Curtis Checked out your blog. You got a great deal on the boat! The seafood buffet on the bottom was a bonus!
There are many others on this list and other areas that also bought boats for great initial price and then put a lot of sweat equity and later dollars into the boats to bring them up to snuff. You are lucky that you are capable and knowledgeable enough to do these tasks on your own because otherwise would be very expensive. In my own case we found a boat that was advertised as "Great for someone who does their own fiberglass work". This was fortuitous because that was what I was looking for at the time. Typical asking price for these boats was $20,000 and we eventually bought it for $7000. I think you can chalk up $13000 difference to the labour, materials and sweat ... Well and some sails etc ... Also the previous owner had a quote of $8000 just to do the deck work required .... Like most boats with balsa cored decks there was water in the deck of this boat and it was actually cracked on the surface around four stanchions. It had no cradle/jackstands/trailer, had sails that were not suitable for my needs, needed work on the interior - cabin sole was rotted from water inside while on the hard, bottom was the worst I had seen (until I saw the before pictures of East Coast Lady) and the electronics were pretty much non existent. On top of this was in a foreign country over 1500 kms from home. Also like most boats that are 20 or more years old there were a lot of gems hidden in the deal. Motor freshly tuned and looked after well each year, brand new cushions stored in a heated loft, older sails that were in fact suited to my needs, brand new (almost) cruising sails that were not suited but were in good shape, etc ... Better yet the cored hull was dry and in great shape So like you I did a lot of sweat equity. I recored the bad spots on deck in year one and then all wet spots in year two. Every deck fitting and all windows were removed, rebedded (the proper way with epoxy, redrilling, etc), the non skid was completely repainted, the hull below the waterline stripped to bare glass, barrier coated and repainted with a nice paint, the instruments replaced (sold the old ones and bought better old ones to replace them), the cockpit sole replaced, a marine head added, etc etc etc ... Aside from the sweat equity a new cradle was purchased and then we drove to Connecticut and hauled the boat home. Were now up to $12000 and ready to go sailing. It did not end there and will not for you either. You will constantly be upgrading systems and making the boat more to your tastes. If you carefully track every expenditure at the marine store, hardware store, etc for each upgrade or purchase you will find you have spent a lot more than your thought you did or planned to initially. Our plan was to buy a boat and then fix it up the sail it and resell it in a year for a profit .. And then do it again to get more boat, etc ... Instead we liked the boat and upgraded it just to make it what it always deserved to be and for our own enjoyment. Over the years we added 5 new sails, a new motor (three times), a new trailer (we built it), new chart plotter, replaced VHF, compass etc ... And a bunch of other stuff including templating keel and long boarding bottom and anything else to make it feel like we were treating the boat right. Stupid little things add up too ... New clutches, spectra cored halyards, batteries, wiring and pretty lines here and there where the old ones looked tired. So last time I checked we were up to $29000+ on a $7000 boat including purchase and all upgrades/repairs. This does not include any ongoing operating expenses such as slip fees etc .... All this for a boat that we would be lucky to get half of that amount for in a sale. However it is the right thing to do for a boat .. It deserves TLC and repays that with a lot of enjoyment and good times. Keep up the blog and the good work Mike Nut Case http://users.eastlink.ca/~mhoyt -----Original Message----- From: CnC-List [mailto:cnc-list-boun...@cnc-list.com] On Behalf Of Curtis Sent: Thursday, October 24, 2013 2:10 PM To: cnc-list@cnc-list.com Subject: Re: Stus-List keel swap Sorry, I did'nt mean for my coment to come out the way is sounded. Pompas ass. "sorry". I did get a deal on my boat. I had to. I am a man of no so much means. I put a lot of hard work into my boat after I payed for her. I also used expenses, that's not correct. I do have slip fees and insh etc. What I was talking abought is refit and getting her ready to sail after being left on a mooring ball after 4 1/5 years. She was in bad shape. Her name is the East Coast Lady. She is a 1981 C&C30MK1 HIN# 675 mentioned in the http://www.cncphotoalbum.com web site. I have tried to write the story in a blog. The engine was purchased from a guy in Road Island "E-Bay" and shipped to my shop. It was and is a good compression tesed take out. I was toldit came out of a boat that fell off a sea wall on the boat ramp and butesd the hull. what ever the engine has been tested and installed in my boat for 3 months. She runs like a top. I did the install my self. Hard work but I saved a ton of cha-ching$ Here is a link to the blog if you want to see her. Again sory for being a butt. Curtis, http://eastcostlady.blogspot.com/ _______________________________________________ This List is provided by the C&C Photo Album http://www.cncphotoalbum.com CnC-List@cnc-list.com
