The Problem:

Stories abound on the waterfront about couples who have tried living together or cruising together on a boat and have failed. The outcomes range from selling their boat to getting a divorce.

The Solution:

The Compatibility Test is a communication tool that examines relationships with people, relationships with possessions, values, attitudes and goals. 

If you are planning to live by yourself, it will prompt you to look at potential problem areas and do some soul-searching.  Is living aboard a boat a viable alternative lifestyle for you? 

If you are two or more people looking into living on a yacht together, each should take the Compatibility Test to compare their perspectives on some of the issues they may confront.  If the couple, partners or crew members respond differently, the test provides you a springboard to compare perspectives and talk about how these differences can be resolved.

The Compatibility Test is not a scientifically designed instrument.

I have combined my perspective as a sociologist with my extensive experience as a liveaboard.  More importantly, the content of this test has been impacted by numerous unnamed mariners who have shared their experiences, positive and negative, with me.

Every author who has written a book on living aboard has addressed this problem.  Here is some of their advice.

"The first step toward boat living comes well before buying the boat.  It is a step of commitment, of honest agreement with yourself and your partners that this is something you truly want to try....Any raw edges in your relationship will unravel quickly in the close quarters of boat living, so hammer it all out on shore where you'll still have room to throw crockery at each other." p. 14     How to Live Aboard a Boat
by Janet Groene

"If you are doing this with someone else then it depends on whether your mate wants to do this as much as you do.  In the course of my discussion with liveaboards, this seems to be one of the most significant reasons why some couples that commit to this lifestyle cease living aboard after just a month or two."  p. 7

"When more than one person plans on moving aboard, honesty is paramount.  If the man wants to live aboard and the woman does not, then it is incumbent upon her to speak up.  Plenty of people who really want to succeed engage in this undertaking only to fail in the end....Life aboard isn't easy in the best of circumstances.  Now imagine having to live with someone who doesn't care to enjoy this lifestyle, and is only living aboard as an accommodation to his or her mate. p. 142-143  The Essentials of Living Aboard a Boat by Mark Nicholas

"Only you can deal with an unwilling spouse, but if she (or he) realizes just how serious you really are, it's possible she (or he) might be willing to give it a try.  Get your feelings out in the open and talk about it.  But both must agree to the move.  There's no room on a small boat for a martyr. p. 313

Living together in the relative confinement of a boat requires a greater degree of tolerance, patience and consideration of one another's feelings than on shore.  Little irritations become magnified all out of proportion unless both are able to communicate freely.  If one feels coerced into living on a boat and would truly rather live in a house, for whatever reason, the experience can only end in failure."  p. 313
Complete Live-Aboard Book by Katy Burke

"If you are a couple and only one of you has the live-on-a-boat bug, you had better forget the whole idea, or else find another partner who feels as strongly about boating as you do.  It will not work unless both of you really want to do it.  If one person is lukewarm about the idea, but willing to give it a try anyway, it might work  - but the odds are very much against it.  If both of you want to live aboard, but have widely divergent ideas about the size or type of boat you need, you will have to make compromises.  If there is any compromising to be done, however, it will have to be done ashore. before you move to the boat that will become your home.  Otherwise, you will never be able to achieve a satisfactory arrangement later.  One of you will always feel slighted."  p. 4  Living Aboard  The Cruising Sailboat as a Home by Jan and Bill Moeller