pretty small ecosystems, and once a culture develops in one it's pretty much set until some new owner comes along and forcibly changes it, one way or the other.

As far as some marinas discouraging or prohibiting live aboards, for some it's a legal/economic/facilities issue, but for many it's just based on having a bad taste left in their mouth from prior experience.

[Blue Crab]

People can lose weight but they don't seem to do it. It's always a pretty big deal when a few individuals do. And for all the fat industry's craziness, we all intuitively know how to lose weight. I must agree with Idora Keeper, as I think I did when his remark was posted some time ago.

Originally Posted by rwidman

I don't think marinas hate livaboards, it's a guaranteed rented and paid slip. If liveaboards are doing things the marina doesn't like (installing things on the dock, etc.), it's a simple matter to outlaw these things in the lease agreement.

My marina's permit does not permit "livaboards". We can "stay aboard" for a few days but our boat can't be our home. Some slip neighbors will stay aboard for a week or so, then go back home (and to work). The permit also restricts boats to a 14' air draft to minimize opening of a bridge on a busy road.

That air draft rule makes a lot of sense.

Marinas should love liveaboards for the security provided. Much as I hate marinas, I've been in a couple for awhile now. There are only two of us at present but we've both saved boats from sinking in their slips, and done countless overhauls on dockline setups. And I personally offer absolutely free halyard sound management for the weekend warriors.

The real problems for marinas and liveaboards are twofold: Many liveaboards cannot contain their comfort sprawl. And marina management often can't muster up the backbone to enforce the extant lease provisions. Human problems both. And as so often the case, rather than deal with specific problems, widespread rules are passed to the detriment of most.

Katsailing: As usual, Hudson Force is correct, IMO, about the lower costs of boat residence, and few people on the planet have more experience. Toss in the visual benefits at whatever that's worth to you (it's $$$huge for me) and if you keep it real relative to liveaboard "comforts," you can also enjoy the boating, presumably the baseline reason for buying a boat, at the the doffing of your sailor cap.