by B.J. Porter (Contributing Editor)

Timing a boat sale can make a big difference in your purchase or sale price. It also changes the number of boats you have to choose from, and how much work you need to do once you take ownership. There are differences in buying a new boat versus buying or selling a used boat, as the markets change with the seasons.

So if you’ve been following along our new boater series but haven’t made the leap, maybe it’s time to pull out a calendar and think about whether you’re good and ready.

New Boat Buying

Buying a new boat centers more around dealer and builder promotional and marketing cycles than the more pragmatic realities facing boat owners selling used boats. And the timing also works with the type of boat purchase you’re making.

Most boat manufacturers offer some of their best pricing and deals on new boats at shows during boat show season. You rarely have boat shows in the middle of the summer in the cooler parts of North America and Europe – people are out boating. They are usually in the fall, like shows in Annapolis and Newport, or in the middle of winter. Outdoor shows in Florida and indoor shows in the north for smaller boats are good options.

During the boat show season, promotions on pricing and financing are excellent incentives to make a deal. Often you don’t have to attend the show and buy in person. If you are negotiating with a local dealer for the brand you want, you can still catch a brand promotion going on at a show. Ask about show pricing. No dealer wants you to buy your boat from someone else because it’s so much cheaper to go to the show!

Of course, any dealer you talk to will always be willing to sell you a boat when you walk in the door any day of the year. But they may not always have the same promotional pricing and options from their sales channel outside show season. But if you’re looking for a boat to tow off the dealer’s lot right away, they’ll work with you however they can.

Buying from inventory vs. ordering new

There are two ways to buy a new boat – you can buy something from dealer inventory, or place an order for a boat to be built for you. Similar to cars, manufacturers build smaller boats for dealer inventory, and you can sometimes negotiate deals at year end for those outside the boat show windows if a dealer needs to clear space for new model boats. But they’re also motivated at shows by their own sales incentives.

Most manufacturers build to order larger boats with new price tags in the hundreds of thousands. Though there may be some small dealer inventory of those boats, it’s likely that if you’re signing a contract that size, it may not even be under construction yet. Larger-volume production boat builders may have some boats under construction that aren’t under contract, which will shorten delivery times.

But keeping large production boats with six-figure price tags sitting in inventory is expensive and risky, unless they’re boats used to show and sell the brand. This means seasonal buying opportunities are driven by the builder’s calendars unless you catch a rare opportunity on an undelivered boat.

The Bottom Line on New

If you’re buying smaller boats from a dealer inventory, it’s not so different from buying a car at a dealership. They have seasonal demands, new inventory coming in, and incentives to get the boats off the lot. You’ll often find those dealers at a show with better pricing or get show price, but catching them at the end of the season or the year can give you some negotiating room.

When ordering a new boat to be built, a boat show can often get you one of the best deals. They will have teams of people there ready to write contracts, and you’ll be able to see a model boat before you order.

Used Boat Buying

While there are some used boat shows where brokers will bring their clients’ boats to show, most used boats are direct sales from an owner to a new buyer. There’s often a broker in the mix, but they do not make the final decision about accepting an offer on a boat. That comes down to the owner.

And boat owners can be motivated.

Seller Motivation

The timing of an offer can make a big difference in the price a seller may agree to. There are significant seasonal drivers to boat pricing and availability, and you can use this.

During boating season, it’s less common for boats to change hands unless the seller has a big change in life circumstances. An owner may spend a summer boating around with a “For Sale” sign hanging on their transom, but that’s often an indicator they’re not that motivated to sell right then and there. After all, they’re out enjoying the boat. They’ll take the right offer, but that’s unlikely to be an offer you want to make.

Sellers get motivated when keeping the boat is causing them pain. This may be financial pain with ongoing expenses, or work and maintenance they’d like to get away from doing. And there’s worry all winter over an expensive asset they don’t want. The very beginning and end of boating seasons are when boat owners feel most of the pain and little of the pleasure of boat ownership.

It’s important to note that this seasonal pricing works in areas without year-round boating. Places like Florida and southern California, where people never stop boating, don’t have the same market pressures.

Fall buying

A boat owner who decides to sell at the end of a season is facing expenses on a boat they no longer want. They need to decommission the boat, winterize it, cover it, store it, and if it doesn’t sell over the winter, deal with it again in the spring. And they’ve got to worry about it and check on it all winter. If they’re serious about selling the boat, there’s an opportunity to save them some financial pain and work by taking it off their hands.

Of course, those things become your problem. But there’s a good window there when the seller is looking at all this hassle, and you can time an offer to account for this.

The fall market is often a little smaller, as many sellers who have been using the boat aren’t ready to put it on the market as soon as the season ends. It may take them a bit to clean the boat up, sign with a broker, or just get their own private listings posted. But if you can catch a seller before they’ve made their winter storage commitments, or take over those commitments and payments as part of the deal, you can work a better price.

Early Spring Buying

Many boats will hit the market over the winter, when sellers get their acts together and get them on the market. In very early spring there may be some good options to choose from. But the pricing may be a little less flexible.

A boat owner who hasn’t sold a boat in the off season has a few options when spring rolls around. They can leave the boat stored and winterized, which is usually the least expensive option. But a winterized boat on the hard under a cover doesn’t show nearly as well as a boat floating prettily on a dock. Serious sellers will commission it to show and sell, and that’s more of a cost.

Your best pricing opportunity is earlier, before the seller commits to pulling the wrapper off and launching the boat and other boaters have shown interest. If you catch the seller before they spend money, that gives you some negotiating room.

Later in the spring, more buyers get serious. All the people who absolutely want to have a boat for the summer are now scrambling over the boats on the market, and the advantage swings a bit towards the sellers. They may wait for a better deal, especially if multiple buyers are looking at their boat.

Seller Timing

The season timing works the other way for sellers. You can expect to get a bit less money selling your boat in the fall, but you will save yourself all the decommissioning and storage expenses. Factor that into any offer you’re willing to take, because you will breathe a sigh of relief even if you take less money than the off season will cost you. Because you’ll be free of the headaches, you’ll never have to climb a ladder in the winter to check on your boat, and of course you’re clear to buy your next boat!

In the spring, you’ll be able to support a better price, and you’ll have more buyers. But you will have owned the boat all winter, so you’ll be out of pocket for storage costs, insurance, and mortgage payments if you have a loan on the boat.

Many who sell in the spring do so because they miss the early fall window by not preparing the boat for sale before the end of the season. If your ownership and storage costs are high, hitting that fall sales window and taking a lower price boat may be the better option in the end. If you sell it quickly and you won’t have to store it or pay for it.

So if you are serious about selling quickly:

• Clean the boat and have it ready for showing before the end of the season.
• Get your listings up a month or two before decommissioning time.
• Delay its haul and decommissioning as late as you can so the boat shows easily.
• Add up decommissioning costs, storage, insurance, boat payments, etc. so you know what keeping the boat for the winter will cost you.
• Price your boat at what you’d want to get for it in the spring, since it might not sell. But be ready to negotiate a discounted fall sale price, knowing that number is your wiggle room.

The key is to let buyers know your boat is available early, so there’s time for them to take it off your hands before you have to put any more into it.