My name is Leo and I'm VERY new to sailing, but my wife and I will be spending next year learning a lot on a coworker's J24 on Lake Tahoe, with an eye to shopping for our own boat next fall.

The idea of the security and ease for single handed sailing is a strong attraction for me to the junk rig, (my wife will help, but is likely not physically up to romping about on a sailboat, stem to stern) as well as an inherent need in my constitution to do differently whatever everyone else is doing (I admit it).  Reading PJR, surveying lightly the conversations with people here, I have to admit though, that I'm concerned that the costs and construction in converting an existing boat (at our age and income level) is going to be prohibitive.  Unless someone here knows a Tahoe/Northern Nevada boating shop who's into such things(!)  I have no intentions of tackling a mast repositioning on an existing sailboat myself, which leaves me the impression this challenge would be impractical for our time and budget.

We're likely shopping around for trailer/sailers, in the 20' range as there are more than enough bodies of water around us to keep a pair of novice sailors busy on weekends, long or short, and our interest in boat ownership is merely floating around from A to B safely and boring as we can.  For now, certainly.

I see that many of the sailors here are in the UK and Europe, what sort of experiences do those of you here in the States have with getting a commercial sailboat reconfigured to accept a junk sailplan?

Thank you for the replies, I hope I don't come across as a "downer" in my message.