[halyardz]

In Graham''s post there is some implied wisdom IMHO. Over the course of say five years, it might be wise to budget for at least one "system" upgrade per year on an older boat. If year one its the tranny, year two might be the sails, year three the rigging, and so on. Then there are the demons of destruction that pop up every now and then that require your attention and funds. In my case the first two years were in the 12% range but it is a 1980 boat. And as Jeff suggests its partly a function of how much you do versus how much you have the yard do. Many of us on limited budgets are forced to be "handy"...or at least more so than anticipated due to increasing costs.