Cruise Lines With Ships You Can Buy a Cabin and Live On

While living on a cruise ship might be a dream for many, there are actually several cruise lines that offer cabins you can buy and use as a permanent residence.

Yes, you can actually live on any cruise ship that you want, but it would require booking a cruise on every single voyage on that ship. You also would not be able to decorate the cabin as you would not own it.

A better solution? Buy a cabin on one of the following cruise lines and explore the world from the comfort of your home.

There are two cruise lines currently in service that offer residential living with one more (Crescent Seas) launching in 2026 and another could launch a few years after.

Current Cruise Lines

The World

The world’s largest private residential yacht that offers residences you can buy and live in full time. There are 165 residences laid out on the 12 decks on the ship. The ship has 106 two- and three-bedroom apartments, 19 one- and two-bedroom studio apartments, and 40 studios.

The cruise ship was launched in 2002 and at 644 feet long, the ship’s website actually refers to itself as the largest private yacht in the world and the “most exclusive floating city on the planet”. The residents vote on the ports and itinerary that the ship will visit in the upcoming season.

Many of the apartments aboard the ship have been designed by the cruise ship residents, but they are not cheap. To enjoy this mobile and adventurous lifestyle, it will cost you between $2-15 million.

But for a view that is always changing from one spectacular sight to another, and to be able to enjoy stress-free traveling to exotic locations, the families aboard the World have decided that the price is well worth it.

Villa Vie Residences

Villa Vie Residences launched in 2024 and currently has one ship that does continual 3 1/2 year world cruises. They offer not only full ownership of cabins, but also seasonal options and rentals.

Prices for seasonal ownership start at $24,999 with full ownership at $129,999 per cabin.

Their ship Odyssey is scheduled to visit 147 countries and 425 destinations during the first 3.5 year cruise.

The cruise line recently announced plans to add a second ship to their fleet. It will be part of a new luxury division from Villa Vie.

You can visit their website at www.villavieresidences.com.

Proposed Future Cruise Lines

Crescent Seas

Crescent Seas is the newest residential cruise line that was announced earlier this year. They were originally planning to have one ship enter service in 2026 with a second vessel being added in late 2027.

They were going to buy Seven Seas Navigator from Regent Seven Seas Cruises and Insignia from Oceania Cruises.

Last month, the cruise line decided to go in a new direction with newbuilds instead of buying older ships and updating them. They are currently looking at debuting their first ship, Ocean, in late 2031. It will be approximately 55,000 gross tons in size.

Prices will start near $3.5 million and go up to $30 million per suite.

The cruise line has the following listed on their website:

“We are creating a residence like no other – where your address is anywhere you want it to be. With Crescent Seas, you can travel the world while always feeling at home.”

You can visit their website at www.crescentseas.com.

Storylines

Storylines has been promising to launch a residential cruise ship since early 2018. They originally had plans to convert an older cruise ship to residential living with condos starting at $155,000 each.

After plans failed to buy an older ship and convert it, they launched plans to build a completely new cruise ship (that can be seen above) that has 530 private residences.

Prices now start at $625,000 and go up to $10 million with 12 different options available.

However, the question remains, will the ship ever be built? It’s been over five years since the new ship was announced and the first piece of steel has yet to be cut on the ship.

The cruise line did release a press release in February 2025 saying that they are now in Phase 2, the Basic Design of the ship. Phase 1 was the Initial Design.

They also stated that they renewed the ship-building contract with the shipyard (Brodosplit). They also no longer have a launch date on their website, at least that I could find. The last expected sail date that they included in a press release was in 2023 when they said it the ship would launch in 2026, which would now be impossible.

Their phone number was recently disconnected and they now have this message on their website:

“We apologize for any inconvenience caused by our recent phone provider issue. The matter is being resolved, and service will return to normal shortly.”

You can visit Storylines.com for more information on them.

There have been a few other cruise lines that have floated the idea of selling cabins that you can live in full time.

Back in 2015, Crystal Cruises was planning on having 48 unique homes on the top decks of three new cruise ships that you could buy and live in. They later scrapped the idea.

Blue World Voyages is a cruise line that never got off the ground. It was going to be the first cruise line geared towards sports and wellness and have some cabins (Residences) you could buy and live in. While their website is still up, they haven’t posted any updates in a few years.