The History of the Houseboat
Also an explanation of the new visiting rules from the City of Amsterdam.
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Mondriaan Houseboat 1988
Beautiful days & having the best time.
My father-in-law Willem Adolf Boonacker bought the boat in 1988 for his son Emiel. It was a great place to stay for a student in the city center of Amsterdam.
At that time, the boat was still painted in Mondriaan colours, making it easy to recognize. In those days a lot of students and artists were living on boats .
The main opinion in 1988 was that boats were too cold and damp in the winter and too hot in the summer.
How wrong could they be? A boat is freedom!
Pantheos Houseboat
1996
The year that I bought the boat from my father in law. Best buy ever !!
Me and my girlfriend were living in an apartment on the Surinameplein in Amsterdam and for a good hide away on the weekends we had now an extra home in the City.
We converted the houseboat with all mod-cons like central heating, dishwasher and also a Daikin airconditioning. The outside was still painted Navy blue and during the years changed into Bentheim white.
That is also the colour now and in 2026 we have changed the name of the houseboat from Pantheos Houseboat to the Martini Houseboat Amsterdam.
Martini Houseboat 2026 Home Sweet Home
You’re in your own romantic movie…so many pinch yourself moments.
From the houseboat you are at few minutes walk from Anne Frank's house and Westerchurch. You are surrounded by nice restaurants, galeries and boutiques. On the corner is a supermarket that is opened 7 days a week. Inside the houseboat you find a bright, tastefully furnished living with windows all around overlooking the canal, a fully equiped modern open plan kitchen, a washing machine, a separate bedroom with a comfortable double bed, a bathroom and toilet. The extra luxury is your private terrace overlooking the water. After a day exploring the city, you can sit outside, relax and enjoy the ducks swimming towards you to say hello. Come and stay on this fantastic location: historical, central and yet quiet and safe, and enjoy the feeling of living like an Amsterdam local in your private houseboat
The New City of Amsterdam Rules 2026/2027
Very strict rules of the City to limited the amount of visitors to stay in Amsterdam.
Holiday rentals on the Prinsengracht in Amsterdam are strictly limited to protect livability, tackle illegal hotels, and address the housing crisis. The historic canal belt attracts millions of tourists, which puts enormous pressure on the immediate surroundings.
Anyone who wants to occasionally rent out a house or houseboat on the Prinsengracht to tourists through platforms like Airbnb, Booking.com or VBRO must comply with the official regulations of the Municipality of Amsterdam.
The Prinsengracht is located in Amsterdam’s city center, an area facing extreme tourist pressure. The municipality uses an escalation ladder to intervene in neighborhoods where livability is at risk. The reduction from 30 to 15 nights in the canal belt was introduced for three main reasons:
1. • Reduce nuisance and rubbish.
2. • Protect the housing market: Homes are meant to live in, not to serve as a permanent income source. By strictly limiting holiday rentals, it prevents regular rental homes from disappearing to the lucrative tourist market.
3. • Preserving social cohesion: If too many properties on the Prinsengracht are continuously rented to tourists, the neighborhood feeling disappears. Local neighbors make way for a constant stream of anonymous passersby.
The municipality of the City of Amsterdam actively checks for illegal rentals.
Breaking the rules, like advertising without a registration number or exceeding the allowed nights, can lead to fines of up to thousands of euros.