CDShack - I've spent sh!tty summers off the lake because the boat was in the shop, i'm living that right now and agree that for me, reliability is the most important factor.

BTW - my boat is NOT in the shop for engine work :D

If you think that everyone with a big/fast boat or exotic/high performance car is "highly skilled and knowledgeable"...well you're in for a rude awakening. There are just as many guys with a big checkbook and a something to prove as there are skilled and knowledgeable guys putting around in poontoons.

I think it boils down to the fact that skilled operator or not, if something goes wrong at 100+ on the water, the outcome is going to be far worse than Average Joe running his pontoon aground at 20 mph after one too many beers.

With respect to earlier comments on insurance for higher horsepower boats, I have good news. I just spoke with my starefarm agent and what I heard was that HP really did not matter much at all, what was an important consideration was the value of the boat (as expected). Playing with quotes, the highest HP rating they had in their system was for 400+HP. Using the same boat with different horsepowers, a boat max HP (400+) cost about $500 and change, $23 more a year than the same boat with 125HP (a 1989 30ft boat @ a cost of $25K was the baseline boat used for these quotes.

Maybe this is just a statefarm thing?

No, it's an agent thing. Your agent hasn't realized that they won't insure it.

I'd ask your agent to run your proposed boat past underwriting and see what they say. I'll bet the farm (lol) they won't touch it.

Twins or single?

Or an area thing cause HP is 100% a Florida factor.

Heres the thing with HP and insurance, the "cheap" companys -ie allstate, statefarm, progressive etc will NOT insure a inboard with over 500 hp per engine that I know of. They also will go as far as deny a claim thats UNRELATED to hp IF you lie when you apply for insurance-ie your barn falls down on boat in tornado or boat sinks, they look at wreckage of whats left and see blower motors, they can and will deny your claim on the contention they would have never insured it in the first place. I heard second hand from OSO member CNC that a insurance company paid ben at precision power offshore to pull and dyno a engine in a disputed claim. When you jump up to 'specialty" companys prices of insurance double/quadruple fwiw, Smitty

Not true, had a 05 Fastech 353 with 525s insured thru State Farm for 3 years up until we sold it last month. The HP was listed right on the policy from them. Our replacement boat is an 07 38 Lightning w/600s. I didnt bother asking State Farm, pretty much knew that I needed better insurance. Insured it thru Wakezone for $200 more than what we were paying for the Fastech.

I have a 27.5 ft LaveyCraft with a 525 insured by Allstate no problem. Tho I would prefer a smaller premium that's for sure. I made the mistake of having a phone conversation with Mr.
Teague about Whipple-izing the 525 in front of the wife. He informed me that my boat may be prone to chine walking and be careful what I wish for. Upon explaining to the wife what chine walking is, I get to
still run a stock 525. I'll know better next time. But in my opinion how your boat will respond to the added horsepower is also a factor.
Michael