Rebuilding a sailboat: how long, how much, in what order

Three years between buying and leaving. A refit that costs 40% of the price of the boat. And an order of works you do not really get to choose. Here is what our 1979 ketch taught us about running a project this size — with real figures, not forum averages.

The real timeline

Bought in November 2025, leaving planned for October 2028: thirty-five months. Here is where the first half went.

What that table does not show: not one of those months was worked full time. The real unit of a refit is the weekend, not the hour or the month. A “two days’ work” job takes two weekends if all goes well, four if it rains.

The money, item by item

Three ratios worth remembering, because they carry over to just about any old boat:

• The refit = 40% of the purchase price. €27,135 of identified work on a boat costing €68,500. And that is the identified work — the list grows, it never shrinks.
• Running costs = 11% of the purchase price, every year. €7,460 a year that lands whether the boat sails or not. Over five years, that is a second boat at half price.
• Two lines account for 94% of what is left to do. The rigging at €15,000 and the hull coating at €4,700. Everything else — dozens of lines — weighs less than those two. It is the only thing that matters when you have to make a call.

The line-by-line detail, showing what is paid for and what is not, is on the budget page.

The order: what you do not get to choose

On a refit this size, half the decisions are imposed by dependencies. Spotting them at the start saves months.

1. Clear out before you take anything apart

An old boat accumulates forgotten gear, duplicate parts, cables going nowhere. Sorting first lets you understand the boat, work out what still functions, and see the jobs before you open them up. It does not make a good video, but everything else depends on it.

2. Everything below the waterline, while the boat is ashore

This is the critical path. Stripping governs the epoxy, which governs the hull coating. Skin fittings get changed ashore and nowhere else. Until that sequence is closed out, the launch cannot be scheduled — and every month ashore costs money.

3. Electrics before the joinery

Cables run behind bulkheads and above ceilings. Rebuilding an interior and then realising you have to go back through it means doing it twice.

4. Rigging last

It is the biggest cheque of the project and, paradoxically, the least urgent: it blocks no other work. Pushing it back spreads the load without slowing the refit.

Five rules we now work by

• Count in weekends, not hours. It is the unit that absorbs the drive, the weather, the tiredness and the tool you forgot.
• Do the worst bit first. The hardest area of a job gets done in the morning, while you still have energy. The comfortable area is the reserve for the end of the day.
• One surprise a quarter. The seller’s debt, the boat settling on its cradle, a parcel lost in the post. None of them was predictable, but their frequency is: a contingency allowance is not optional.
• Lead times are not working hours. A job waiting on a part does not advance, however fresh everyone is. Ordering early costs less than working fast.
• Publish the figures. We keep to the budget because it is online. It is project management disguised as transparency.

Going further

Before you buy: the eight things to check, the check on the seller’s debts and the printable viewing checklist. During the refit: stripping the hull, the skin fittings, the electrical system and the fuel system.

The refit day by day is in the logbook, and the countdown to departure on the departure page.