How do you manage houseboat ownership groups?

dallinw32

dallinw32

New Member
Hello! I was wondering how people manage and run their houseboat ownership groups.

I’m about to graduate in computer science from college, and I’ve been fortunate enough to have gone to Lake Powell on a houseboat every year since 2008 with my family. In that time I’ve heard about and seen a lot of the difficulties my parents’ ownership group has had coordinating maintenance, finances, scheduling, and communication.

I’m thinking about building software specifically for this. However, before I put a bunch of time into developing the wrong thing, I want to see if it would actually solve any problems other people are having.

A few questions:

1) How does your ownership group keep track of everything and coordinate?

2) What’s the biggest pain point or annoyance in your current system?

3) If software could magically fix one thing, what would be?

Thank you for your insight! If you have a lot of ideas you want to share, I’d be happy to get on a call. If people need something like this, I want to make it as useful as possible.
 
dallinw32 said:
Hello! I was wondering how people manage and run their houseboat ownership groups.

I’m about to graduate in computer science from college, and I’ve been fortunate enough to have gone to Lake Powell on a houseboat every year since 2008 with my family. In that time I’ve heard about and seen a lot of the difficulties my parents’ ownership group has had coordinating maintenance, finances, scheduling, and communication.

I’m thinking about building software specifically for this. However, before I put a bunch of time into developing the wrong thing, I want to see if it would actually solve any problems other people are having.

A few questions:

1) How does your ownership group keep track of everything and coordinate?

2) What’s the biggest pain point or annoyance in your current system?

3) If software could magically fix one thing, what would be?

Thank you for your insight! If you have a lot of ideas you want to share, I’d be happy to get on a call. If people need something like this, I want to make it as useful as possible.
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this is a fishing report site!!!
 
Our group has one person who coordinates all maintenance issues, another who does the scheduling and another who takes care of the finances.
I don't know how a program could help but a group with responsible owners is the key plus communication. One rotten apple can spoil the whole barrel.
 
Sorry some of my friends aren’t as welcoming as they could be, it does say new member beside your handle. We have categories to post in, for next time this could be more appropriate in recreation than lake issues but a moderator might move it later. Not a big deal

Some solid software would be a welcome option for timeshare management. There are a few solid companies who offer the services but no software for self management that I am aware of.

Some kind of live board might be nice, to see who’s turn it is and when your next turn is overlayed in a calendar. Also a way to post and ask for trades of your week for another or notifying that you’re week or share is up for sale. That would be for owners. real time weather and condition updates?

Otherwise it might be focused on managers and their needs. Mostly their problems seem to be with finding good labor to turn the boats and owners who don’t report problems or damage.

If you could integrate both owners and managers needs into one set of data that might be cool. If you message me I can give you the name and number of a successful long time, time share manager. He might be best the best guy to ask what their needs are

PS- welcome to Wayne’s Words
 
I’ve been a partner on several boats. Some groups have been better than others. But they all have one weakness - timely communication.

Among other things, I’d suggest focusing on an easy way for owners to log problems and needs of the boat. Something as simple as recording like the pump for the slide doesn’t work. I’d also love to see an inventory so owners could know when they need to bring certain staples.

A maintenance log would be welcome too.
 
We had a maintenance tab on our owners book which also included all the procedures for operating the boat and such. The Maintenance section had discrepancy sheets where the current user could write up any discrepancies or missing items, etc. Along side that area was a "repaired" section where whomever completed the repair or resolved the discrepancy could document the solution. That remained in the book for history and look backs to determine if it's a repeat, etc. That sheet was a two part form so it could be forwarded the the "maintenance person" for the boat as soon as the trip was over. Chuck
 
I am not on one now, but when I was we had a corporation, bylaws, dues, a president, Secretary, and treasurer. At the yearly corp meeting all repairs for the year were discussed, voted on and approved with a spring date for repairs by members. if something came up in the mid year we would call the president, discuss it and get it fixed. Email and phone calls were the mode of communication. We all lived close and were all personal friends so it worked well. A file was kept on the boat for maintenance and member info along with engine logs and fuel logs.
 
Thank you everyone for the warm welcome and the input! (If anyone else has thoughts please keep sharing them)

Cookie said:
For myself, a simple cloud-based program so any owners can follow. Most people just want to know the details, and they shouldn't have to ask for them.
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This is the main idea I have. I'm thinking of building software so you could access it from any device with a web browser. It would have some tools to help boat managers (whether they're external or just one of the owners) keep everything organized, and to give all the owners increased transparency and an easy way to see all of the info they need.

Marina Bum said:
Some kind of live board might be nice, to see who’s turn it is and when your next turn is overlayed in a calendar. Also a way to post and ask for trades of your week for another or notifying that you’re week or share is up for sale. That would be for owners. real time weather and condition updates?
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Thats a feature I'm looking at. It could also be built to make off-season reservations more straightforward. For realtime weather and conditions, I did make lakestats.com/lake-powell which lets you check lake levels super easy (built it just as a fun project). Weather conditions I have learned, is a lot harder. Mostly because there are no weather stations at Lake Powell.

Ryan said:
Among other things, I’d suggest focusing on an easy way for owners to log problems and needs of the boat. Something as simple as recording like the pump for the slide doesn’t work. I’d also love to see an inventory so owners could know when they need to bring certain staples.
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Both great ideas I didn't think of. Building something that has a way to report and document issues would certainly help groups stay on top problems. And an onboard inventory would certainly have been helpful for our family many times.

Skip said:
Check on/off/ maintenance logs are a must, that way owners can list what they found condition wise and helps as reminder. Our logs list all the items to be covered, pump outs, cleaning, water tanks filled, etc.
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This seems to be the most common thing on this thread. I could totally build something like this that lets you log conditions before and after your trip, run checklists, let you take photos of things, etc. I'd love to see the checklists people are already using.

I'm looking at building something to help groups with managing their timeshare owners groups, essentially to tackle these problems and more. If this is something you want your owners group to have, message me and I can let you know when we're starting to test it or when it's ready for the public.
 
Lake stats app? I looked for an app in playstore but could not find. I have always used the Lake Powell Water Data base link on WW. Is there a complete name? This is out 15th Thanksgiving on the lake. We have had a blow or two over the years but this week the weather has been perfect.
 
kilojuliett said:
Lake stats app? I looked for an app in playstore but could not find. I have always used the Lake Powell Water Data base link on WW. Is there a complete name? This is out 15th Thanksgiving on the lake. We have had a blow or two over the years but this week the weather has been perfect.
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It's a webpage, If i'm not mistaken......here 'tis: LakeStats - Real-time Lake Conditions

Don't let the ping pong ball water level upset you, though.....mcpltret says it's just the national debt.....so no worries....he keeps track of these things, you know.... 😋
 
kilojuliett said:
Lake stats app? I looked for an app in playstore but could not find. I have always used the Lake Powell Water Data base link on WW. Is there a complete name? This is out 15th Thanksgiving on the lake. We have had a blow or two over the years but this week the weather has been perfect.
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If you have an iPhone, you can make webpages behave kind of like an app.

Just click the middle icon at the bottom - the one that looks like a square with an up arrow.then click “add to Home Screen”.
 
Rainbowbridge said:
It's a webpage, If i'm not mistaken......here 'tis: LakeStats - Real-time Lake Conditions

Don't let the ping pong ball water level upset you, though.....mcpltret says it's just the national debt.....so no worries....he keeps track of these things, you know.... 😋
Click to expand...
It is a webpage, but also as of literally today it's also on the iOS App Store. (That makes it so you can still see data when you're offline) I'm gonna add more features soon so theres more data to look at.
 
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