Our friends in London are finding that it might actually be cheaper to convert to a houseboat lifestyle rather than buy a landbound home.

For one, it’s nigh impossible to grab up property without the enormous price tag attached. Alex and Felicity Cooper are one couple who have jumped off the chase-down-a-flat train and have instead bought a Dutch barge christened Luctor for £200,000. Alex views this as a much welcome deal. Of the barge, he told CityA.M., “It’s a massive 120 foot boat–37 by six metres–with two big bedrooms, and a big living area and kitchen. Paul did it up really nicely with industrial lights and scaffolding planks that he sanded down and varnished. It looks more like a warehouse flat in somewhere like Islington or Shoreditch than a houseboat.”

Even though their houseboat won’t increase its value over time the same way a flat would, there are some darn good benefits. Besides the view, the lifestyle, and the downright fun that any of us find when we stay on a houseboat, the Coopers’ monthly living expenses at their slip are a reasonable £500 a month. By offering the self-contained cabin at the back of their houseboat for rent, they can easily cover this expense.

And better yet, Alex has a better opportunity to expand his talents as a chef graduated from Le Cordon Bleu, a cookery school in Paris, by expanding his former Underground Supper Club into the Ship’s Kitchen—a dining experience provided onboard the Luctor. To be sure, the Coopers’ story is one good argument for Londoners to begin looking into the benefits of houseboating. To catch all the details of the London side of things, read the whole story by Alex Dymoke here. Bottom photo credited to CityAM.com.