The unattended boat in a slip
Your boat spends most of its life alone at the dock — city water on the hose, shore power on the pedestal, a bilge pump you're trusting to do its job. DockNeighbor keeps watch between visits: a few small sensors on the boat, a station at the marina or aboard, and the news on your phone wherever you are.
What can go wrong
Not scare stories — just the slow, boring failures that dock neighbors trade over coffee.
The dock hose lets go
City water is pressurized 24/7. A failed washdown fitting or a split supply hose can keep feeding water into the boat for days before anyone happens to walk the dock.
The bilge pump's silent partner fails
Bilge pumps run on the battery. A slow leak makes the pump cycle more, the cycling drains the bank, and eventually there's no pump at all. The failure you see started as one you couldn't.
The pedestal trips
A GFCI or breaker trip at the pedestal takes out your battery charger and the fridge. Nothing dramatic happens right away — which is exactly the problem.
The storm hits while you're inland
A front rolls through the marina on a weekend you're hours away, and all you have is the marina webcam and your imagination.
How DockNeighbor covers it
Each risk maps to something that ships today, with the plan it needs called out honestly.
Water in the bilge reaches you in seconds
A sealed float sensor in the bilge, or a pair of leak probes at the height you choose, reports to the station the moment water arrives. The alarm reaches your phone first, with the app closed — and if you haven't answered five minutes later, the dock neighbors you marked. The sensor runs for years on its battery and needs no Wi-Fi on the boat.
A hard limit on dock water
Put a LinkTap valve between the dock spigot and your boat. The station reads it over the boat's network like any partner device: a flood alarm closes it on its own, you can close it from the app, and every open carries a volume or duration limit — so even a hose that bursts on Friday night ends with a bounded amount of water, not city pressure running until someone notices.
Watch the battery your bilge pump depends on
A voltage sensor on the house bank — or the one-box unit that watches battery, bilge float and shore power together — shows voltage sag developing days before it matters, and alarms on a threshold or a fast drop. You see it from your desk instead of waiting for your next visit.
Know the moment the pedestal trips
A shore power sensor tells you when the pedestal drops and when it is back, so the charger outage lasts hours, not weeks. The plug-in version doubles as a switch you can turn on and off from the app.
Check the boat from your desk
Readings come through the station and the cloud, so the app shows the same boat whether you're aboard or three states away, with 2 years of history on Dockside. Weekender adds SMS and WhatsApp for the alerts that can't be missed — welcome on storm weekends — and room for partner devices like the valve.
The setup
Small battery-powered sensors, bought once. If your marina runs a DockNeighbor Station, they are the whole install.
Recommended hardware
- Battery, bilge and shore power in one box — one unit near the house bank, one device slot~$62
- Bilge float sensor — in the bilge itself~$60
- Water leak sensor — an alternative for a sump or under a sink~$26
- LinkTap valve on the dock spigot — a partner device, Weekender and up
Prices are approximate retail. They reach the station by long-range radio from anywhere on the boat, including the bilge.
No station within range? Bring your own aboard: the M2 ($99) on the boat's internet, or the M2-4G ($149) with your own SIM. Which one, and where to buy →
Recommended plan
Dockside — $20/yr per vehicle
Dockside covers up to 2 DockNeighbor sensors, and for a slip boat that is usually enough: the one-box unit on the bank plus a float in the bilge watches battery, bilge and shore power, with alerts on your phone and by email and 2 years of history. Step up to Weekender ($7/mo · $60/yr) for the valve and other partner devices, up to 15 devices, and SMS or WhatsApp alerts.
Every vehicle can try one month of Dockside free, started from the plan badge in the app's Settings › Vessel.