Fender Kickers, yacht sales experiences, get it off your chest here...

sigma38dave

sigma38dave

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While prepping the boat for sale today I was approached by a club member who wanted to know whether I was intending to use our local broker or try to sell it myself, to which I replied I was.

He warned me of his experiences selling a very tidy Westerly Fulmar, I believe these hopefuls came via Facebook Yachts and Yachty Bits for sale...

1) Someone wants to view on New Years Day, he rearranges his day to make it work, arrives early and preps boat ready. Buyer turns up and says he's not really in the market for a boat but didn't have anything to do today so thought it would be fun to look at a boat and kill a bit of time.

2) Guy arrives from Wales on the train and says he'll have it and wants to sail it home. My man can't believe his luck. Buyer wants a warranty similar to purchase of a new car or the deals off.

3) Another viewing...'Where's the other engine?'. Buyer is surprised it's not the popular twin engined Fulmar and is just the basic single engine model.

At this point my man gives up and contacts the local broker.

Please share your experiences so I can mentally prepare for battle.

Thanks!
 
I sold my last motorboat almost without engaging the services of a broker.

Advertising it on three different websites brought responses when the advert was freshly posted but dropped off after a week. Several replies were easily spotted as scammers or chancers offering a tiny fraction of the asking price or above the asking price if I could just forward the difference to the courier.

One lad claimed to be working away on oil rigs so couldn’t visit in person, another was in Norway and wanted advice on where to buy a trailer locally and for more photo’s. I wasn’t even sure he knew which country the boat was in but he was insistent on the idea of towing it home by buying a brand new trailer and hiring a towing vehicle.

I didn’t rule out any of them but was cautious about them all. The Norwegian lad asked for my bank details which I weighed up before sharing them with him.

Before I knew it he paid a deposit into my account for the boat unseen which rang more alarm bells. At that point I brought in our friendly broker so any other payment went into his client account to at least give the potential buyer some security.

A week later the Norwegian turned up at the marina having transferred the balance directly to my account bypassing the security of the broker.

Funds cleared, the broker completed the sales documents and confirmed all other paperwork was present and in order. We had lunch with the buyer, an affable football coach who decided to fill the boat with cans of beer and have it transported to Norway. He wanted the boat to get to his summerhouse on a small island and had been impressed by the same make of boat his friend has.

While we were finalising details a local buyer who knew the boat rang offering to buy it there and then and was keen to have second choice if the first deal fell through. At the same time oil-rig man emailed to say he was now back onshore and wanted to arrange a visit.
 
Baddox said:
I sold my last motorboat almost without engaging the services of a broker.

Advertising it on three different websites brought responses when the advert was freshly posted but dropped off after a week. Several replies were easily spotted as scammers or chancers offering a tiny fraction of the asking price or above the asking price if I could just forward the difference to the courier.

One lad claimed to be working away on oil rigs so couldn’t visit in person, another was in Norway and wanted advice on where to buy a trailer locally and for more photo’s. I wasn’t even sure he knew which country the boat was in but he was insistent on the idea of towing it home by buying a brand new trailer and hiring a towing vehicle.

I didn’t rule out any of them but was cautious about them all. The Norwegian lad asked for my bank details which I weighed up before sharing them with him.

Before I knew it he paid a deposit into my account for the boat unseen which rang more alarm bells. At that point I brought in our friendly broker so any other payment went into his client account to at least give the potential buyer some security.

A week later the Norwegian turned up at the marina having transferred the balance directly to my account bypassing the security of the broker.

Funds cleared, the broker completed the sales documents and confirmed all other paperwork was present and in order. We had lunch with the buyer, an affable football coach who decided to fill the boat with cans of beer and have it transported to Norway. He wanted the boat to get to his summerhouse on a small island and had been impressed by the same make of boat his friend has.

While we were finalising details a local buyer who knew the boat rang offering to buy it there and then and was keen to have second choice if the first deal fell through. At the same time oil-rig man emailed to say he was now back onshore and wanted to arrange a visit.
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I think this goes to show you can’t write any leads off, no matter how suspicious they first appear!
 
I pondered long and hard about the relative merits of brokers and do-it-yourself when I put my boat up for sale early this year. In the end I went with a broker, the first of which didn't appear to have much of a clue other than wanting listings and faded quickly out of the picture. The second, recommended on here, was absolutely worth the money and worked hard to usher the sale through despite lengthy geographical issues - the broker, me, the buyer and the boat all a long way apart.
I can't praise Yachtsnet in Falmouth enough for managing the sale from start to finish, wherever your boat is based
 
I have mine for sale at the moment through a broker although I have also had a couple of enquiries through friend of a friend. Only one viewing who made a silly offer. Currently have some communication from a chap in Scotland who sounds keen but going to be offshore abroad for three weeks before he is able to come view.
 
SimonX said:
Currently have some communication from a chap in Scotland who sounds keen but going to be offshore abroad for three weeks before he is able to come view.
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Ah, the 'offshore for a few weeks' buyer... a familiar face in the second hand boat world!

Hope it goes well.
 
Advertised my first boat, a tidy little 16'3" centre-board trailer-sailer, on Boats and Outboards or similar years ago. German chap rang, said he wanted it, offered asking price, and that needed to collect it in the next couple of days while he was still in UK. I was somewhat sceptical, but he turned up as arranged. Offered me a German cheque, which he seemed surprised I didn't feel confident accepting. Was evening, and banks closed, so he drove 20 mile round trip to the local airport to get some British cash, paid in full, hitched up the trailer and set off for northern Germany there and then!

Second boat, a Hurley 22, I sold through a brokerage in Plymouth. I lived a long way distant and had a very full-time job, so accompanying viewings myself wouldn't have been practical. Part of the deal was they would lift it ashore into their sales/display yard. I sailed the boat to their premises, and was standing there watching as the boat being lifted by crane out of the water and over the quay next to me. Suddenly the forward strop under the boat shot forward, the bow plummetted, and I ducked and ran like hell. I'd escaped death or serious injury, but the mighty crash and then splash behind me I anticipated didn't happen, and when I looked back the strop had somehow caught on the small bow fitting, saving the day and my boat, which still hung there facing downward at a crazy angle. When visiting the boat a week or two later, I was surprised to see they'd polished it, successfully removing the staining around the waterline on the white hull that I'd been unable to get out by hand with yacht rubbing and some proprietary oxalic acid gunge. This polishing hadn't been offered or mentioned, and (to my relief) I wasn't charged extra for it. The boat sold quite quickly for something akin to the asking price, so apart from the cranage scare a very satisfactory process.

Third boat was another very tidy little 17' 3" bilge keel trailer sailer, which again I think I advertised on Boats and Outboards, and I can't remember anything about the sale, so must have gone pretty smoothly.

More recently I sold the 23' long-keeler I'd had for many years and had cruised very widely around southern Britain and northern France. It had become scruffy on the outside - varnish gone and dark coloured GRP hull needed a serious polish - but the inside had a gorgeous custom 'traditional' style hardwood fit-out, and the boat was very well equipped for cruising, including a great Beta 14. I advertised it on ApolloDuck, and had several seemingly serious enquiries from people in Eastern Europe who planned to sail it back there, though none came to anything, and a lot of UK based chancers. It was quite alienating to have a lot of queries from (young?) people who not only knew nothing about boats (and variously thought they were going to sail it round the world or live on it), but were incapable of writing basic English, and seemingly unacquainted with the basic niceties of polite social interaction. It did eventually sell to an older British buyer, but it was a long convoluted and stressful saga, still too painful to recount.
 
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dunedin said:
Except that it applies to a lot of people in the (shrinking) oil industry, but many of them are boat enthusiasts, have the funds to buy and the time to use a boat when on leave.
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Yup, and I've verified on LinkedIn that he is a genuine oily worker with Totalenergies. Be good it it happens but Im not holding out forit, the broker said its unlikely it will sell until the spring
 
LittleSister said:
It was quite alienating to have a lot of queries from (young?) people who not only knew nothing about boats (and variously thought they were going to sail it round the world or live on it), but were incapable of writing basic English, and seemingly unacquainted with the basic niceties of polite social interaction. It did eventually sell to an older British buyer, but it was a long convoluted and stressful saga, still too painful to recount.
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It was all going so well with the 3 previous sales!
 
Sold my boat yesterday. I listed it for free on a French app called “Le bon Coin” - a sort of French exchange and mart or Craig’s list.

The boat went to the second buyer, who came to look at it. The first interested party had previously owned a 30 footer, which he had sold following a head injury. He certainly had the money and good intentions, but the test sail made him realize that my boat would be a bit too much for him to handle, so no harm done.

The next buyer came to view the boat that same afternoon. He had a Wauquiez 42 DS, with a sale agreed pending survey. He quickly made an offer close to the asking price which I accepted, agreeing to hold on until a satisfactory survey on his own boat had been done.

In all I had about six inquiries that I deemed serious. All but two had boats that they needed to sell, hardly surprising at this level of the market. The other buyer who did not have a boat to sell was an old guy, who found a similar boat with in-mast reefing, and did not need most of the fancy options with which my boat was loaded, so he went with that one.

Had Benbow’s new owner not come through, I’m pretty confident that she would’ve gone in the spring to one of the other buyers who had a boat to sell.

The whole thing was very painless, I saved myself about eight grand in brokerage fees.

It is so important when first talking to a prospective buyer to identify if they are a serious buyer who is in a position to deal. This is one of the things I learned from JT, the sales manager at Contessa yachts when I worked there as a student. Has the punter got a boat now? How much cash are they looking to spend ? When do they want to unload it ? The right triage at the outset saves a lot of time and effort. It isn’t worth wasting your time on the curious and the dreamers.

Bye bye Benbow 🥲

IMG_5984.jpeg
 
SimonX said:
Yup, and I've verified on LinkedIn that he is a genuine oily worker with Totalenergies. Be good it it happens but Im not holding out forit, the broker said its unlikely it will sell until the spring
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Not always the case, our last boat sold in December within a week or so of the advert appearing. Turned out to be the only Moody 346 twin keeler on the market at that time.
 
Graham376 said:
Not always the case, our last boat sold in December within a week or so of the advert appearing. Turned out to be the only Moody 346 twin keeler on the market at that time.
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There’s another the same as ours (but not so nice although I say so myself!) that has been up for a few months. I guess it depends on the individual's circumstances. This guy sold his old boat (a smaller MB with a single OB) and is probbaly looking to get an off-season bargain. I'm prepared to give way a little but not desperate. If need be we will do our planned trip to Normandy in this boat and sell/buy later. Also have to see how investments do - the good lady has set her heart on a Broom 42CL like we saw in Amsterdam but they are selling £50-70k over what we had originally budgeted
 
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boomerangben said:
I’ve enquired about two boats, one on with broker, one for a private sale. No replies to my emails. I suppose they need to hear a voice to know I’m serious
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Odd, Ive replied to several Mails myself and always had replies from any Broker I've contacted about boats I'm interested in
 
boomerangben said:
I’ve enquired about two boats, one on with broker, one for a private sale. No replies to my emails. I suppose they need to hear a voice to know I’m serious
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I’d say email is best for first contact so that is strange.

Potentially they’ve got sales going through and advert hasn’t been updated?

Edit to add I’ve just had my first enquiry via email after 2 days online, it was a sensible message, ‘When are you available for me to view please?’ and his phone number. I spent less than 2 minutes replying, it’s not exactly onerous to be courteous with this.

Although if he offered 50% of the asking price without viewing I might have just ignored it.
 
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My boat was 650km away in the Adriatic, so a broker was the only option. A 1300km round trip for a fender kicker was out of the question.

It sold very quickly, within 2 weeks in November, had a bit of a problem with the authorities in Croatia and Slovenia (the nationality of the new owner) ... both claimed that because it was UK flagged it must pay VAT. Broker sorted it out as it was in Croatia when they acceded to the EU, and had the Croatian paperwork to show Croatian VAT (zero rated) - this seemed to make no difference to the customs authorities. Broker sorted out a T2L and all was good. Bought my next boat with the same broker. If you find a good one then they are worth their weight in gold, more so if the boat is expensive.

Mine checked the provenance of both boats, asked for all the ownership info from the point of original sale, and provided the same for the new boat I bought. He handled the contracts, payments, and viewings - all went like clockwork.
 
boomerangben said:
I’ve enquired about two boats, one on with broker, one for a private sale. No replies to my emails. I suppose they need to hear a voice to know I’m serious
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This is very annoying, and not just with respect to brokers. I bought a painting online in an auction with one of the most highly reputed art dealers last week. After three unanswered emails asking for confirmation that payment had been received, in desperation I rang. Their automated system told me that their lines were very busy so customers were best advised to make contact by email…Aaaassrgh.

I did finally get through. Click click “ah yes, the money came through, we have received your emails, here’s who you need to contact about collection”.

(It is a watercolour of some boats on the hard, so I feel is at least distantly relevant to the forum).

IMG_5931.jpeg
 
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