The Van Zandt Shipping Company is offering to compensate low-income teens' families if they agree to live on one of the company's new houseboats for a year. It seems like there are no strings attached, and cousins Faith Porter and Hope Lewry happily sign up, hoping it will help their families. But something is amiss when Faith and Hope board the Bering Sea Arks. It turns out, there may be hidden strings in this program, and the cousins are entangled right in the middle.