Living in a van (Dublin)

10pennymixup wrote: »

The GCD has a waiting list as long as your arm. The extended mooring permit was raised to €3500pa, and along with liveaboard insurance which is required to get the license, pumpout fee's, deposit etc you wont get much change out of 5k pa.

Any barge that you buy for a "years rent" (circa sub 15k) will most likely need to be surveyed initially then regularly out of the water for insurance. So throw on another €5/700 and try find anywhere near Dublin to do that. They don't give a permit to let any old sieve into the GCD.

Plus any barge sub 15k is going to need some serious money put into it sooner more than later. A new narrowbeam barge in the UK sells for on average £100k stg, what do you think a €15k in Ireland (if you can find one) is like underneath the waterline (or inside).

The boat exampled by the other poster looks like a dutch platbodem westlander with a top from the seventies and hull possibly older can't see if it's riveted (some of these boats hulls go back to the 20s/30's). 24v electric not 12v, no mention of a holding tank and an ancient engine that's getting harder and harder to get parts for. You'd be throwing money at it

GRP boats with a diesel heater would be a cheaper option but the condensation in Winter puts most people off. And they to need maintenance.

AFAIK there is no other extended mooring permit zone in Dublin, which is where the OP was looking (it's in the title). The next nearest mooring zones to Dublin (Hazelhatch, Sallins etc) are also full.

The nearest the Shannon gets to Dublin is Athlone. On the Shannon only a few private marinas allow/ tolerate it, and they too cost decent money. Doing it elsewhere on the Shannon and canals is done, but not legally. Waterways Ireland have recently cleared out Tullamore by lifting and impounding illegal boats, they'll be doing the same in Shannon harobour at the start of September

Living on board on a fixed mooring legally in Dublin is expensive and very difficult to achieve. One of the reasons why so few do it and probably why you never ended up doing it. It's far from a viable alternative to living in a van on the cheap.

And a canal barge as an investment is a poor idea, new ones depreciate in value, and old ones need constant expensive maintenance.

Thanks for such comprehensive info! I did briefly consider the barge/mooring idea last year but when I started looking into it it didnt seem viable costwise for the reasons (although yours are much more comprehensive, i didnt get quite that far into the research process) and when I enquired re. moorings at GCDock was told in no uncertain terms that it was closed to new moorings / all sewn up

RickDeckard wrote: »

Windows - 2 of these :


http://www.rainbow-conversions.co.uk/rooflights-vents/fiamma-turbo-vent-premium-40-crystal.html


One with fan, one without.


I only plan to do this for a few years until I have monesy saved.


Paperwork - Its started out as a commercial van, Ive passed CVRT with as it is now.



Once I finish a bit of work on a few weeks, it will be fully registered to a camper van. The work I have to get done is to fulfill the legal requirement for re-reg.


Then I get camper van insurance. I have a small car as a 'primary vehicle'.


Yes, I will be in the camper van full time under the camper v
an insurance, you are not supposed to daily drive a campervan.


But that's the worst thing against the Irish state in what I am doing.



The goverment's policy pushed me into this , I want to be a 100% legal, covered and safe and legit as I can possibly be , but I'm in a grey area, and frankly this is survival.



To each their own, not everybody thinks the same and solves problems the same way.


Romance - If someone does not under stand where I am coming from on this then we would not click.


If /when I meet a nice person, for sure I'd share a gaff, if we could rent at affordable rate some whrere.


This is about me giving myself a competitive advantage in life at this time in my life, because no other fukk#r will give it to me, will they?

Haha, legend. Great attitude.

bladebrew wrote: »

I am currently travelling in Europe in a campervan but only because it a cheap way to see a lot of places, living in it full time would drive you mad! Ireland is way too cold, a diesel heater is a must but they make noise, chinese ones are cheap but a branded one is €1000ish, there are a few people living in a van with no shower or toilet posting on youtube but I have no idea how, I assume they are using public toilets which are not always the cleanest, and when you wake up at 5am in a thunderstorm it's nice to have a toilet onboard,
One public toilet I went to use in France turned out to be a squat toilet absolutely destroyed in crap! I have a cassette toilet in the van, you could put one in a van, but you need somewhere to empty it every few days, and there needs to be a door to slide it out of,

Vandog is one of those people who I like but says that you don't need a shower everyday and that's not what humans are meant to do etc, that is rubbish if you don't have a shower for a few days in any kind of heat you feel horrible and smell horrible,

Insurance is a massive grey area, Dolmen is a popular insurance company that prohibits the van being your full time residence, so you need an address, I doubt they have anyway of knowing that you are living in it but it's still lying to them, you need a car policy aswell,

Our van has over 100 litre fresh water tank but we need to fill it every few days, small vans have no where near this capacity in most cases, sink water goes into a grey tank which again needs to be emptied every few days, I don't know anywhere in Dublin or Cork that has this facility? Apart from campsites,

It's a pity campsites don't allow people to live in vans on site, if you were parked hooked up to mains, with a shower and toilet block and a heater you could definitely live fairly comfortably in a purpose built campervan, but living in a panel van in a city centre sounds like a nightmare,

Edit: Fulltime van lifers never mention rain for some reason, you have no idea how loud rain is until it's 3 foot above your head! From rainy rainy Sweden!

Thanks for your insightful post. V helpful.

Idbatterim wrote: »

would it be worth getting a leaf?

RickDeckard fair bloody play! There is actually no point in Dublin, renting any more, unless you absolutely have too. Anything sub E1500 for a one bed apartment, will be a kip. The amount of money you have to land out for the crap it gets you, is insane! from one bed apartment to several bed house...

honestly, there are log cabins, 5x5m going for a five grand. A detached property with a garden, done to your own taste. You can get broadband and all utilities from the house. No landlord, no rent hikes, no ****!

I’ve seen some great cabin options but where would I put one? If I could afford a site I’d absolutely do that. If you know of somewhere to put one on a temp basis please let me know!

Its true re. the Dublin & surrounding rental market. The places I have seen for 1300-1500+ are absolutely disgraceful. Ive seen everything from damp walls dripping with blue / black mould, a flat roof leaking in several places including into an electric shower switch and down walls with sockets, a garage not even wide enough for a car and NOT converted read NOT insulated being rented as a ‘studio flat’, a portacabin that you would find on a buildimg site with an outdoor toilet/shower across the yard clearly from a very very old house that may have once been on the site, and various awful specimens of trailers in dubious neighbourhoods... all of these examples were 1300 and above, most well above. Even given that, there are desperate people competing for them, mostly non nationals ive noticed.
As much as I accept the law of economics supply/demand, the current situation is completely unacceptable. I will not pay that type of money for that type of accomodation. I cant justify it. I’d can quicker justify contining with my current 4hr roundtrip commute while researching/starting work on a clean van conversion that would allow me save towards a property of my own over the short term while being better rested (not such a long commute) and be mine to sell on when I can get on the propert ladder... or failing that look for work abroad somewhere that has an affordable and habitable standard of accomodation within a reasonable travel distance of work.

Cyrus wrote: »

So just so everyone is clear you can afford to rent you are choosing not to and looking for what you see as a clever way to meet your basic needs to allow you to save money to buy a house?

If so can we all stop talking about the disgrace it is then this is a choice not a forced situation.

If your definition of ‘can afford to rent’ is the need to to spend more than half my monthly wage to live in a desperately substandard living space in order to be within a reasonable distance of work, with the rest of my wage accounted for by other responsibilities, therefore no cashflow left for socialising, holidays, or similar and no scope to save towards buying my own home, then yes I suppose you can determine that I can ‘afford’ to rent. Personally I certainly wouldn’t define that as affordability.

As for ‘choosing not to’, to be clear I am considering a van or some similar solution as a last resort. Not only will finding a half decent place to rent leave me with no cashflow, there is just a dire lack of supply of habitable properties. I have viewed lots of places with an intent to rent but most were not habitable by any reasonable persons definition (see my comment on a previous reply on this thread as to the extent of that). The few that were in any way decent or that I could see a way to make small improvements to myself, I absolutely did registered my interest in and supplied all references etc., but did not succeed in getting an offer. Typically there are close to / usually above 20 ppl at viewings, some bid over the asking price. Three of the places I registered my interest in were taken by multnationals via corporate lets and those landlords did not even bother to cancel the viewings just told us on arrival! Presumably they were offered an increased amount or chose the security of a corporate tenant. So there isn’t even respect for peoples time in this situation, they allowed already tired & desperate people to turn up after their days work and waste their time seeking out places to view that were no longer available. Personally I cannot get back to where I currently rent until 11pm on evenings I do viewings due to lack of transport options/times. I’ve also looked at sharing in Dublin/surrounding comm belt, same thing there can be 20+ people looking at the room and the prices now for a room in a shared property are what you’d not so long ago have paid for a 1 bed. Astronomical. All above assuming you even get a viewing. The majority of my enquiries don’t even get a response. I’ve tried various manners of wording my enquiries etc. I’ve been told that an ad for a listed property gets hundreds of enquiries within the first few hours. You have to be sitting by your phone and get in contact as soon as the listing goes up to have half a chance at securing a viewing!

How long should I continue to spend my time and evenings like this? It seems increasingly futile. This is why I am considering a van and was seeking advice. Not because I fancy living in a van or think i’d be pulling a smart one, but because it seems like it might offer me a solution on a few counts.

If you don’t view the current rental situation in Dublin and the surrounding commuter belt as lacking in affordability and supply of habitable housing it honestly shows that you are not out there yourself trying to find a place to rent. From that perspective you are very lucky indeed.

z0oT wrote: »

Question for the OP:

Is moving out of Dublin to another part of the country a feasible option? Although from reading some posts here, the other cities aren't much better. Could you possibly manage moving to somewhere rural? Depends on your job.

I rented in Limerick City for 6 years up until last year. My rent was 450EUR for a one bed apartment on the outskirts of the city, but I initally signed the lease in 2011, it was no problem to find places back then.

EDIT: Regarding Edinburgh, I rented a one-bed there back in 2010. I had the lease signed within a week of landing there regardless of there being 4/5 other people checking out the apartments when I viewed them. 500GBP per month for a one-bed about a 15 minute walk from Princes St. in the City Centre. I don't suspect it's like that now.

Thanks. For my role/type of work, there’s nothing down the country, no. The opportunities are Dublin centric. If i was to pack in trying to live in/closer to Dublin I’d have to look to moving abroad. Not ruling that prospect out.

seamus wrote: »

Security is always going to be your issue. If it's dirt cheap and close to the city, then how do you stop people with issues from using it? And if you need security, then prices go up.

Though maybe there is an idea there; set it up into fenced-off 16 sq.m. lots and rent them out for a week at a time for €100. That's enough space to set up a decent tent and stretch your legs, but the fencing gives you some privacy, and the €100 cost discourages single-nighters.

This would be really great. My main hesitation with the idea of going through with this idea and starting to seek out a van to convert is the parking / overnight safety element of it. I’d have no problem paying a few quid to close off that concern / for the peace of mind.