Acquiring our Narrowboat.

Part 3.


By mid '92 we had learnt a lot from our research; but the time had come for us to answer that all important question......."Are we 100% committed to buying a narrow boat and spending a good part of a year away from home and family?" It was..........


Decision Time:


We could have just made the decision there and then, heck we had immigrated to the States with two kids and didn't make an exploratory trip, but I guess you become less of a risk taker as you get older.

We agreed that the best way was to visit England and check out the "real world" of narrow boats and canals before making our final "Go/No-Go" decision. We spent two weeks travelling up and down the country trying to find well hidden marinas and moorings and visited about 20 brokerages and private sellers. We found out:-

There is a difference between a BMC 1.5 and a Russell Newbery DM2 engine.

What an Alde c/h, a Mansfield po, etc. etc. really looked like.

The pros and cons of different styles and internal layouts.


There was plenty of room for price negotiations, somewhere around 10% to 20% of asking prices, and that private sellers tended to have an inflated idea of the real market value of their boats.

Our memories were not failing us - travelling along the canals was peaceful and fun. We hired a boat for a long weekend to prove it.

Our upper end of £25,000 was just about the low end for better quality boats and these seemed to be holding their prices better than the medium and low end. This was an important consideration for us as we intended to sell at the end of our travels


Sometime during this trip we agreed it was a definite "Go". However, we realized we should be prepared to pay more than £25,000 and expanded our search criteria to include boats with asking prices up to £38,000. We even got into some serious negotiations on two boats that were at both ends of our price range; one for £15,500 and the other for £35,000; however we did not reach agreement on either one.
We did place a "boat wanted" advertisement in Waterways World; it generated a couple of realistic private prospects; lots of unrealistic offers and a duplication of what we were already receiving from the brokerages.



All we had to do now was establish our departure date, let our family and friends know they could start scheduling their vacations, and ............


......become narrow boat owners

Preface ...|... Assumptions ...or... Research.
Cruising the Waterways ...or... The Conclusion


John.....The Canaloholic in Reno.