People sell docks at Lake of the Ozarks the way they sell boats: the structure can move, and the paperwork often cannot. Ameren’s permitting page states it directly. If a dock is sold and moved to a different property, a new permit is required before the dock is installed. The existing permit number stays with the property. It does not follow the dock down the lake.
This site does not list docks for sale and does not take a commission on a dock. The form asks a builder to look at a move, a used dock you already found, or a dock you want taken off a shoreline.
Before you buy someone else’s dock
- Ask whether it was built with encapsulated flotation. Drums and bare foam are not legal replacements, and old non-encapsulated foam is the debris Ameren has spent years getting out of the lake. The flotation rules are the checklist.
- Ask for the width, the wells, and the roof. A dock that fit the seller’s cove may be too long for yours. Cove and channel limits are in the size guide.
- Assume you need a new permit at the destination, drawings included, at the $550 new-or-modification fee, before anyone ties it to your seawall.
- If you are buying the house and the dock, you usually are not relocating anything. You are transferring the permit into the new owner’s name. That is a different form, a $100 transfer fee, and, in the fire districts Ameren names, an electrical inspection approved within the previous 12 months.
Moving your own dock
A move to another spot in front of the same parcel can still be a modification, because Ameren permits a location, not a vague “somewhere on my shoreline.” Docks have to sit inside the side property lines extended into the lake, with the residential setbacks in Appendix B. A move to a different parcel is a new permit at the new parcel and leaves the old permit number behind.
Tell the builder the origin and the destination. “Take it to our new house” is not a location. Use addresses, coves, and mile markers.
What the form should say
Choose “move a dock or buy a used dock.” In the notes, say whether you already have a dock picked out or you want the builder to move the one you own. Include ages and materials if you know them. Photos of both shorelines matter more than a brochure photo of the dock on a trailer.
Work is still limited to a certified dock builder or the owner. Buying a used dock from a private seller does not make the seller the person who may install it on your shoreline, unless that seller is the owner doing their own dock or a builder on Ameren’s current list.