For a dozen years, marine consultant Dave Cowheard cherished his lifestyle on the water. The solitude. The serenity. The privacy.
Then spree killer Andrew Cunanan killed himself on July 23 on a houseboat on Collins Avenue.
Cowheard lives on a houseboat. On Collins Avenue.
“Suddenly, friends of friends were calling and asking, `Is that your houseboat we’re seeing on TV?’ ” he says.
Cowheard, 53, lives in Sunny Isles Beach, 100 blocks north of that houseboat. But it’s no surprise that in South Florida, where the popular image of living on water produces instantly recognizable images of regal sailboats and oversize yachts, one houseboat could be mistaken for another.
Those boxy wood-and-fiberglass structures built on barges haven’t been front-page news since the early ’60s, when a TV series called “Surfside 6” put three private eyes on a houseboat docked in front of the Fontainebleau Hotel for fun and adventure.
“We’re a dying breed in Florida,” says Cowheard, who has lived on a houseboat since 1985. “They’re not many of us left anymore.”
Many of South Florida’s remaining houseboats, probably fewer than 200, are grandfathered in under old zoning laws. A morass of restrictions or outright bans makes it hard, if not impossible, to bring a new houseboat into the watery neighborhoods of Dade and Broward counties.
Many of the houseboats dotting the docks on the 79th Street Causeway, on Indian Creek and along canal-laced Fort Lauderdale are decades old, passed from one owner to the next.
Usually motorless and permanently docked until a tug boat moves them to a new location, they’re called “floating homes” or “barge homes” to differentiate them from motorized, seaworthy boats that double as homes.
“A lot of people have the perception that anyone living on a houseboat is involved with drugs, a ne’er-do-well and one step above being homeless,” says Chuck Willard, 72, a Fort Lauderdale boat captain and the original publisher of The Waterway Times, a South Florida monthly magazine on the boating life. “Obviously, that’s not true.”
The reputation started to soil around the late ’70s. Homeowners began complaining that houseboat owners didn’t pay the same hefty real estate taxes as those living on solid ground but still used schools and other services. And new voices in the environmental movement complained loudly about raw sewage in clean water.
Still, the stalwarts remain, and for good reason.
“My backyard,” says Cowheard, taking in the scenic coral rock bridge and the placid Intracoastal to the west with a sweep of his arm.
“Friends call up and say, `How’s the ocean today?’ ” Then I climb up the stairs to my sundeck and take a look.”
On Cowheard’s third-story sundeck is a hammock for sleeping, a grill for cooking and a stereo, stashed in a wood-and-fiberglass box, for entertainment.
On Larry Vita’s houseboat in Fort Lauderdale, where the 75-year-old boat builder has lived for 15 years, the bar is well equipped for serving icy daiquiris to the parched.
Indeed, houseboat living is as much a way of life as a type of home. It attracts both career professionals and free spirits, seduced by lower taxes, like-minded neighbors and spectacular views.
“It’s a wonderful way to live in the city and still have your own space with great views,” says Linda Ridihalgh, editor of Living Aboard magazine, a bimonthly national magazine geared to people who live on boats. “You’re on the water, watching the sunsets.”
The McCallums–Sherry, 48, and Gerry, 52–like the houseboat lifestyle so much they bought one on Fort Lauderdale’s New River to use as Gerry’s office for his job as a commercial laundry equipment salesman. The McCallums lease their two-story home on Fort Lauderdale’s Marina Bay and are renovating their eight-room office houseboat so they can lease part of it to those looking for office space.
Like most houseboat owners, they’re attracted to the aquatic lifestyle and routinely ride their surf bikes around the marina where Sherry McCallum knows nearly everyone–and their dogs–by name.
“How many neighborhoods do you know where everyone knows everybody?” she says. “Here, we not only know each other, we look out for each other.”
Stepping inside a houseboat is like stepping inside any home except when you look out the windows, you see water. As with homes on dry land, houseboats run the gamut in size and amenities, from 1,000 to 5,000 square feet with one to five bedrooms and multiple bathrooms. Prices range from $50,000 to hundreds of thousands.
The more upscale boats offer nearly all the extras you find elsewhere: Hot tubs. Bidets. Jacuzzi tubs. Central air conditioning. Walk-in closets.
Kitchens come complete with full-sized appliances, including dishwashers, garbage disposals, microwave ovens, built-in islands. The Cowheards’ home includes a full-sized freezer, about half-filled with just-caught lobster.
Still, it’s a more scaled-down life in terms of earthly possessions.
“There’s no such thing as having `stuff,’ ” says Sherry McCallum, who lived with her husband on a 50-foot boat for a year and a half before moving to a 1,100-square-foot houseboat six months ago. “You have no attic to fill.”
To conserve space, most multistory houseboats use spiral staircases. And some owners use smaller furniture so rooms don’t look cluttered.
Ever mindful they’re on water, a few owners opt for lightweight, easy-care furnishings like rattan furniture, evenly spaced for balance.
Because Cowheard and his wife, Ederlinda, 47, live about 500 yards from the ocean, they don’t open the windows because the sticky salt air leaves a film on furnishings and can corrode appliances. Thanks to two central air-conditioning units cooling their three-bedroom, three-bath home, they live in comfort.
As with any home, the furnishings reflect the owners. On the Cowheards’ 2,000-square-foot houseboat, a five-pound lobster Cowheard caught sits on a piece of driftwood. A shell lamp hangs in a corner.
The shark-shaped cookie jar plays a few notes of the ominous “Jaws” theme when it’s opened. And a mounted hog snapper hangs between a large wooden knife and fork mounted on the wall.
Also a part of the home are the Cowheard pets: Sam, a cat, and April, the dachshund. When April feels nature call, she heads for towels on the floor, which serve as her backyard.
As casual and carefree as the houseboat life seems at first glance, it’s still a home. There’s no escaping the maintenance.
“But instead of hiring a plumber to fix a leaky basement, you hire a diver to repair a leaking hull,” McCallum says.
When guard rails rust, they need to be scraped and repainted. Cracks and leaks in the fiberglass create rotten wood that must be removed and replaced. Exterior wood and fiberglass require periodic paint jobs to keep the houseboat looking good. The bilge pumps, to remove excess water, need to be meticulously maintained for safety’s sake.
Beyond the maintenance, there are a few other downsides.
“Sometimes I think I miss flowers and plants,” says McCallum, who lived on dry land all her life before moving to the boating life two years ago. “But I don’t miss mowing the lawn.”
Though houseboats are fastened to piers by ropes, chains and sturdy metal arms, they still rock when the wind roars. For some owners, even a little rocking is too much.
“I’m really sensitive to the movement and actually get nauseous,” says Ederlinda Cowheard, a registered nurse. “I take Dramamine.”
As a solution, the couple bought a one-bedroom condo about five minutes from their boat about a year ago. If the weather is rough, Ederlinda sleeps peacefully there.
Finally, there’s the real-life risk that comes with living on water.
“If your houseboat gets rammed, it can sink,” Cowheard says.
In fact, the scenic houseboat is also a vulnerable houseboat, subject to disaster caused by ripping winds, restless seas and careless boaters. As a result, insurance is so expensive that some houseboat owners do without. That’s possible because owners arrange their own financing or buy the boats outright.
Shortly after Hurricane Andrew five years ago, Cowheard says he was quoted an $8,000 premium for $40,000 worth of coverage. He didn’t buy it. He’ll take his chances.
“That’s the price you pay to live in paradise,” he says.
And that isn’t all. Monthly dock fees range from $300 to $1,000-plus, depending on the location and boat size. Plugging into dock facilities provides owners with water, phone and electricity and the monthly bills that go with them. To dispose of sewage legally, homeowners hook flexible hoses to their storage tanks and connect them with sewage hookups on land.
Still, the price for paradise is a little less if you live on the water. Owners are supposed to file a tangible personal property tax return with the county.
Even so, personal property depreciates faster than real estate. So houseboat owners who file that return, and not all do, pay only a few hundred dollars in taxes compared to a few thousand dollars.
For that reason and others, communities started yanking the welcome mat on houseboats years ago.
