Our cruising costs - month 26 for a middle-aged couple on a 30' boat.

[Cthoops]

October was our 26th month of cruising full-time on our Bristol 29.9.

In October we went from Oriental, NC to Beaufort, NC, with a ten day stop in New Bern, NC to take one more car trip up north. The expenses related to that trip (rental car, tolls, gas, marina, etc.) were actually 1/3 of our total spending for the month.

Here we go:

Groceries/Non-food Groceries/Alcohol: $784.09

Gasoline/Diesel: $77.42

Denatured alcohol: $55.00 (3 gallons)

Medical: $14.34

Cell data, iCloud storage, and Garmin inReach subscription: $170.54*

Mail: $5.35 (hold package charge by Beaufort, SC UPS Store)

Laundry: $4.00

Restaurants/Entertainment: $25.42

Life Insurance Premium: $220.75 (quarterly payment)

Subscriptions: $117.25 (newspapers, streaming services, annual YNAB payment, etc.)

Maintenance: $47.58 (anchor gloves, disposable gloves)

Marina: $40.00 (one night near Southport - the $280 New Bern Marina cost is in the Connecticut-related expenses)

Connecticut-related expenses: $825.24 (marina, rental car, gas, tolls, parking, Uber to and from Enterprise, etc.)

Random Items: $107.78 (yarn and knitting tools, lighters, overnight shipping to return our ballots, citrus rags, etc.)

Total: $2,494.76

2020 Monthly average: $2,774.77

2019 monthly average: $3,457.97

2018 monthly average (September – December): $4,465.95

Monthly average since starting to cruise: $3,350.28


I hope this is helpful.

[sailorboy1]

You need some heckers for your threads. So ............... knitting????? What are you like 90? What are you going to knit for use on that tiny boat? Couldn't that space used for someone important?


Serious, it seems the real life regular accounting of cruising costs that include all the "not counting" don't seem to be as much interest on CF as the ones with creative accounting that support wannabees dreams.

[skyhawk]

thanks sailorboy for resurrecting an old thread. I'm not sure I understand your point, but thanks anyway....

a topic that has no doubt been tripped around and over a lot of times here.....
Still, I find it interesting....as a wannabe
it's a topic that has been rattling around in my head for a couple years now as I'm at the age and have the mindset for "early retirement" but there are just so many variables that my head swims when I think of it.

regardless, not not cthoops and how they live
I'd imagine this monthly average of $3,350 is based on mostly coastal cruising with a minimalist sort of lifestyle...with only $25 spent on eating out/entertainment.
and by the looks of it not many nights spent in marina.
and by the looks of it that would be the huge variables that would differ from person to person.
Cruising costs are prob generally very close to a person's "normal/typical" life.... and would probably be very comparable to someone fulltiming in an RV..... excpet perhaps a bit more maintenace costs for haulouts, etc....

[sailorboy1]

Originally Posted by skyhawk

thanks sailorboy for resurrecting an old thread. I'm not sure I understand your point, but thanks anyway....

This isn't an "old thread"

The point is that LOTS of wannabes come here, yet the detailed real life costs threads don't get much attention really.

[skyhawk]

I only wrote 'old' because it's 11 months and no replies till yours.....but know it dawns on me that perhaps the post date format is the reversed day month year....so it's in fact very timely!

Its seems that what little I've read so far on this topic seems to go, just as it does in the RV world, to..."it depends on you"....or "its complicated".....and so they quickly just dissolve

I appreciate CThoops post because it gives the monthly average and enough granular detail to understand it's just normal living costs. I know that we'd need to adjust it up a bit, because in non covid times we tend to like to explore little towns in our travels and sample local places to eat more often...grocery bill goes down a hair, dining out goes up some.

It also makes me chuckle a bit on the side.....many years ago I used to track every cent I spent...for several years I could tell you within roughly $100 or so what I spent and where every year. (and this was before smartphones and all the tech we have now!). I stopped when it finally dawned on me that I wasn't really using the data and was really 'wasting' a lot of time..... thanks to cthoops though for doing it! I'm going over to your blog for more perspective!

[sailorboy1]

11 months, it is still Nov 2020

Doesn't matter I was just giving it a bounce because if people don't read she will just stop her series. Then all people will be left with are mine.

[skyhawk]

yeah...my mistake...
i took 1/11/20 to be January 11, 2020

[StrangerTimes09]

this is awesome thanks for sharing as some looking in to sailing this helps give me a rough idea of what lays ahead

[Cthoops]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

You need some heckers for your threads. So ............... knitting????? What are you like 90? What are you going to knit for use on that tiny boat? Couldn't that space used for someone important?


Serious, it seems the real life regular accounting of cruising costs that include all the "not counting" don't seem to be as much interest on CF as the ones with creative accounting that support wannabees dreams.

Keep it up and I won’t knit you anything for your birthday.

I do agree, however, that the run-of-the-mill cruising cost accountings don’t stir up the same angst as the more extreme (either high or low) budgets. It’s all good. As long as it gives one person some ideas I’ll keep posting them.

[Cthoops]

Originally Posted by skyhawk

thanks sailorboy for resurrecting an old thread. I'm not sure I understand your point, but thanks anyway....

a topic that has no doubt been tripped around and over a lot of times here.....
Still, I find it interesting....as a wannabe
it's a topic that has been rattling around in my head for a couple years now as I'm at the age and have the mindset for "early retirement" but there are just so many variables that my head swims when I think of it.

regardless, not not cthoops and how they live
I'd imagine this monthly average of $3,350 is based on mostly coastal cruising with a minimalist sort of lifestyle...with only $25 spent on eating out/entertainment.
and by the looks of it not many nights spent in marina.
and by the looks of it that would be the huge variables that would differ from person to person.
Cruising costs are prob generally very close to a person's "normal/typical" life.... and would probably be very comparable to someone fulltiming in an RV..... excpet perhaps a bit more maintenace costs for haulouts, etc....

The eating out/entertainment spending has crashed since Covid began. I’m definitely looking forward to the day that the spending in that category goes up.

As for marinas, we don’t have any objection to staying at them when it makes sense, but we do prefer being on the hook and often there are other things we’d rather spend our money on than paying for a slip or a ball. They definitely have their place though!

[sailorboy1]

Originally Posted by Cthoops

Keep it up and I won’t knit you anything for your birthday.

i take it all back