[nirvana]

I bought the boat with grander ambitions than to use it as a place to live, and so I spent more on it than I would have if I was just looking for housing. Worse, in the last years I had it, the marina really jacked up the rates.

If you're looking to save as much as possible, you can get boats for $1,000-$7,000 that a single person can live aboard fine (or two people towards the higher end of that scale)... and by going out of the urban area to more remote locations you can get cheaper marina slips.

[fennecfoxen]

Also, if you borrow to buy the boat and you use it as your primary residence, the interest payments are tax-deductible.

(That means if you have a decent interest rate and reasonable risk tolerance, you can invest the cash elsewhere and make more money than you would save by buying the boat outright.)