How do people afford this hobby!!!

[tiggs]

Successful reef = money + time + knowledge

You can minimize your investment in any one by investing more in the other 2. But no matter how much of 1 you have, you can't minimize the other 2.

So with a lot of time and knowledge, you can pick up or build the equipment, get frags at frag swaps and sell coral to pay costs. You can have a really nice tank for next to nothing.

GREAT advice. Seriously, this might be the best simple explanation I've ever seen on the topic of reef keeping cost.

 

[Tiger-Paws]

My tank (soon to be tanks) is my PTSD treatement, money is not an issue.

I spend what I want, when I want on what I want.

Yes this can be an expensive undertaking, it all depends on what you want out of it.

Remember this "Buy the Best and Cry Only Once"

 

[Amanda Bitner]

About $4,000 so far. We got the tank, sump, live rock for $350. My husband built a new stand, bought all new equipment, redid the plumbing and blah blah blah. I try to avoid the “how much did that cost” question because I just as horrible as he is lol.
Oh, 180g display 55g sump.

 

[lzrlvr]

Does not cost as much as you think

 

[Mindi]

Love the boat comment as someone who is on boat number 15....Burst Out Another Thousand...love it. You can do a lot to reduce the cost of running your reef tank by using homemade additives. Sure the setup cost is high unless you get a secondhand bargain but I manage my costs pretty strictly as a pensioner. I use Jecod/Jebao Chinese mfrd stream pumps, return pump, and Coral Box skimmer and wifi dosing pump.These are all mfrd by Jecod who used to be Jebao and used to be low quality. My Coral Box products are absolutely excellent. Look at Fishstreet.com. I had quite a few failures a few years back when they were Jebao but since the Coral Box range has been released they are all good IMHO.

Additives are easy...see Randy's recipes for Alkalinity and for Calcium and Magnesium. They cost a couple of dollars a gallon to make at the most. He has now put out a revised Alkalinity part using NaOH for people wanting to boost pH a little. (like me living in a CO2 soup)
Carbon feeding of bacteria in Australia has a few options. !. Red Sea NOPOX at $60 litre...works well. Vodka at $33 litre, and vinegar free. I have successfully migrated from 19-20mls NOPOX daily to 12 mls of Vodka in my 520 litre tank and that is holding NO3 at <1.0. I am happy with that and may not proceed with my original intention of moving on to vinegar....why give myself a pH challenge when I already have to deal with a poorly ventilated house. My other cost saving step was to stop buying GFO and particularly the new technology synthetic phosphate absorbers. My main gripe was how poorly they perform for the quite high cost. I tried liquid phosphate reducer (which I presume to be Lanthanum Chloride) and found that the dose required is extremely small and it is super effective if you have a good skimmer. I paid about $30 for 500mls and dose 7 mls a week for zero phosphorus on my Hanna ULR Phosphorus tester. My fish and corals have showed no adverse reaction to any of these inputs to the tank.

The other change I have made is to sell my RO/DI unit and use my excellent municipal water dosed with Seachem Prime for ATO with some local NSW added to replace skimmate. My water changes I use NSW because I am lucky enough to live by the sea. Membranes and filters are high cost items. I did buy a Hanna Low Range Copper checker and a small bag of Cuprisorb lying in the sump sees copper always showing zero on the Hanna Checker. My house has PVC water pressure pipe anyway not copper. Six months after the switch to municipal water and Prime shows absolutely no negative impact. If there are trace amounts of any other heavy metals or similar in the water then nothing is complaining.

The only time I have ever actually introduced a problem and killed anything was when I went after some bad red bacterial slime with ChemiClean a few years ago. It killed my two nice Sarcophytons stone dead.

So yes it is expensive to start and then to maintain...but there are a lot of cost saving choices available to be made.

 

[Servillius]

Drive a smaller car, live in a smaller house, eat nothing but Kraft mac and cheese, and send your kids to the local community college ..... a man's got to have his priorities after all!

You get to eat the cheese?!? Luxury!

 

[ca1ore]

You get to eat the cheese?!? Luxury!

Ooooh, I hate to be the one to break the news to you ..... it's not actually cheese .....

 

[catmonaco]

I’m coming back in after 12 years and the tank and other things was given to me, but free isn’t always free so to speak. So my answer to your question is “very carefully,”

 

[Zeal]

The start up cost is where it hurts but my upkeep cost is maybe... 30$ a month? Maybe less actually.

It does hurt spending a huge lumpsome of money all at once but it's just like anyother hobby. Also helps if you can DIY

 

[snowboard1]

No seriously, I’m getting back in after 8 years and I can actually hear the sudden disturbance in the force. I’m sure lots of opinions.
Well I sold it all and actually did quite well on all parts and livestock but now I’m starting at zero.
I don’t see many threads about cost except to say that “it’s expensive” .
How expensive? Some real numbers would be good. No judges here! We are all in this hobby together!
Why the interest? Like I said, starting again and just tryna feel better about this endeavor. Love to hear some positive feedback!!
Thanks so much

Craigslist for parts and selling coral to my lfs...

 

[Servillius]

Ooooh, I hate to be the one to break the news to you ..... it's not actually cheese .....

You get chemicals?!? Luxury!

 

[ca1ore]

There are ways to reduce the $$$, though as others have noted hobby inherently mean $$$. I've long been a keen DiY'er ..... stand, sump, ATS ..... saves a bit. I'd actually hate to even try to add up the cost of my system. Many of the components are years or even decades old, but I reckon if I had to buy it all new again I'd get very little change back from $20K; and that excludes the livestock which is another $10K easily. Yikes! Less than my sound system though.

 

[ca1ore]

You get chemicals?!? Luxury!

Very good .... cheese food .....

 

[tgp4274]

i built my tank from glass ordered from my work
same with my sump
bought the wood and built the stand and canopy
even with doing as much DIY as i can
between that and livestock of fish and corals
i think i could have bought my self a new full size truck by now.... lol

 

[Servillius]

I think to some degree there’s a factor that amounts to age and getting desensitized to the cost.

When I bought my first AI Lights when they first came out I bought them 1 at a time for $599 each and my wife did everything short of making me stand on street corners in a short skirt for the money.

Now I’m watching other people break down the cost of a tank and thinking $2000 for lighting? That’s cheap!

Not all of old age is wisdom.

 

[snowboard1]

Sorry to clarify, I have no idea $$ as it's been 12+ years and about 5 tanks later with all the upgraded stuff that goes along with moving to a bigger tank. I buy and sell gear on craigslist and occasionally from lfs/mailorder. I have a mixed sps tank with large predators so tons of water mainenance, etc...

 

[Ron83]

I personally refused to build a reef tank until I felt I could afford to automate it. The reasoning was that I kept Cichlids for a dozen years and know that I don't like water changes. So I wanted a large refugium to help with filtration. I don't have automated water changes but an Apex on my tanks with corals. It allows me to monitor and control many things even if I am not home. The down side is cost. If you are the type of person that will spend a little time every day working on the reef then you can certainly be successful spending less up front. I spend time working on tanks probably twice a week but watch them every day.

 

[Ron83]

And, my wife may view this so I would certainly not divulge a dollar amount that I have in this hobby. She has a 20 gallon in her office and she is just as into this as I am. Still, she has no idea how expensive this hobby is. It is easy to drop $10,000 into tank larger than 100 gallons. Shhhh.... Don't tell

 

[jack5746]

Unfortunately there's a big misconception that you have to buy all the really overpri.... I mean, expensive stuff to have success. I'm looking at you, ecotech.

Agree 100%. Refuse to spend even one penny on any of their brand.

 

[jack5746]

Well I’m in about $3500 and it’s only a 65gal main and 15 sump peninsula tank I’ve gotten all my corals little by little my spendings more and more cause there are so many beautiful corals and no end in sight thankfully everything is doing great good growth I love this hobby we have to chairs on either side and the wife and I just sit there ounce the kids are asleep and just gaze for a while and its serenity that’s is what I get from it and it a worth every penny.

Nice tank!