Dirty Sailor

So, you’re embarking on a boat project? A seasonal commissioning? A complete refit? If it’s your first major effort, or maybe even your first time in the boatyard, it can be an intimidating place for the uninitiated. Marine repair and carpentry are very specialized and often very expensive trades to hire on. Many boat owners have been taken for quite a ride; not due to those few unscrupulous yards, more due to their own inexperience.

Especially when planning to perform most of the work yourself, it’s essential to educate yourself. Here’s a few insights into the unspoken boatyard realities that will help you keep your eyes open and your feet on the ground.

• Good, Fast, Cheap: Pick Any Two. Top-quality boat work, expertly accomplished, on a guaranteed schedule, will be expensive. Excellent workmanship on a tight budget -when you can find it- will seldom be fast. Last-minute, time-constrained work done for a low or fixed price us extremely unlikely to be done to a high standard.

• “Time and Materials” It is often excruciatingly difficult to make a guaranteed quote on major repair and refit work. Savvy shipwrights will know that 1/3 of the work will simply be in “opening her up” to see what really needs to be done. Real quotes are rare, and accurate estimates unlikely. The specialty tradespeople willing to make -and stand by- a firm quote will do so based upon copious previous experience dealing with exactly what work you’re having performed; such tradespeople do not come cheap, nor should they.

• You Need It When? Here’s a handy way of figuring out how long a project will take. Using all the experience available to you, estimate how long the project will take if: All materials are at hand, all tools are in place, any sub-trades are available, all other projects are cleared away, and all distractions banished. Now take that number, double it, and shift it to the next-higher unit of time. Thus, a 2-hour project will take 4 days. A 1-week project will take 2 months. A 3-year project will take 6 decades. Etc. Budget your time accordingly.

• $1000 per Foot. Broadly speaking, the least amount you can spend on a functional boat, without major problems, usefully configured, in “sailaway” condition, excepting cosmetics, is $1000/ft. You could spend this much outright, or purchase something cheaper and improve it to this level, either way. I’d say this is fair for both sail and power. You can spend less upfront by getting dirty yourself, but once you put a cash value on your own labor, you’ll probably end up here eventually.

• 20% every year. Maintenance, general upkeep, repairs, fuel, dockage, mooring fees, gear failure, haul-outs, insurance, government fees, pump-outs, and the like can be managed or mitigated, but never avoided. Budget 20% of your boat’s market value every year towards upkeep. Yes, you can spend less, but it’s wise to budget for for the worst-case.

• Nothing is More or Less than Anything Else. There is no material from which boats are made that can truthfully be called “maintenance-free”. Rough old wooden boats can cost more initially to get up to “Bristol condition”, but once there, the maintenance costs need not more than a ‘glass or metal boat. The wind is not “free”. On balance, it has been my general experience that sails/rigging cost just the same per mile as engines/fuel.

• Expect More, Assume Less. It is wise to expect the final cost of anything to be higher in the end. It is foolish to assume that that anything will ever be cheaper. Never ignore the “total cost of ownership” implications for any product or service, even when the labor is your own.

• The Materials Are Half The Total. The ratio of material to labor costs vary according to the job, but excepting those few rare “bolt-in”, “drop-in”, or “plug-in” equipment installations, expect to pay as much to install something as to buy it. Likewise, in case of a “2 hours @ $50/hr” labor estimate, count on a $60-$100 material bill.

These “rules of thumb” aren’t universal, or even often acknowledged. Many seem simply cynical. Still, keep in mind that experienced shipwrights have seen many many budgets crash and burn, and have generally adapted to a “worst-case first” mentality when considering any project. Still, if you’re mindful of such rules, you can save yourself time and money from the very beginning, whether hiring on the work or doing it yourself.

Opportunities to save cash abound when digging into a deep dirty boat project. Used gear, insider hook-ups, boatyard charity, barter, salvage, and simple good karma can substantially reduce the total cash outlay. My last boat project was a well-equipped 30′ cruiser which splashed at the $16,000 mark, seemingly in disregard to several of my above-quoted “rules”.

Get dirty, and seek out that middle path between “expensive/better” and “cheaper/worse”!