Like griff is getting at, I think the used market is interesting right now. Any 90's an older boats are too old for the bank to finance (in most cases) so they are largely restricted to cash buyers. This holds the price down on even very very nice boats. I've always played with small $$ toys on the side and flipped them, and there is definite ceilings at 5K, 10K, 20K, etc. One member here just sold a gorgeous Formula 311 for beyond budget, and it took months. Not because the boat wasn't near perfect, but because people don't have the disposable cash at that price point. Just my $0.02

2 angles on that point:

1. Boats hit a low value, as basically a sum of the parts value. Cobra Power has a 38 Scarab in the classifieds they are parting out. Prices seem reasonable for the 496s, the drives etc and then they want like 14,999 for the hull. If you add up the parts it is abut 15K more than what the whole boat is worth in one running piece! Clearly parting it out completely will yield a higher sale price than trying to sell a 15-20 year old boat outright.

2. Some boats are worth more than their original purchase price (Cig 20 comes to mind) but some get over restored and lose all that equity. There was a beautiful 28 Magnum named Powder Keg that had just gone through a perfect restoration.....price started high and then 3 years later was down to about 30K and it sold a few months later. This would have been a case like an older Cig 20 where it is selling for double what it cost new but since the owner dumped crazy money into the restoration the equity vanished quickly!


Percentage of purchase price arguments are tough to gauge since the prices fluctuated so great. A T/S Top Gun owner from 2000-2001 will do much better as a % resaler than a buyer of a 2006-09 TG since the original MSRP was almost 1/2 on the earlier model. You will lose more on a new TG in 3 years than a guy in 2000-2001 paid for his whole boat!

This happened with German cars in the late 80's........MB S class/ Porsche 911's..........the new ones went up in price/demand so rapidly that the resale of an older model climbed as well. Another example was the 1995 M3 (MSRP was 33-34K) but by 1999 that identical car was 45K+ so because the new ones were essentially the same car but more money the used ones pulled more money also. I had a 95 M3, bought it used 24K miles 3 years later for 27K, sold it 3 years after that for 22K with 55K miles on it. First owner lost 7K on it, I lost 5K for a total depreciation of 12k in 6 years (2k a year, not bad). Yet my buddy bought a 99 for 45K an lost 15K in 3 years (5K a year)...........same body style car! Granted there was a new body style out/more HP but the fact was he lost 2 1/2 times what my car did in 1/2 the time!............similar for owners of the 440-500K TG's compared to the original TS/ TG's.