Cruising on $5,000 / Month

[DWT]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

I have a regular budget spreadsheet for my current living (having both a house and a boat). A funny thing happens when I take the house expensives out and take a few related adjustments to the boat costs, it comes out to $3001. That is pretty close to my planned budget of $3000/mo and I came up with the $3000/mo before I did the spreadsheet.

Thanks Sailerboy1. What you said make sense. I will be doing the same thing soon.

I am going to plan for $5000 and hope to only spend $3000. It would be nice to have that cushion to fall back on if something major happen.

[tomfl]

Originally Posted by sailpower

Technically you're not a prepper if you're not buying bullets!

Easy to see you are not a real prepper. This is a starting point to figure out how a prepper gets bullets.

Amazon.com: bullet molds

[sailorboy1]

Preppers don't need a cruising budget because it doesn't matter by then. So lets leave that to some other thread (and I know there is one that has been dead for a while).

I'm starting to get a feeling that a $3000/mo cruising is some lost middle ground. The $500/mo people think you are a rich bast**d and $5000/mo people believe you will starve and be stuck somewhere when the boat breaks.

[sailorchic34]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

Preppers don't need a cruising budget because it doesn't matter by then. So lets leave that to some other thread (and I know there is one that has been dead for a while).

I'm starting to get a feeling that a $3000/mo cruising is some lost middle ground. The $500/mo people think you are a rich bast**d and $5000/mo people believe you will starve and be stuck somewhere when the boat breaks.

No worries Don I don't think your rich. I think Really rick folks probably spend $3000 a day..

[Therapy]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

PS - I hit a milestone savings goal last week. 5 years ago it seemed like a LOT of money, but now it doesn't seem as much.

I know.
Sucks doesn't it.

The wife decided that we probably have enough money to retire early and make it ok. She also just said OK to try cruising full time to see how we fit. I know no one knows till they are out there for a year or so if they like it or not. Chartering doesn't help. Owning a boat and cruising for only one month at a time doesn't help much either.

So next year some time I may just be in the "seriously looking for a boat" group. Maybe earlier in the looking. Not that I don't look daily.

If it doesn't work out we will accept the loss in resale of the boat and try land cruising. We looked at fifth wheels last week for grins.

Luck to ya!

[Jim Cate]

Originally Posted by Therapy

...
The wife decided that we probably have enough money to retire early and make it ok. She also just said OK to try cruising full time to see how we fit. I know no one knows till they are out there for a year or so if they like it or not. Chartering doesn't help. Owning a boat and cruising for only one month at a time doesn't help much either.
...
Luck to ya!

Words of wisdom, those! The realities of long term cruising are difficult to grasp until you actually try it on for size.

Sounds to me like you will prosper, mate. Good luck, and see ya out here someday.

Jim

[hpeer]

I haven't read all the thread through, probably won't.

It's just really good to know that $5,000/month is a pretty decent number to have a good time.

On our sister site (Early Retirement & Financial Independence Community) is an on-line retirement calculator called FIREcalc. It's the best one I have seen.

FIRECalc: A different kind of retirement calculator

According to that we will be North of $60,000 annual, maybe up to $75,000. We probably have a few more expenses than some, but this thread reassures me that we will be fine.

We have our boat, paid for, and I've been working hard to upgrade her to be more easily single handed.

[tomfl]

I suspect there are a few 'wild cards' that are very important factors in how much one spends cruising.

Maybe the most important one is insurance. Some folks want what I will call a gold plated policy for their boat. Even more important some other other folks want a gold plated health insurance policy. Others get by with limited liability, or no boat insurance at all. Similarly some folks depend on what is provided for free by the country they are in, or if they have US insurance qualify for subsidized insurance; while others pay big bucks for a gold plated policy.

Next I would look at how folks feed themselves and how they dress. I am sorta with sailorchick34, but instead of following her advice about $US4 tops at Goodwill, I go to the Goodwill Good Cents store and buy my clothes for $US1.79 a pound. On the other hand I know some folks who spend fifty or a hundred dollars on a new shirt.

For some folks maintaining the boat is the biggest expense. Others do most of the work themselves and are able to buy materials at bargain prices. When my accumulator went out I went to Home Depot and bought a new one for $US38.75 and spend a day cleaning out the anchor locker and crawling in to install the accumulator; something that would probably cost a couple of hundred dollars if I paid someone to do it.

Not saying my monthly bill is $US500, but it is not above $US1,200 over the last year and that includes a new Frigoboat I installed.

[BandB]

Originally Posted by tomfl

I suspect there are a few 'wild cards' that are very important factors in how much one spends cruising.

Maybe the most important one is insurance. Some folks want what I will call a gold plated policy for their boat. Even more important some other other folks want a gold plated health insurance policy. Others get by with limited liability, or no boat insurance at all. Similarly some folks depend on what is provided for free by the country they are in, or if they have US insurance qualify for subsidized insurance; while others pay big bucks for a gold plated policy.

Next I would look at how folks feed themselves and how they dress. I am sorta with sailorchick34, but instead of following her advice about $US4 tops at Goodwill, I go to the Goodwill Good Cents store and buy my clothes for $US1.79 a pound. On the other hand I know some folks who spend fifty or a hundred dollars on a new shirt.

For some folks maintaining the boat is the biggest expense. Others do most of the work themselves and are able to buy materials at bargain prices. When my accumulator went out I went to Home Depot and bought a new one for $US38.75 and spend a day cleaning out the anchor locker and crawling in to install the accumulator; something that would probably cost a couple of hundred dollars if I paid someone to do it.

Not saying my monthly bill is $US500, but it is not above $US1,200 over the last year and that includes a new Frigoboat I installed.

For many people there is a single question: Are you willing to lead the lifestyle and make the sacrifices necessary for us to live on a boat and cruise based on our income?

Each of us can accept different levels of comfort and luxuries. We even vary in terms of what we consider necessities. I admire those who are able to live and cruise on $1000 or even $2000 or even $3000 per month and be happy. But that shouldn't be used as a negative against those who just couldn't.

[Red Sky]

It's a story that's getting tired. Class division, hate those with money. Right out of Saul Alinsky's, Rules for Radicals Handbook. Hate for those that worked hard, saved for the future and have money to be able to enjoy themselves as they see fit. I took nothing from anyone except an honest days pay for my labors. If you want to or need to live on less, I don't judge. In fact, I think those that do, live a truer existence to their beliefs than those that are in the "I drive a Prius, therefor I'm better than you crowd". Or those that buy a $100,000 Tesla and think they are doing something noble.

[Tony B]

I think the amount of money you budget yourself for is a statement of your standard of living. Some need more and some don't have a desire for much. I just retired and we are now permanent cruisers. We budget ourselves on about $2500/month. This was based partly on how we lived as dirt dwellers. We want to maintain at least the same standards. We anchor out a lot when on the go and settle in marinas when we plan to stay a month or more. We still like to eat out once in a while and do some touristy stuff. This budget also includes taxi's, rental cars, insurance for the boat and van and travel money to see the kids in Ar., Tx. and Mo. We have only been gone a month and had a major engine problem. It will probably come to about $3,500. Fortunately, we have the money for that. If not, take that $3500 and divey it out to 12 months and that will eat $300/mo average off your budget.
Our income is higher than we budgeted for to help pay for those incidental disasterous moments.

One can live on any budget they choose, just like on land. You can live under the freeway overpasses for free if you choose. If you can walk to everywhere you need to be that's so much less money you need. After a while all you will need is money for food. Kind of works the same way on the water. So, there really is no answer - It's all about what you want.

[Blue Crab]

I'm in that vast middle ground of monthly budgets. I can afford all of the item on the right I want but if I won the lottery, I'd be getting a lot more of the other ... ah ... much higher-priced item.

[chuckr]

Originally Posted by Therapy

I know.
Sucks doesn't it.

The wife decided that we probably have enough money to retire early and make it ok. She also just said OK to try cruising full time to see how we fit. I know no one knows till they are out there for a year or so if they like it or not. Chartering doesn't help. Owning a boat and cruising for only one month at a time doesn't help much either.

So next year some time I may just be in the "seriously looking for a boat" group. Maybe earlier in the looking. Not that I don't look daily.

If it doesn't work out we will accept the loss in resale of the boat and try land cruising. We looked at fifth wheels last week for grins.

Luck to ya!

good for you and your admiral -- by the way we both left work early and our whole goal was the bahamas and back and then we decided we could maybe make the bay islands and back - left for the bay islands and never came back - just kept going

we do not tap our retiirement accounts and live on our social security only -- for those

our expenses for 5 years by year by catagory have been published here as 5 years of cost data -- we spend between $2,500 and $3,500 a year - this year will be interesting as we are in the med and God willing will sail italy, croatia albania and back to tunisia for next winter - we will see what the costs are but anchoring may be an issue -

OH -- the admrial was very skeptical when we first left now she does not want to go back to the usa and just wants to keep going --

[hpeer]

we spend between $2,500 and $3,500 a year

A MONTH or a YEAR?

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by hpeer

A MONTH or a YEAR?

We now have a $100/mth Thread...