Hello all, a few questions...

[SoCal]

Hello, first post.

Some background, I grew up in LA, sailing for a few years on my dad's boats. I spent two years living in a floating home on the Columbia river with the only boat I've owned, an old 21' Glasply.

As I didn't think I could afford the fuel for a larger power boat, I passed the ASA's basic keelboat class in preparation for buying a sailboat soon after we retired to San Diego. But now because of health issues and the low fuel consumption, a used tug is looking like a better choice.

I love sailing, but I love 'boating' and being on the water even more. If I had bought a sailboat, I'd probably be the only sailor taking my boat out on beautiful windless days, so maybe a tug should have been my first choice 😉

Looking into the future, my first question is about how long it takes to sell a 70 to 90k boat. I sold my Glasply in a couple of weeks, but with a much smaller pool of buyers capable of affording something in this price range, what's the typically length of time it takes to sell? I'm looking at one R25 that's been on the market since late 2013!?! How common is this?

I know there're many variables, but excluding local slip fees, what's an average range of monthly or yearly costs for insurance and maintenance on this type of boat?

Also, I'm familiar with planing and displacement hulls, but not semi-displacement hulls. Now that I'm retired and in no hurry to get anywhere, I would prefer to crusie around 5-6 knots, but is this possible with a semi-displacement hull? Or would it be more efficient to keep the revs up and cruise at its designed 8-11 knot cruising speed? (I've read about carbon buildup if the engine isn't run at high rpms every once in a while).

Thanks for any info!

 

[scross]

Welcome!
As to your question about re-selling a Tug. Haven't done it but did do a lot of research on R25's on market when we were looking 18 months ago. Boats in reasonably good condition priced right do sell in a couple of months - especially if on the market in the spring. Boats priced well above market will not sell. One in SC comes to mind that is priced roughly $30,000 over the market. It has been for sale for a long. long time. Perhaps the owner really doesn't want to sell - like asking $30,000 for an old Chrysler mini-van.
IMHO R25s with trailers sell a bit faster than those without trailers. Boats along the coasts sell faster than those located in Kansas.
The R25's came with several engines. A smaller engine (e.g. 110 HP Yanmar) will probably perform different than the 150 HP Yanmar, Volvo and Cummings engines. Think about parts and service availability for the different engines when looking for your boat.
As to costs. Getting your boat set up exactly the way you want it in the first year will probably cost more than the second or following years. We spent about $4K in the first year getting ours set up how we wanted and for FCC fees, graphics, new life jackets, galleyware, bar-b-que, etc. This year we will probably spend half of that on upgrades and interior maintenance. Insurance is about $650/year. The engine maintenance at 500 hours is about $2K on top of the other expenses. Not sure what other engine maintenance costs run. These costs are for our boat and probably not reflective of other boats costs.
We pay slip fees 6 months of the year and it is in the driveway at no cost the other 6 months. Slip fees vary considerably.
Hope this helps!

 

[SoCal]

Welcome!
As to your question about re-selling a Tug. Haven't done it but did do a lot of research on R25's on market when we were looking 18 months ago. Boats in reasonably good condition priced right do sell in a couple of months - especially if on the market in the spring. Boats priced well above market will not sell. One in SC comes to mind that is priced roughly $30,000 over the market. It has been for sale for a long. long time. Perhaps the owner really doesn't want to sell - like asking $30,000 for an old Chrysler mini-van.
IMHO R25s with trailers sell a bit faster than those without trailers. Boats along the coasts sell faster than those located in Kansas.
The R25's came with several engines. A smaller engine (e.g. 110 HP Yanmar) will probably perform different than the 150 HP Yanmar, Volvo and Cummings engines. Think about parts and service availability for the different engines when looking for your boat.
As to costs. Getting your boat set up exactly the way you want it in the first year will probably cost more than the second or following years. We spent about $4K in the first year getting ours set up how we wanted and for FCC fees, graphics, new life jackets, galleyware, bar-b-que, etc. This year we will probably spend half of that on upgrades and interior maintenance. Insurance is about $650/year. The engine maintenance at 500 hours is about $2K on top of the other expenses. Not sure what other engine maintenance costs run. These costs are for our boat and probably not reflective of other boats costs.
We pay slip fees 6 months of the year and it is in the driveway at no cost the other 6 months. Slip fees vary considerably.
Hope this helps!

Thanks for all that!
I realize you're right about the time required to sell, regardless of the cost, if it's a great deal it'll sell.
Just one more more question. On a boat in the 65-90k price range, do most people hire a separate engine mechanic in addition to the boat surveyor?

 

[scross]

I'd highly recommend an engine inspection in addition to the survey. Especially for a boat out of warranty. A good surveyor will check out all the systems and look at the engine, transmission and prop but will not test them for anything other than basic function. Our mechanical drive train inspection included a 30 minute test ride to check out all aspects of the drive train performance.

 

[S. Todd]

Some of us send our oil and transmission fluid in for an oil analysis every fall when we change those fluids. If I was selling (which I am not because we really enjoy our Tug) I would be happy to supply those test results to a potential buyer that asked for them.