Best Value Opportunities

What we mean by value

Not the cheapest boat on the list. Value here means the gap between what a boat costs and what she is actually worth once you have accounted for her condition, her specification and what she will cost you over the next two seasons.

A well-specified boat with fresh rigging and recent sails at the top of her price band is often better value than a bare one at the bottom. The cheap boat usually gets expensive in year one.

Where value tends to appear

• Just after a model refresh. When the yard launches a successor, the outgoing generation reprices even though nothing about the boat changed.
• Motivated sellers. A move, a change of plan, a boat that has been listed a season too long.
• Well-maintained ex-charter. Higher hours, but a documented maintenance history and a price that assumes the worst.
• Boats that need one obvious thing. A sail wardrobe or a set of batteries frightens buyers off far more than the cost of fixing it.
• Larger boats in a thin local market. Fewer buyers down here for the biggest hulls, which shows up in the asking price.

Ask us which ones we mean

We will not publish a permanent list of "bargains" — the moment a boat is genuinely well-priced she tends not to last, and a stale list is worse than none. Tell us your budget and how you will use her, and we will tell you which boats on the current book we would look at first, and be straight about why.