The BEST Cheap 36 Foot Sailboat - Ep 284 - Lady K Sailing 

Saturday morning breakfast is regularly just a coffee and a Lady K episode. All a sailor needs.

Many, many years ago myself and a friend decided to buy a "big" boat. We both sailed sub 30 footers. We bough a Beneteau First 501 from Moorings Charter in St Martaan, we live in the UK but what is an ocean when you are saving money. As a charter boat she had 4 cabins with heads and showers. We were two young families with friends and kids. We got her back home with no drama's, the keel and mast remained in place. The sails were poor and that is being kind. A year later with a few pounds and a lot of hours work we had a boat that gave two families huge fun both in the UK and the Med. Two of our kids went on to become yachtmasters. Not for everyone but it worked for us. Sadly decades later only one those friends remains to tell the tale.

Looks like a great starter boat, but good to know about the 20 year watershed moment. Looks really good. I'd go half-sies 👍

This boat has always been on my wife and I’s watchlist.

We fly to Long Island next week to meet up w our delivery captain and spend a month bringing our boat to Texas! A 41 year old dream come reality! We are nervous but excited! Along the way we bought some consulting from this guy and he gave us good advice! Looking forward to ‘learning the ropes’! See you fine peoples upon the waters! 🌊 ⛵️ 🌊

Thanks Tim. You just ticked every box for the wife and I! We now have another one for the list 😊

They make a 3 cabin version as well, if you're willing to settle for a wet head. The wet head is roomie and looks like it easily works with shower curtain to keep everything dry.

Enjoy your truthful, non- biased reviews of old and new boats and the niche they fill. Currently going through reviews of many brands, sizes and price of my retirement plan. Great seeing you on PS, too!

I've got a 37' Endurance. Two double cabins, pilot berth and separate head/shower. Full headroom everywhere. Deck saloon/pilothouse. And it's a full keel ketch.

You mentioned going halfsies on the boat in New York. It made me wonder about arrangements like that? Any experience with them? Is it a great way to experience sailing for half the cost? Or a great way to start a lifelong feud with someone? I’d love your thoughts. Maybe even a video.

If any of you at all like the Old Style boats… check out a Hans Christian 33! It’s the biggest interior on a 33 - especially an older one - you can imagine! Bob Perry… what more need be said eh!? If you ever get a chance to get on one… don’t pass it up!

Thank you for the review. I’ll keep this one in mind when looking for a cruiser in retirement

Thanks Tim, keep em coming!

Sunday evening after diner with a "sleepy time tea with honey" on ice and Tim on the helm telling us sailors with another great episode. Happy Sailing ⛵!

We bought our Jeanneau SO 36i in 2009 and can confirm that this is a great yacht! We sail in the Mediterranean and love the big cockpit, this is where we spend most time. The 36i sails very well thanks to the brilliant design by the late Marc Lombard, who designed many racers. About 11 hundred 36i's have been built, get one if you can!

Love it. These are great boats but my heart is wth the full keels. Just that there arent very many of them

It's a good recommendation that fits a subset of boaters. I wouldn't consider 100k cheap. This boat does appear to be rather fast and spacious. It has a nice layout for two couples or for larger parties. From looking at Sailboatdata its specs don't indicate that it's blue-water capable (comfort ratio 2). Also it has a relatively deep draft for the east coast USA (6.36ft). So it will have have limited weather windows, and limited anchorages. Within those limits it looks like a good choice though.

Sailed many miles in mine around NZ , Some heavy weather at times as we get down here , Great little all rounder .

Hunter 37 legend

As someone in the (very) early stages of planning out my sailing dream, these videos are immensely helpful! When it comes closer to the time to start seriously shopping, you’d best believe I’ll be booking some time. Thanks for all the great information and work you put into these videos!

Just found your channel. I am contemplating boat life. I’m watching due to you peaking my interest in boats. I’m in a unique job field and hope I can figure something out. Thanks in advance.

Thank you for the information

Catalina 36 mk2

It is a nice boat. No question about it. Just imagine though what you get on a Hunter of the same size.

Before they passed, my parents were looking at the 36i to retire on in the islands.

i love the videos!! When I retire fully in 3 years I will be looking for another 29 or 40-45. You will be hearing from me. Thanks for all the information.

Hmm, going halfsies with someone knowledgeable sounds intriguing.

Super helpful. Thank you

In January we chartered a 389 sun odessey, what a comfortable beautiful boat and the bathroom is fantastic

Enjoyed watching this with my bowl of Raisin Bran 👍🏽

Love the content. Keep it up.

Hi awesome boat for sure. The 1993 Hunter 33.5 I used to own is worth considering as well. Half the price, same layout and with most of the features. Only the head here is more substantial. Worth considering despite being older.

I have a 2009 49i now, but will sell it soon for a 39i maybe.... Thanks for this video! btw 49i sails great, comfortable stable and fast. With low sail area on a furling main I'm sailing at 8 kts all the time. These are great boats and sort of simple in design. exterior and interior things were design to be easy to maintain since they were targeted to the charter industry.

Great information. If you ever have time. Maybe doing a video on sailboat that are great for the PNW, say Washington Puget Sound up into Canada Desolation Sound.

My body is screaming for adventure... this is amazing stuff.. Do you also have a video about sailing finances? How much does maintenence cost, fuel, other expenses to sail like that...

Green information 👍

love to se your videos .... tanks

Similar to the 35.5” Endevour. My wife and I took it to the Bahamas, absolutely no experience and only paid $27,500. Now THAT is affordable to all.

Backed out of a sale on another 36. Was hard to do, but the boat was just going to be too many projects upcoming. Might have to shift gears to something like a Juneau thats turnkey.

Always good, thanks, so better than the 360 with that walk around stern bed?

My breakfast consisted of a flat white and a cinnamon roll. Thank you for sharing your insights with aspiring skippers!

wish had looked at these before buying the Bristol 38

I really like this boat.

10 years ago when you were spry? I'm 60 and less spry than I was ten years ago. Year ago, on a charter, in the BVIs, my quarter berth was my last climb in and turn around. I'd love to see a small-ish (under 40) boat with an (partial) island berth. Pullman's are neat, but island bunk. I have been on the big brother: 39i.

Nice video.

I hadn't look at this 36 before. Might be just the right size

Beneteau 323

Tim, please do a video on the next step up in boats but with a budget in mind. You have talked about something live-on-able for yourself, but not a monster. So maybe 4-5 choices? This is too light and many others are too slow/don't point at all. Short of a racer but not full keel truck. You get the idea. The boat you could afford and live on up scaling from Lady K but still fun to sail (PHRF sub 120)?

I purchased a 3 cabin 36i this year. IMO this boat has it all. The NY boat looks like a good deal but and was listed for a suspiciously cheap price. But its stranded on Lake Champlain. I imagine it would be a lot of money to transport it by road to Long Island Sound.

"You could literally grab this boat in New York today and be in the Bahamas for November." Umm, not sure I want to be in the Bahamas this November. The Abacos are some of my favorite places on Earth, but this is going to be a very bad year for hurricanes. I already cancelled a RI > BVI November training sail based on the NHC forecast...

I am not sure what to get, I am in Texas but live in the South of Chile where I would like to sail the fjords of the Chilean Patagonia, so I think I need a heavy boat in the 40 foot range, just for two people, two heads because one will be busy for hours several times a day, One with a queen size bed in the back, a stand up shower, 6 foot headroom, a center cockpit, sugar scoop, cutter rigged is ok but not mandatory. I like the layout of a Hunter Passage 42 for example of layout but heavy displacement with a full keel and protected rudder. So, finding a boat that has 90% of all that is not easy. And affordable because I am sure for 400K I can get what I want and more but under 100K is not easy.

Wow 12,000lbs that's crazy light.

Last time I was this early, someone beat me to the first comment. Big fan of budget friendly recommendations for single handing!

Can you do an updated video on trailer sailors? And I’m not talking about the old ones you can get for a cheap back. I’m talking about some of the newer trailer sailors being produced in Poland like Tes yachts. I believe you spent some time living in the Durham region of the GTA, which I am from. If you check out the Tes model of trailer sailors, this is a type of boat that could not only be used in Lake Ontario but you could load it up on your trailer for the weekend and hit Georgian Bay or Lake Simcoe, or due to its swing keel and shallow nature even smaller bodies of water like balsam Lake. I’d love to know your thoughts on this type of sailboat for people who have access to so many different waterways.

I wish...

Hey! 401st! Hehehe. Interesting. Thanks, Tim.

I had avocado toast with sunnyside up egg for breakfast 🍻

That one in NY has been on my list for 5 months. Not sure what is wrong with it, other than its in Lake Champlain.

Quick fact. There is no Forrest Gump bench. Never was. It was only there for the movie. We went looking for it while we were in Savannah. Found the park but no bench. Confirmed by locals. Cheers

Been binging your videos for a few weeks now and i was curious if you've ever had the chance to form an opinion about Southerly sailboats. I know they're British built, and not many make the trip across the Atlantic, but they seem to have interesting features, such as a swinging keel, interior pilot controls for bad weather, and seemingly nice construction. However, im just a novice enthusiast, and i still don't know what i don't know.

Great episode, Tim. You mention the price change that happens at the 20-year mark for boats. Would love an episode on that and your thoughts. I was fortunate to buy a nearly new boat 9 years ago and it’s now 10 years old. A 39’ and I’m getting very close to retirement. Don’t want to downsize, but wondering about my options and don’t want to lose a lot of value in another 10. I’ve done a ton of upgrades in the past 9 years and it could easily take us all the way to Bahamas and back. Question for us is, do we sell and upgrade to retain value so we can sell the newer boat in another 10-years for value or do we keep the existing boat for 10 more years giving up the value of the price drop when we want to downsize?

Freedom 36 Mull or Freedom 35 Pedrick. The freestanding carbon mast system has huge benefits. The conservative sailing community needs to recognize the wonderful attributes of this concept. I've had 3 Freedoms and of course convinced of the concept pioneered by the brilliant Garry Hoyt. Great sailboats.

Love 36 feet boats, we purchased a year 2000 Bavaria 36 holiday in mint condition, check our boat on our channel. It’s a 3 cabin layout plenty room for a small family. Easily sail single handed. I am currently getting it ready in UK 🇬🇧 to sail down to the Mediterranean in May next year. 👍

Cool. Now do a video on how not to hit your head on these boats. Somethings I've noticed is low curved surfaces plain gel coat. Pad it? or maybe just put some tape on it so it visually stands out. And an update on Chlorine Dioxide. I first bombed the forward pullman berth/head with 35 grams. Went well, but deep in the pockets of the hanging locker still had boat smell. Less but. I then did the rest of my 46' Hunter center cockpit (est 360 ft square 7' ceiling. The calculators use square footage, assuming an 8' ceiling. For Mold and Mildew it said 360 grams. ) I had two 'pots', using liter yogurt containers, 2/3rds filled with hot water with about 320 grams. I stuck these inside 5 gal buckets. Aquarium bubblers in each and a fan on the floor blowing upwards. (the gas is heavier than air.) Worked amazingly well. If I did it again I think I'd use less. [Also, there's 320 grams of 'salt' vaporized, distributed, decomposed and condensed inside my boat. I think a good wipe down of surfaces would take care of that, but it's not even necessary. You won't ever see any filmly layer. (I've done this now 5 times in my garage, other car, and now my boat. It is a very clean process. I've set test materials right next to the pots. No residual anythiing. Nothing gets bleached.) 24 hours later I went back on board wearing the appropriate full face respirator. Opened all the hatches. It still has a slight 'public pool' smell, but the boat smell is gone. (Surely they must know about this stuff in Florida.) If I did it again I'd use more fans -- blowing into the lockers. My large cupboard where I keep my clothes (in bins in DIY dry bags) really stank. Not any more. You can do this without a full face respirator, but I noticed when I dropped the tablets and ran out wearing a not full face... my eyes kind of ached a little. Don't attempt this unless you know what you are doing. This is the same gas used in WWI.

It’s nice, and I see your logic here… but if I have $75k to spend I’m buying a solid Morgan 384 and spending the other $40k making it bombproof.

catalina 36, kinda like the bavaria's too but pricey.

I am browsing for a Jeanneau 39i - the larger sister of this 36i - would be nice to hear your assessment of this also. I have noticed one thing that worries me with the 39i,. This 36i has "inboard" shourds, where the 39i has outboard - I have always had inboard.. and a worried about this change.

Great boats for sure, I'm just still waiting to win the lottery and buy an Oyster 495.

It's time to trade in Lady K (after paint job) to buy Jeanneau 36ft

Hey Tim any chance you'll showcase a Pacific Seacraft 40 in the near future? (Great work btw -- I'm now an avid watcher of your vids)

What about a sail boat we can find on sale on Sunsail, Mooring etc...?

Hi Tim == I'm looking for my first sailboat now, and have just started watching videos on sailing. I have to say that I am enjoying your videos so much that I am going to do something quite rare for me, and that is become a patron (got any hints on how I do that?). By the way, the boat I am looking for is a MacGregor 26 M. Have you done an episode on that boat?

Bacon!!! 🥓

Heya, great videos. Love watching them, they are really informative! Would it be possible, and if so how tricky, to buy a boat as a non US citizen? I am from Europe ( non EU country ), gonna probably move to Colombia soon and am leaning towards buying a sailboat. Kinda hard searching from half a world away..

Are there any comparable YT channels with great info like this on for the southern hemisphere, particularly Australia anyone knows?

Great summary of a very interesting boat. Overall it looks like one heck of a boat, but there's one big thing that stands out as a significant negative for me, and that's the deep spade rudder. If one is planning long term offshore sailing, surely that rudder presents a significant weak point, as anything that wacks it is likely to bend the rudder post, jamming the rudder, and creating an instant emergency situation with little chance of remedy out at sea? A Hydrovane with it's independent rudder might be a ice backup if it can be installed on this boat, but could the boat be steered with that smaller aux rudder, if the main rudder is jammed while offset to one side? .... All those questions make me very wary of big spade rudders. But I'm a relative newbie sailor, so what say ye all? Thanks.

Is there any information about induction cooktop for boats? Is this a big energy drain?

Question... if I sail from New York to Bahamas today, with this boat, it would take me 4 months to be there? I have no idea how to sail, but I just have the dream of getting into it, and I'm wondering how I calculate the routes and time for a journey. Is there any app? Maybe an in-depth video about that would be great

The only problem is the only ones in my price range are in Croatia. I could go up to $70,000 even though my price range is really up to $60,000, but if I found a good one I could push up to 70. It looks like I am still sticking with a Hunter 33.

Thanks Tim. Lovely, attainable boats indeed. Not "cheap" to many of us lol. _I'm a little unsure how you split reviews between here & PS. May I say the whiteboard looks unusually messy for your cabin?. Just trying to be constructive btw._

Bacon,sausage and two eggs

I'm buying a Gozzard 37a at the end of this month. What are your thoughts on it? Is there a ghost in the closet with this vessel:)? A couple of port lights leaked and had to be fixed...

What boat would you recommand to cross the pasific going to the phillippines?

we have a 36 CC benateau oceanis... feels like a lot of similarities with this boat... any one able to comment on the difference re how they ssil? We are mee to sailing and although we live pur 36CC we want to keep progressing woth experience and skills development... also we are both over 6 feet and feel a slightly larger boat would be more comfortable for us.

Is it possible to live aboard on the lakes year round?

Question with injection topsides does that mean it has no balsa Core?

That's what my allied seawind weighs

Hello, since its 16 years old, how many years the bank would aloud mortage on it?

2 years I'll pay cash for a sailboat like that when I retire, had a cheeseburger for lunch

Eggs and rice for breakfast

A burrito

I’ll go halvsies, for real. Based in Charleston and have access to private aircraft for cheap. How do I reach you?

36 feet is the upper limit to an oversized repair storage road transport. It's wide.

Actually the process is resin infusion molding. Resin infusion is done by laying up the glass in the mold, covering the glass with a vacuum bag, pumping the air out with vacuum pumps and letting the vacuum draw resin into the mold. That is very different from injection molding. Those are nice boats, but they really need electric winches and a leisure furl boom.

could this boat cross the atlantic?

Since when did the words "cheap" and "sailboat" go together?

Halfers Eh?

That boat in New York has been for sale at least 3 years. Gotta be something wrong with it

One yacht is tax paid, the other is not? How much is tax? Replace standing rigging at 20 years must be a US standard? Insurers like 10 years in Europe. Did I see a SunSail charter badge on the second yacht?

breakfast? -- eggless mcmuffin