Charter your own boat? How?

[Vlady]

Dear Yachtsmen,

I'm planning to purchase a sailing boat (between 33' and 40') and as I cannot use her all year around and considering (maintenance, moorage, etc.) - would like to hand over her to some Charter Company (e.g. Sunsail?) for charter use for most of the year. I'm mostly interested in contractibility options and finance side (e.i. ROI).

Hopefully there is someone that did have similar experiences and would like to share with me.

Yours, in a way.

 

[JeremyF]

This subject crops up every couple of months on this forum. The concensus seems to be that its a great way for Sunsail to reduce its capital expenditure by half, but for the 'owner' its a bad deal due to the state of the boat at the end of the 'lease'

Have you done the sums properly? If you dont get any pleasure from the actual ownership, such as maintenance, and gentle pottering around on board, I believe its cheaper to charter as and when you want to sail

Jeremy Flynn

 

[Guest]

Don't forget that your boat has to be coded to Small Commercial Vessel standard - not a cheap thing itself if you don't buy the right equipment with the boat e.g. liferaft, fire extinguishers, fireproofed engine compartment etc don't come cheap.

 

[Vlady]

Cheer cornishman938,
for you advice. I'm indeed familiar with boat equipment prices, however I do believe that that is something for the Charter Company to take care of it. Furthermore, I do wonder does you yacht need to to be coded to Small Commercial Vessel standards even if you purchase her somewhere in Med?

 

[cgull]

I believe and actually do Own a small boat and charter big ones when you want them. A perfect solution in a less than perfect world

 

[Guest]

It doesn't matter where you purchase the yacht, but it does matter where you will operate her from. If you intend to charter her (either on your own or through a chartering agent) from a UK port she will need to be coded. The agent might well get her coded for you, but do take care as agents sometimes are agents for equipment suppliers, too, and might not get you the best deals on items such as liferafts and other expensive gear.

 

[webcraft]

Coding can be a reasonable option or outrageously expensive, depending on the boat. It certainly won't be any cheaper if a charter management company does it for you.

So - you need to think about the type of boat in relation to coding costs. For that, you probably need to know more about coding.

You can have a look through the coding requirements at

http://www.bluemoment.com/codeofpractice/index.html

- Nick



BlueMoment.Com
http://www.bluemoment.com

 

[Luke]

I have just gone through the experience of getting a similar size boat up to coding standard, finding a reputable charter management company and so on. Its early days yet (we have only been taking bookings for about 8 weeks) but so far I've paid my marina fees for the year, am on the way to covering other running costs (including those associated with it being a charter boat) and, touch wood, have no regrets to-date

Email me at luke.savage@db.com for more details.

Luke