Boat ramp traffic way down and fewer boats on the water?

airshot said:

Your first couple sentences says it all....roasted chicken now over 9 bucks, three years ago they were 4.99 or less...**** near doubled along with everything else. Glad my boating is cheap or I would have to give that up being retired on fixed income. Living close to lake erie, there are lots of boat owners around here, but many are in poor condition, just sitting out in the weather not moved for years.

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Costco and Sam's still have them for $5. That alone just about makes the trip worth it for me, delicious.

I've seen them off and on at Wally world's deli, but I think they're getting $7 for them.

Boggles my mind as well that they can sell them so cheap when a sack of chicken scratch is like 15 bucks here.

MrGiggles said:

Costco and Sam's still have them for $5. That alone just about makes the trip worth it for me, delicious.

I've seen them off and on at Wally world's deli, but I think they're getting $7 for them.

Boggles my mind as well that they can sell them so cheap when a sack of chicken scratch is like 15 bucks here.

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Costco's chicken is friggin delicious.

LDUBS said:

I was in the grocery store yesterday and was shaking my head (FoodMax, not Whole Foods). Food prices are still crazy high and seem even higher than a month ago. Then >20% more for rents and gaso prices are literally up >50% since the great disaster of 2020. A lot of families can't afford previous leisure activities. It is a darn shame when a married couple each working decent jobs can't afford to put anything into savings.

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I wonder if Nany and Gavin Newsom are aware of this? )

airshot said:

Your first couple sentences says it all....roasted chicken now over 9 bucks, three years ago they were 4.99 or less...**** near doubled along with everything else. Glad my boating is cheap or I would have to give that up being retired on fixed income. Living close to lake erie, there are lots of boat owners around here, but many are in poor condition, just sitting out in the weather not moved for years.

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Lake Erie..............!! Lets go get them Walleye"s!!

MrGiggles said:

Costco and Sam's still have them for $5. That alone just about makes the trip worth it for me, delicious.

I've seen them off and on at Wally world's deli, but I think they're getting $7 for them.

Boggles my mind as well that they can sell them so cheap when a sack of chicken scratch is like 15 bucks here.

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Lost But Happy said:

Costco's chicken is friggin delicious.

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X2. The Costco chicken is good stuff.

Costco has an interesting and very successful operational strategy. I recall hearing that 95% of profits come from membership fees. That was pre covid so things might have changed. Things like the roasted chicken are priced to attract members. And it apparently works based on their ongoing success.

Wow... I really need to go boat shopping up in Jersey!

Around here, you can't give away a big boat, but light, cheap-to-run tin boats are like GOLD.

thill said:

Wow... I really need to go boat shopping up in Jersey!

Around here, you can't give away a big boat, but light, cheap-to-run tin boats are like GOLD.

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The glut of small boats is a new thing here, in years past they were non existent when you wanted one, but lately I'm seeing them all over, both glass and aluminum small boats. There's a few a bit west of me listed that are older, but free with papers, one is piled full of trash with a late 60's 33hp motor, another is sitting on a trailer with no bunks that needs the transom wood panel replaced, that one has a rough looking trailer but both have huge free signs on them.
One has its title pinned right to the free sign. Its been there all week.
I passed an older 16ft Starcraft American, (glass boat), with a 90's 50hp with no lower unit and a $150 sign duct taped to the windshield.

A neighbor spotted this on his way home from work, I went and got it right away, the guy said he thought he was going to have to pay someone to take it. He had it for sale for $250 for a year, he said he changed the price to free this morning.
It had a blown up 85hp Mercury on it with no lower unit, but the hull is clean and its got a title, the trailer has a home made registration with it. It was on a major road leading to the bridge into DE, yet no one stopped all day and just took it. I didn't need it but for free, its a decent project I suppose. Its going to need a new floor and a new transom panel but I have enough stuff here to do all that. The title says its a '1963 Starcraft bit the model space on the plate is blank. I did have to shovel out two trash cans full of trash and rotten seats and wood but it made getting started a lot easier. The windshield was broken to bits but I've got a glass windshield for one of these that will work well.

In my area tinnies are still holding a good price unless it needs lots if work, but tons of old glassers that folks can't get rid of. Many are filled with leaves and junk yet advertised as ready to go fishing !! Small tinnes under 14' are pretty plentufull but to small for the big lake. Anything 16' and over in good shape sell fast for big bucks. The Perch and Walleye attraction raises the prices. Take a drive around and about 65% of yards have a boat sitting in them, but who knows what condition they are in ?

airshot said:

In my area tinnies are still holding a good price unless it needs lots if work, but tons of old glassers that folks can't get rid of. Many are filled with leaves and junk yet advertised as ready to go fishing !! Small tinnes under 14' are pretty plentufull but to small for the big lake. Anything 16' and over in good shape sell fast for big bucks. The Perch and Walleye attraction raises the prices. Take a drive around and about 65% of yards have a boat sitting in them, but who knows what condition they are in ?

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Similar here. Decent Aluminum boats 14 foot and over are still able to draw a good price. As far as glass boats goes. I could easy fill an acre or two in a matter of a few days with free or almost free ones.
Feel bad for a guy that lives near me. Bought a brand new 2023 1850 crestliner fish hawk loaded with a Merc 200HP. He got sick and never even put it in the water. Beautiful boat. Best of everything, high end lowrance electronics , active target, ghost T-motor, two electric down riggers, high end seats, etc. He started at 65,000 and is down to 51,000.

I hung the trolling motor on the Starcraft this morning and took it out on a local lake for a bit, I was there from 6am to around1pm, and was the only boat on the water, at a lake with two ramps and parking for at least 40 or so rigs.

I found this when I got home on CL, about a 20 minute ride from for me. I emailed the seller my number, he got back to me almost instantly very anxious to sell it.
I took a ride there and the boat is pretty clean, plus its got any older Diehard branded 3hp trolling motor ( MinnKota made), and a Walmart deep cycle battery.
The trailer is okay but a bit oversize for a 14ft boat. I have a better suited trailer though I can use.
This make three boats this week, this one is almost a twin to the 16ft version I got the other day.
I didn't need it, but I bought it for $150 cash The new battery is 2/3rds of that alone.
The ad said it was listed 28 days ago, but it was listed under 'sporting goods' not 'boats'.
In normal world this wouldn't have been listed for that long or this cheap but the seller said he just wanted it gone,

Everyone posting all these boats they’re buying must have acres of land to park them all on

How much room does a handful of aluminum boats take up?
I have two that I use, two that are spares, and two lesser condition boats that become my winter covers for those that I use. I found that most 14ft hulls fit nicely upside down on top of a 16ft hull, and a 12ft fits flipped over atop a 14ft hull. It lets me not have to worry about the cover caving in when it snows. I used an old billboard tarp for my boat cover and just strap it down

The 6 boats take up three parking spaces, plus three extra trailers that area also stacked behind the garage. I have a 12ft high gantry on wheels that I built year ago that can stack and unstack boats and trailers with just a chain hoist so its a one man operation when winter comes or if I need one of those extra trailers. The newest 16ft though is parked at the end of my driveway, but I may have found someone who wants to swap me for another Mirrocraft 16ft hull. He's looking for more of sight seeing type boat and I only use a boat to fish, so the open hulls work best, not mention require less motor or fuel. Having another 16ft open hull will give me the option of one with a steering console and a 20" long motor, and one that takes a tiller steer short shaft on a bracket. It would let me use the tiller model with my smaller 9.9hp four stroke in the local ponds and maybe get rid of a couple of the 14ft boats, but that'll be a tough decision because I really like my later model Starcraft with the 35hp limit, it'll carry nearly as much as my 16ft MIrrocraft will because of the wider beam width and stall sides. No matter what I do it won't be anytime soon because I would never let one of my boats go for as cheap as some of these have been going for lately around here. And properly priced one would likely never sell.

What I would expect to be happening is people dumping or parking their big boats, which I do see, there's no shortage of 23-42ft boats either dirt cheap or free but that's been the case for years, but what's not happening is those who are dumping he big boats are not buying smaller boats, they're out of boating altogether. Then there's a decisive line between those who buy a modified V hull and those who buy a V hull aluminum boat, the two crowds rarely cross paths. Most of the dirt cheap boats are 'utility' type hulls but for me, those are what I use the most.
I have seen more used motors starting to sell, I think a lot of guys who don't just buy new boats every few years are starting to realize that a good two stroke will outlast a four stroke and are so much simpler to work on. I just listed a couple of newly found older 15h Johsons that I really didn't want to sell, but I was figuring I can't keep them all, so they went up on CL. I got a few tire kickers who thought they'd buy them for $100 or so, but I put them up at $1,200, not $200. Both ran on fuel mix and I didn't go any further than checking athat they had good compression and clean lower unit oil. One sold on Sat evening for $950, and the guy emailed me back Sunday night with a video of it running on his boat. The other one sold this morning to a guy who drove four hours to buy it. It sold for asking price. It makes me think I let the first one go too cheap now.
I have 14 other 15hp hp OMC motors so letting a couple go that I didn't need didn't hurt too bad but I rally didn't expect them to sell so fast. Boats on the other hand are not selling, and I see over a dozen decent looking 12 to 14ft boats all under $400 within 40 miles of me here.

Boosh said:

Everyone posting all these boats they’re buying must have acres of land to park them all on

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HA HA, I hear ya. I have acres but can’t justify having a bunch of boats around that won’t get much use if at all. Presently have two boats. One I keep at the lake all summer. The other is here at the house at my disposal whenever I want to go fishing. Just got rid of a third boat I had this past spring, why keep it around, pay to regester it, and have to deal with it if it won’t get used.

I'm watching the "big boat" market closely. Looking to snag a project trawler around 35ft to fix up over the coming years. There is no shortage of them for much less than you might expect. Granted they are in need of a lot of work but I have a barn I can park it in and 6yrs to get it seaworthy before my wife retires.

I haven't seen any trawlers for sale around these parts. Most of the bigger boats are 23 to 35ft cruisers with gas V8's. When gas skyrocketed the first time years ago those boats were dead, they had a slight resurgence but soon died out again.
Now many are free or close to it. Some good, many not so good. My last big glass boat was a 26ft Penn Yan Sportfisherman with flybridge and two Chevy motors. The boat was great but the cost of fuel and the cost of keeping it year round at a marina got way too high. When I first bough it in the 80's it cost me $550 for the slip and winter storage, and about $80 per trip in fuel, by 2002the marina had gone up to $5,500 a year, plus $1000 per haul out, and $2,500 per winter for storage. It was too big for my yard so it had to live at the marina. In the years I had it I had replaced two prop shafts, rebuilt both motors, and added trim tabs and hydraulic steering. I also repainted the rebuilt part of the upper cabin. I had also bought a full enclosure for it that cost me $6k back in 1999.
It was turn key when I sold it and it took four years to find a buyer, and even then it turned out to be a partial trade of a van, a mini van, and some cash. The new owner took the boat up to Mass. After the sale, I fielded a ton of questions, mostly about fuel consumption. The guy seemed shocked that it took five tanks of fuel to get from NJ to MA in December. WIth a 26 knot top speed all out, it needed very bit of the two 110 gallon fuel tanks it came with. It was bad enough to fill up back when gas was $1.63/gal, but at near $4, no thanks. Back then things were cheaper all around so I had the money to keep it going but now everything goes into just paying the bills and n groceries. Since 2002, my taxes have gone from $500/yr, to $9,500/yr, my home insurance went from $380/yr to $3k/yr, my average grocery bill went from $40/wk to $280/wk, truck insurance went from $400/yr to $2k/yr. All while income hasn't improved at all. What's worse, things I bought knowing they were indemand items 20 years ago are now worthless it seems. because no one has any cash. If it comes down to it, I feel that if someone isn't willing to pay what something is worth, and if it just won't sell, I might as well die with it or cut it up in tiny pieces.
I consider myself lucky that I was able toget rid of my bigger boats years ago before al this mess we see today began.
Now the latest thing here is them trying to force everyone to remvoe all the big trees in their hyard because they see them as a 'safety hazard' if a storm came. IN an neigborhood with 100x100 yards they want no trees that exceed the height of the home and no trees in 'fall' range' of the house. My trees shade my house in the summer, so they're not going anywhere. The leaves fertilize my garden too.

Billy H said:

HA HA, I hear ya. I have acres but can’t justify having a bunch of boats around that won’t get much use if at all. Presently have two boats. One I keep at the lake all summer. The other is here at the house at my disposal whenever I want to go fishing. Just got rid of a third boat I had this past spring, why keep it around, pay to regester it, and have to deal with it if it won’t get used.

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I've got a 100x70ft yard with driveway long enough tor two cars. The city here is starting to give people grief for vehicles that don't move at least once a week and they're trying to ban boats and utility trailers on private property. Guys who have had boats for 50 years years are being told to remove them or get fined. Its put dozens of more boats up for sale cheap. Now they're going after people who keep a can of gas in their garage or shed as being a fire hazard.

"Homeowner's associations are some of the most hated organizations in the country"
I just saw this clip on my news feed. Definitely some truth there, from what I can see.

Boosh said:

Everyone posting all these boats they’re buying must have acres of land to park them all on

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If they don't...I have many acres that they can use. In my area, they will bring much higher prices !!....lol...

oilsmoke said:

I've got a 100x70ft yard with driveway long enough tor two cars. The city here is starting to give people grief for vehicles that don't move at least once a week and they're trying to ban boats and utility trailers on private property. Guys who have had boats for 50 years years are being told to remove them or get fined. Its put dozens of more boats up for sale cheap. Now they're going after people who keep a can of gas in their garage or shed as being a fire hazard.

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One reason I moved way out into the country many years back !! My lot is 175 x1320 ft and I am only restricted to no semi truck parking... Most have big pole barns with toys inside. My wife's sister lives in town, more restrictions and higher taxes !! Will gladly take open space, fewer restrictions and lower taxes

Taxes in NJ seem to double ever two or three years lately.
Most don't have big buildings because they add to the taxable value of the property.
They even tax you for the square footage of paved spaces.
I have a house thats single floor, with an unfinished basement and 5ft tall attic, the house measures 24x28ft, my tax bill says my house is 1,408 sq ft of living area with $60,000 worth of 'Improvements' which counts the shed, asphalt driveway, landscaping, and screened in side porch. I only paid $53k for the place 8 years ago. It was assessed then at $72k, and is now assessed at $155k despite most similar neighbor's houses selling for under $80k.

The city has an ordinance saying that no vehicle may be parked on unpaved surfaces. So keeping a boat or trailer in the back yard or behind the garage will get you a warning or fine.
Take the boat off the trailer lay it on the lawn your just fine. They limit sheds to no more than 8x8ft, but you can park a 40ft shipping container with no issues. But don't let your grass get more than 5.5" tall or they post a big warning on the door. They actually higher senior citizens to go around and look for violations to fine people over. They spend tax dollars looking for ways to raise money via fines. We don't have an HOA, this is the city that causes these issues.
I got a warning the other day because there's excessive grown near my house. I have a bed of mint and Ivy that grows on the north side of the house because nothing else will grown there in the shade. Lately its overrun a bit with wild strawberries. Its behind a 6ft fence on two sides and my house on the other. To see it you have to look over the fence or stand on a ladder. Yet they somehow found a way to get a pic of it and send me a warning about the need to have 'grass not weeds'.

They have issues with everything where I live but I don't pay them much mind, they generally find bigger things to complain about soon enough elsewhere and go away.
Last year they're thing as complaining about bees swarming my garden being a hazard to anyone who may wander that way. The way I see it is if they wander over my 6ft fence into my garden, they have a much bigger issue than bees to contend with. The fence was put there because my garden kept getting raided when I was at work. I found I was never getting any ripe tomatoes, and when one was close, it would disappear by the time I got home.
A game camera showed some woman who 'baby sat' a neighbors kids would walk the kids down the street during the day, then go down the neighbors driveway and use their pickup truck to get over the fence to load a bag of tomatoes or what ever she felt like taking. The best pics were her reaction to the foot deep pile of wet manure I dumped at the base of the fence. When that didn't stop her I hooked a cattle fence charger to the tomato cages. That seemed do the trick. When I showed the pics and video to the local police they told me I wasn't the only one to have the same problem with garden thefts lately. One neighbor planted a row of new trees and plants around his house and someone came in while he was at work and dug up four trees, two banana plants, and two fig trees. All on camera. The woman was on foot pushing a baby stroller pulling a plastic wagon that she loaded up with the trees she stole.
With food costs going nuts, gardens need to be secured I guess.

I keep my boats stacked when not in use or for sale. Right now I've got the two I just picked up turned upside down behind my shed chained together. The trailer that was under the 14ft boat is too big and heavy, so it'll get sold, and I've got a small, older trailer that'll work just fine. So in reality the 14ft boat isn't going to take up any more space than the trailer already did.
I'm just still super shocked that so many boats that used to be in such high demand go unsold all of a sudden. ITs not like this isn't a populated area, this town has over 70K people and the county over 150k or so. Its not farm land, its mostly suburbia built in the 40's and 50's.
My street has 80 homes, 71 of them have small boats but only one that I know of is actively using theirs besides me. Most have boats that sit until that one time or they decide to take it out then realize it no longer runs and it costs big money to fix at the marina so they push it back in a corner and cover it up. A few have jetskis, but I've not seen those come out of the garage in years now either. They have been trying to pass an ordinance lately to ban people from doing their own car repairs or painting of any type. They passed the car repair part but no one seems to enforce it so far.