Buying a small yacht

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GrantD

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Hi all,

So, retirement approaches and the classic dream of sailing round the world rears its seaweed bewigged head.

No naive fools, we have a 5 year plan.

Step 1 was Competent Crew. Done
Step 3 is Day Skipper. Booked for next April.

Step 2 is to buy a small trial boat, anything from a 22ft Pandora for 1k to a Centaur for 5k or anything reasonable that looks like value. Then play on it in advance of the Day Skipper course. And Read voraciously.

Then play on it for another year before buying a 33 to 34ft Moody as our liveaboard and heading off to...

My question is about boat prices.

The one boat I have booked to view was online at 2.5k the buyer basically admitted on the phone he would settle for half that.

I have heard people on forums say the most they have ever paid for a boat was 72% of the asking price.

Now OF COURSE "it depends" I get that and condition seems all. .... But

But as a rough guide, is the general approach to overprice then take 2/3 or 1/2 or 10% less?

Housing market, mid 1980s, Sheffield, you always offered 20% less, it was expected.
South East 20teens, always got bid up, expected.

I have heard its a buyers market. Do sellers know that yet? Are online prices on Apollo Duck and elsewhere realistic?

Any advice on current boat buying culture appreciated.

I dont mind £100 here or there but I dont want to be the mug who pays the asking price when everyone (but me) knows the real price is advertisedprice - x

Cheers
.grant
 
At this end of the market boats are worth very little. Many are worth nothing at all. Some are worth even less than that. The cost of keeping and running the boat are far more important and should be uppermost in your calculations. Mooring fees and insurance might cost £2000 per annum+ and very basic maintenance another £500- £1000. So your Centaur can cost almost its value every year just to keep it parked and running.
An anecdote---
I know of a boat which has gone for scrap. Five years ago it was a tidy little example well painted with an elderly owner who passed it on due to his age. Family not really interested so up for sale it went with a broker---£12000 IIRC No takers.
Boat remained unsold and kept in a marina unmaintained for several years with renewd efforts to shift it every year just before annual berthing fees due. Still overpriced and no takers. They must have spent £10000 on mooring fees and insurance over the years and probably more. They should have sold it for £2500 in the first place and someone would have a nice boat and they wouldnt have lost money.
 
I normally look at all the other boats for sale online of a similar spec/condition to get an idea of asking prices, just to get a ballpark, but in this category of boat it will hang 100% on condition and the prices will vary wildly.

It simply isn't possible to set a blanket rule on prices for boats in this price range - the reason being the difference between 50% and 75% of a 2K boat is 500 quid, and a seller may be willing to let it go as this is in the ballpark of his ongoing costs just to keep the boat (storage costs, mooring or marina fees, insurance, time etc..)

The difference between 50% and 75% of a 40K boat is 10K ... and you would be hard pushed to get a seller to give up 10K - that's not to say it doesn't happen, but the sums of money in absolute terms are much higher when expressed as percentages.

I would say, set yourself a budget and find the best condition boat you can for your budget, and get something that will also be easy to sell again.
 
Thanks BW

We've kind of assumed any boat at this level will be hard to sell unless we find a clean Centaur for 3k ?
 
Biggles Wader said:
At this end of the market boats are worth very little. Many are worth nothing at all. Some are worth even less than that. The cost of keeping and running the boat are far more important and should be uppermost in your calculations. Mooring fees and insurance might cost £2000 per annum+ and very basic maintenance another £500- £1000. So your Centaur can cost almost its value every year just to keep it parked and running.
An anecdote---
I know of a boat which has gone for scrap. Five years ago it was a tidy little example well painted with an elderly owner who passed it on due to his age. Family not really interested so up for sale it went with a broker---£12000 IIRC No takers.
Boat remained unsold and kept in a marina unmaintained for several years with renewd efforts to shift it every year just before annual berthing fees due. Still overpriced and no takers. They must have spent £10000 on mooring fees and insurance over the years and probably more. They should have sold it for £2500 in the first place and someone would have a nice boat and they wouldnt have lost money.
Click to expand...

Thanks, useful advice

We're trying for a bilge keel as we take your point about mooring fees. We think we can moor a 7 to 9m in Rye for about 1k which is fine. Theres a mud mooring in Chichester for 700pa

But you confirm what I thought, some boats are overpriced.

Sounds like the less spent the better on the trial boat

Grant.
 
I'd say that the starting point at this level is that the boat is worth the value of the engine. You buy the engine and get the rest for free. That means if the inboard is dead, it's worth nothing (because the replacement costs £x,000s). You'll find otherwise sound Centaurs right down to £1,500 (2020) with no engines in them. 22'-ers you can even pick up for nothing, a token payment, again if the inboard is gone, eg up to the Cirrus generation of Westerlys. Not much different for outboard models either.

The sad truth is, people attracted to small boat very rarely have the money or interest to do all the maintenance and replacements that are necessary, and are not really that much cheaper than on a big boat. Consequently, most of them are in a very tired state and, hence, an invitation to spend as much as could buy a decent 25' to even 30'-er.

I saw a beautiful C&N 32 go for £5,500 that you could have sailed to the Med in tomorrow. A very well kitted out, ready to sail MacWester 26 for £2,000 because the owner had already bought their next boat. Neither were advertised.

The very rare small boat that has been maintained is worth paying over the market average for. What you're buying is the time and pleasure it will give you now, not after you've had to spend £x,000s and months doing up. Especially this time of year.

I quite like the Pandoras but nice Hurley 22s, Achilles 24s - both of which have the beginners' advantage of an inboard outboard engine in a well (avantage as in cheaper but perfectly sufficient) - are going sub £1,000, and are good boats. The Cirrus will give you more headroom. More space inside too, I think. Worth doing weekends going around clubs and yards and asking owners (rather than brokers) who is motivated to sell. But I'd pay over £2,000 for one that's sorted, rather than a tired Centaur.

Once you're confident, there are places abroad that you'll buy better boats than are generally available in the UK for much less.
 
Agree with others, no such thing as a set amount - across the market, the key is standard of the boat.

Don't be tempted by lots of flash toys, keep the first boat smallish, basically but soundly equipped and well maintained and people will want to buy so expect to pay for it. If you donlt want it, someone will.

Donlt buy something that needs a lot of work as you won't get the money back at all and if you get to the stage of having to replace blown sails, mouldy interior upholstery and foul running rigging then you may have spent more on upgrades than on the boat. Might be worth it on £50k boat, Not so much on a £5k boat!
 
Good point. Toys go out of date quickly and leave lots of nasty holes and brackets to be fixed up. I'd be looking for a really nice stock one. Watch out for such equipment, electrical we're talking about, that is already obsolete and unsupported.
 
convey said:
I'd say that the starting point at this level is that the boat is worth the value of the engine. You buy the engine and get the rest for free. That means if the inboard is dead, it's worth nothing (because the replacement costs £x,000s). You'll find otherwise sound Centaurs right down to £1,500 (2020) with no engines in them. 22'-ers you can even pick up for nothing, a token payment, again if the inboard is gone, eg up to the Cirrus generation of Westerlys. Not much different for outboard models either.

The sad truth is, people attracted to small boat very rarely have the money or interest to do all the maintenance and replacements that are necessary, and are not really that much cheaper than on a big boat. Consequently, most of them are in a very tired state and, hence, an invitation to spend as much as could buy a decent 25' to even 30'-er.

I saw a beautiful C&N 32 go for £5,500 that you could have sailed to the Med in tomorrow. A very well kitted out, ready to sail MacWester 26 for £2,000 because the owner had already bought their next boat. Neither were advertised.

The very rare small boat that has been maintained is worth paying over the market average for. What you're buying is the time and pleasure it will give you now, not after you've had to spend £x,000s and months doing up. Especially this time of year.

I quite like the Pandoras but nice Hurley 22s, Achilles 24s - both of which have the beginners' advantage of an inboard outboard engine in a well (avantage as in cheaper but perfectly sufficient) - are going sub £1,000, and are good boats. The Cirrus will give you more headroom. More space inside too, I think. Worth doing weekends going around clubs and yards and asking owners (rather than brokers) who is motivated to sell. But I'd pay over £2,000 for one that's sorted, rather than a tired Centaur.

Once you're confident, there are places abroad that you'll buy better boats than are generally available in the UK for much less.
Click to expand...
I looked at an Achilles 24 Bilge Keel as I sailed one when they were new. The one I looked at had an inboard diesel which they could not get going, parts are unobtainable so I started to look for one with an outboard. The trouble was that the Virus arrived and living in the N of England all the ones which were of interest were 300 miles away.
Anyway ended up with a year 2000 24ft Trailer sailer with a trailer for less money than a year 2000 Drascombe Luggers are going for.
 
One thing I'd add here, I bought a 30ft boat as our first. Nearly five years later I'm still improving, upgrading, fettling etc. If you have a plan for a bigger boat, and you can afford it now, maybe consider going straight for it? Then you can spend time now learning about the boat and how to sail her, and slowly upgrading etc. Otherwise you'll lose money on the one you buy in the mean time.
Just a thought.
 
Definitely get something that's been well maintained otherwise you will spend your time working on it instead of sailing and growing your experience.
 
Perhaps I'm just incredibly unlucky but I've struggled to get much off the asking price of boats. I even had one seller tell me that he had underpriced his boat and was going to readvertise about 20% higher. Totally delusional.

When we were last in the market, we made offers on two boats- one at 87%, one at 92%, both offering immediate transfer of ownership, which we thought was attractive because they were both in expensive marinas with the next season's bill fast approaching. Each time, the offer was rejected, and the boats stayed on the market.
 
Some people seem to have an exaggerated opinion of the value of their boat, so they are either lucky and someone with more money than sense comes along and agrees to buy at the inflated price, or more often, the boat sits there slowly deteriorating and losing even more value.
If you keep looking you will find the realistic owner who has a good reason for selling (agreed to buy another boat and doesn't want two boats) and will price their boatv at a sensible level for a rapid sale.
 
You will have such hassle selling whatever you buy that I would go straight for the type you want. And I would suggest you go to the parts of the world you most want to sail to and chat to some live aboards (they are grumpy/social/lonely/happy types like everywhere else but are always up for a chat about their boat).

See what works there and try to buy that. For us it’s lots of opening ports, a walkthrough stern (because that is your front door to quay and dinghy) and a large aft cockpit with a proper table for 4-6 as that is where you will be living 90 percent of the time). And I wouldnt touch a UK make for warm sailing because they are brilliantly designed for cold weather.

But each to their own. I gave away my 24 footer 8 years after I’d bought my warm water boat after countless attempts to sell it, hundreds of hours keeping it smart and decent and about 16k on mooring and 5k on a new engine. It took the 5k spend to enable me to give it away.
 
convey said:
I'd say that the starting point at this level is that the boat is worth the value of the engine. You buy the engine and get the rest for free. That means if the inboard is dead, it's worth nothing (because the replacement costs £x,000s). You'll find otherwise sound Centaurs right down to £1,500 (2020) with no engines in them. 22'-ers you can even pick up for nothing, a token payment, again if the inboard is gone, eg up to the Cirrus generation of Westerlys. Not much different for outboard models either.
Click to expand...
Yes, I was very impressed with Dylan Winter's acumen, buying a Centaur with a nearly new engine for less than the price of a new engine itself.

The sheer numbers of Centaurs on the market may have facilitated this opportunity - it's easier to haggle when you can point to so many other similar vessels on the market.

Since OP is in the solent area I suggest he visits Tudor and Hardway sailing clubs and see what's listed for sale on their noticeboards. There were three nice boats on the Hardway noticeboard last summer. A nonmember will probably be welcome at either on a weekend afternoon.

www.phoenixyachtclub.co.uk is good for getting a bit of experience and cheap Day / Coastal Skipper.
 
Personally, I think it's both sad and great that old small boats are so cheap.

Sad that it shows that young people today are not as interested in sailing as previous generations, especially in mouldy old boats. It also shows that so many were produced in the 70s and 80s and of course unlike wooden boats don't just disappear.

Great that it means that there are some fantastic boats available at half the price they would have been ten years ago. I've recently bought an MGC 27 in great condition that was such good value in terms of what fun you get for your money.

I think a good centaur is a good boat and the price difference between a good one and a mouldy old one means I would get the best you can afford. Newish engine. Newish rigging, newish electronics. It would cost a lot to upgrade a cheaper boat.

I would also look at Hunter duette 23 and horizon 26/27 bilge Keeler's as they are better sailers than the centaur.
 
convey said:
I'd say that the starting point at this level is that the boat is worth the value of the engine. You buy the engine and get the rest for free. That means if the inboard is dead, it's worth nothing (because the replacement costs £x,000s). You'll find otherwise sound Centaurs right down to £1,500 (2020) with no engines in them. 22'-ers you can even pick up for nothing, a token payment, again if the inboard is gone, eg up to the Cirrus generation of Westerlys. Not much different for outboard models either.

The sad truth is, people attracted to small boat very rarely have the money or interest to do all the maintenance and replacements that are necessary, and are not really that much cheaper than on a big boat. Consequently, most of them are in a very tired state and, hence, an invitation to spend as much as could buy a decent 25' to even 30'-er.

I saw a beautiful C&N 32 go for £5,500 that you could have sailed to the Med in tomorrow. A very well kitted out, ready to sail MacWester 26 for £2,000 because the owner had already bought their next boat. Neither were advertised.

The very rare small boat that has been maintained is worth paying over the market average for. What you're buying is the time and pleasure it will give you now, not after you've had to spend £x,000s and months doing up. Especially this time of year.

I quite like the Pandoras but nice Hurley 22s, Achilles 24s - both of which have the beginners' advantage of an inboard outboard engine in a well (avantage as in cheaper but perfectly sufficient) - are going sub £1,000, and are good boats. The Cirrus will give you more headroom. More space inside too, I think. Worth doing weekends going around clubs and yards and asking owners (rather than brokers) who is motivated to sell. But I'd pay over £2,000 for one that's sorted, rather than a tired Centaur.

Once you're confident, there are places abroad that you'll buy better boats than are generally available in the UK for much less.
Click to expand...

Convey

Thankyou you so much for the detailed reply

Great insights, just what I was hoping for

What do people think of this?

Slightly over budget but....

Leisure 27 for sale UK, Leisure boats for sale, Leisure used boat sales, Leisure Sailing Yachts For Sale Leisure 27 1979 - Apollo Duck
 
moondancer2 said:
Personally, I think it's both sad and great that old small boats are so cheap.

Sad that it shows that young people today are not as interested in sailing as previous generations, especially in mouldy old boats. It also shows that so many were produced in the 70s and 80s and of course unlike wooden boats don't just disappear.

Great that it means that there are some fantastic boats available at half the price they would have been ten years ago. I've recently bought an MGC 27 in great condition that was such good value in terms of what fun you get for your money.

I think a good centaur is a good boat and the price difference between a good one and a mouldy old one means I would get the best you can afford. Newish engine. Newish rigging, newish electronics. It would cost a lot to upgrade a cheaper boat.

I would also look at Hunter duette 23 and horizon 26/27 bilge Keeler's as they are better sailers than the centaur.
Click to expand...
Thanks Moondancer

Yes, one firm of naivety is thinking you will enjoy the renovations ?

Grant
 
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