The monthly payment, and then the part the banks’ calculators stop before: what the boat costs you every year, and what that works out at per hour on the water.
$45,000 boat · 60 hours a season
$359 a monthThat is the loan.
This is arithmetic on your own numbers, not financial advice and not a quote. No rate, premium or yard price here is an offer from anybody.
Published ranges checked 2026-09-20.
Quick answer: the payment is the small half. On the numbers this page opens with — a $45,000 used boat, $9,000 down, 15 years at 7.5% — the payment is $359 a month, and insurance, a slip, maintenance, winterising, registration and fuel add $13,755 a year on top. Depreciation adds another $2,700 that never arrives as a bill. Used 60 hours a season that works out at $301 an hour on the water before depreciation and $346 with it. Change every one of those figures for your own: none of them is a quote for your boat.
Why this calculator has a second half
Every boat loan calculator on the internet stops at the monthly payment, and they all stop there for the same reason: the people who publish them are lending the money. The payment is the number that makes a boat look affordable. It is not the number that decides whether it is.
The question underneath “what would the payment be” is almost always can I afford this boat, and answering that means adding up the year. So this one does: the payment, then insurance, mooring or storage, maintenance, winterising and launch, registration, fuel at the hours you actually go out, and depreciation kept on its own line because it is real money and it is not a bill.
Cost per hour is the number worth arguing with
A boat used 120 hours a season and the same boat used 30 are completely different purchases, and the price tag cannot tell them apart. Cost per hour can. It is also the figure that makes a fair comparison with the alternatives possible — chartering, a boat club, or renting the two weekends a year you would genuinely use one.
That is not an argument against buying. Plenty of things worth owning are terrible value per hour. It is the number to have in your head before somebody else does the arithmetic out loud for you.
The published ranges, and what they are worth
| Cost | Published range | What moves it |
|---|---|---|
| Insurance | 1–3% of value a year | Where you keep it, above everything else. A hurricane zone is not a northern lake. Then your claims history, your experience and the type of boat. |
| Maintenance | 7–20% of value a year | Age. Roughly 7–12% for a newer boat and 10–20% or more for an older one. This is the famous “10% rule”, and it is a rule of thumb, not a measurement. |
| Depreciation | 5–12% of value a year | Steepest in the first years of a new boat, far flatter on an older one. It is the whole financial argument for buying used. |
Those are ranges published by the sources listed in the tool, carried so the calculator can suggest somewhere to start. They are not national averages and they are not a quote. Mooring, winterising and registration are not in that table at all, because they are so local that a published range would be actively misleading — the marina and your state’s agency have the real figures, and both will tell you in a phone call.
The five calls worth making before you sign
- Your insurer. With the boat’s details and where it will live. Free, and the fastest number to get right.
- The marina or yard you would actually use. Not the cheapest one on a map. For most owners this is the biggest line of the lot.
- The same yard, for winterising. Ask for haul-out, shrink-wrap, winterising and spring launch as one number, per foot.
- Your state’s boating agency. Registration, any title fee, and whether your state charges personal property tax on boats — some do, and it surprises people.
- Your own logbook, for hours. Or last year’s, honestly read. The hours you plan are not the hours you get.