A city of 250,000 people could have 250 boats (that’s enough for a marina or two) and it would be 0.01% of the population (the one percent of the one percent). That seems to not really be that crazy.
And if you consider that a small percentage of the boat population may have 2 or even 3 boats, than it gets even less weird.
I also think that if you live near water, people are generally at least a little more likely to get a boat instead of a nice car or bigger house or other luxury item.
But 0.01% of 250,000 is 25.
(Sorry 🙁)
It’s like when you drive through an area that’s all McMansions you’re like “how they hell are there this many people with enough money and poor enough taste to own all these McMansions”? I guess the thing is that money people property sprawls out, whereas most of us live in a container city down a hole clustered around a sewer outlet so thousands don’t take up that much space.
boats aren’t expensive, especially the older they are. fixing boats properly is expensive, but you also don’t really need to do that. My dad had a racing boat when I was a kid, it cost him $400… I bought a dinghy last year for $200. That’s less than the cost of a game console. And it costs literally nothing to go take it out on the water.
everywhere I go in the world there are giant marinas with a million boats
I’ve told you a MILLION times to NOT EXAGGERATE!
And how do you get to go everywhere in the world, that marinas stand front and center of your attention? Could it be that you go… on your boat?
“I swear to God it smells like shit everywhere I go!”
Same people who own all the empty properties, residential and commercial; Fucking leaches, that’s who.
Eh, as someone who knows a boat person its like only half that, the other half really, really like boats.
They aren’t as expensive as you think especially the shitty sailboats
This boat made me fixated on the idea of buying a boat and living in it.
While the buying part is plausible.
The living is a lot fucking harder.
You have to really like being on the water. It’s just as hard as living in an RV off grid.
Floating homes for alcoholics? Pretty much anyone who can sign a down payment contract.
My dad used to own a sailboat, which was a high point for someone squarely middle class. We’re talking a 44 ft sailboat.
These things are holes in the water who the fuck wants a boat
the upkeep alone - painting scraping replacing the anode every fuckin year… it’s a fuckton of work for a ‘fun hobby’
At the height of being poor in like '83 or so (mortgage rates to 17%; just ponder that) we panick-moved to a smaller town with a union job but found a fixer house with an attached shop.
Dad, ever the salesman and skilled labourer, would do work for people in exchange for wood-working tools: Old window Jenkins would part with Lester’s Table Saw if Dad re-tiled the shower.
So we got tools. And he traded for plywood and plans. And suddenly we had a dory he could fit on top of this '75 econoline150 van. And fishing was great. But it was a lot of rowing this pig of a boat.
So he modded it with a dagger-board and a mast port. Took him 5 min to rig it and he was set for fishing.
Those summers camping because we couldn’t afford to do anything else but at least gas was cheap, they were awesome.
I think these people just have shiny boats, which are too expensive. If you want to find them, they’re finishing the Penske file so they can still afford exorbitant Slip fees and dream of Taking the Boat Out with the estranged family members who will then love Dad again and make up for all this toil. Dude needs a cheap ugly van and a wallowing pig of a dory to ‘sail’ around a lake in the woods; aim smaller and actually go make memories.
At the height of being poor in like '83 or so (mortgage rates to 17%; just ponder that)
FWIW A mortgage payment at 17% interest on the $20,000 my parents paid for my childhood three bedder in 1980 was cheaper than a single mortgage payment i make today.
How do you make a small fortune?
Start with a large fortune and buy a boat.
Bust
Out
Another
Thousand
I used to work at a fish market, and one of the fishermen we dealt with once won a large sum of money from a big fishing tournament. When they asked him what he was gonna do with the money, his response was, “Keep fishing until it’s all gone.”
As the saying goes:
The two best days of a boat owner’s life are the day they buy the boat, and the day they sell the boat
Meh, a boat is a hole in the water to dump money into, a car is a hole in the road, and a house is a hole in the ground. At least the boat combines the advantages of the other two.
Bring Out Another Thousand
Sailboats aren’t prohibitively expensive for a normie, especially if you buy a used one. If you look at the large empty houses near every harbor though, you’ll see a better sign of the wealth disparity. The rich own multiple houses worth millions each and they seem to be rarely used while many people can’t afford a starter home now.
Buying a boat is cheap, owning one not so much. Between marina fees and maintenance it adds up really fast.
As my dad would say, “A boat is a hole in the water you throw money into.” Boats are cool and fun if you like to sail, but between maintenance costs, mooring fees, the cost to take it out of the water and store it at a boat yard once the season is over, scrape the barnacles off, repaint it, etc. it’s not a cheap endeavor.
That’s why the only reasonable way to own a boat you can’t trailer is to live on it full-time.
I have a friend who grew up on the coast and her family always sailed for fun.
When she got divorced she bought a sailboat and traveled for a bit in it. She then parked it at a marina and lived in it for so many years close to her kids and grandkids. She paid $100K for boat and her marina fees were $300/month. The boat was paid off with the divorce settlement.
The cheapest 1 bedroom apartment to rent nearby was $3500/month for less square footage than her boat. The cheapest small house was around $1,000,000 or around $6000/ month at the time. The homes around the marina were all priced at several million dollars.
We met someone like that and they were considered homeless by the city, lol. I think they were annoyed at that.
Seattle is full of people that live on boat as an affordable alternative. You can’t be squeamish about insects or get seasick easily because of the storms. I couldn’t do it myself, but I’ve known quite a few that have.
What kinda insects we talking about here?
Water spiders, gnats, etc. You know, bugs you see in a boathouse or in the bathrooms around water.
We don’t really have gnats here in Seattle. It’s great.
So we only get water spiders and etc.?
Why would you assume that I spend time on boathouses or aquatic bathrooms?
You’re in a thread asking about boat related stuff
Yeah, asking questions about boats.
You haven’t asked a single question about boats, only about insects.
Lol, I assume everyone has been camping near a lake or something. That’s what I meant by bathrooms on water. If you have ever been by a pier, look underneath, that’s a good tell as well.
A Space Noodle is a relative of a Pool Noodle, is it not?
Totally different.
Eh, water navy, space navy, close enough; I could see how some would get confused
me writing “the ocean :)” as my permanent address on government documents
This is the right answer. It’s an RV on water but it doesn’t disintegrate (working as intended, that) like an RV or fifth wheel.
What’s a fifth wheel, in this context?
Large trailer camper that is pulled by a ‘5th wheel’ hitch, like the ones found on semi trucks or heavy duty pickups.
Travel trailer.
There are a lot of people in the world. Like a loooooot. Even if the % of non normies is only like 0.01% of the population that would easily explain those boats.
If there was a plague that had a 100% human infection rate and killed 87% of the people infected it would still only set back world populations to around the start of the 1900s
True. The start of the 1900s was no time for messin’ around and making babies. We had to go work in the mines
This is the real answer and the reason online bubbles are so sad.
There’s so many different way to live your life and we are atrofied around a couple of equally bad options.
The ideas that normies don’t sail isn’t true. I’m a normie and not rich and I started a sailing school because it’s fun as hell. You don’t need ^to ^own a boat to go sailing, you only need to know how.
Can confirm, especially the smaller sailboats like lasers and such. You can get going insanely fast on a windy day on the lake :)
Homie how tf are you sailing with no boat?
you join a club and are crew. it’s literally how most sailing clubs function. How the hell are you supposed to race a boat if only the owner gets to be on it? The larger the boat the more the crew you need. The fees at my club for crew are $40 a year. That’s like 1/3 the cost of netflix and way more worth it. And many clubs also have a “why buy?” club where you can captain one of the fleet boats a certain number of times a year and bring your own crew.
That’s the power of your imagination!
A friend with a boat is what you want. Same with a pool.
The best boat there is is one you don’t own!
Never sailed in a pool before, brb.
You get really good at tight turns.
It’s always good to have friends with things you want to use but don’t want to own. Another thing that falls into that category: puppies and kittens.
This simple trick, 🏴☠️
You wouldn’t download a boat
You wouldn’t download a boat
Not a sailboat, but still a downloaded boat. https://www.drdflo.com/pages/Projects/Printcess.html
sail on home to the never say die flavor of simple Rick.
Show up to race night with beers and sailing gloves. And the aforementioned knowledge of sailing.
you can stick a tiny american flag in your lil belly button and float on by.
Rent a boat?
They said you don’t need a boat.
You don’t need to own a boat. Apologies.
You don’t need a boat, but sailing is much easier with a boat.
That’s what gaming pcs with vr are for
A friend of mine used to work in a yacht club, albeit a very small one on a river, not the sea. He was firmly convinced that at least half of the boats belonged to the owners of craft businesses. He was of the opinion that the boats were bought with black money, either to be able to do something with the money or to sell the boats again later and launder the money that way. I don’t know if that’s true.
Have a friend who would go north in the summer to work on forest fires and would come back to his sailboat at the end of the season to spend winter at the marina, he doesn’t even know how to sail…
