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Our Coast Guard vessel database search is designed as a public resource for anyone looking to view the documentation aspects of a particular vessel... and it's completely free. This service will provide readers with a basic idea of what the National Vessel Documentation Center has on file with regard to a vessel's status. The information serves as a starting point for more in-depth research with respect to ownership, mortgages, and lien claims. In conducting a query, be sure you have selected the appropriate type of search. Matching criteria may then be entered in either upper or lower case. Responses will accordingly correspond with the exact term or phrase you have stated. These will be shown in a list box directly below the submit button. It may take several moments to complete the process if the search involves a large number of records. Simply click the reset button if you wish to engage in a fresh search. Although generally current, the data provided here is subject to periodic updates. It is also subject to errors or omissions and should not be relied upon without further investigation. Certain archived files which have been inactive over the past several decades may also be unavailable. Information of this nature is however, available by special order. Data beyond what is returned from our search lookup resource can be obtained directly from the documentation center. This includes ownership information, preferred mortgage filings, lien claim notices, and supplemental data. Copies of these and all other recordings or submissions can be ordered by using our special "Vessel Record Request Form". Keep in mind when implementing any kind of vessel documentation research, that it may extend beyond just the federal status. Recordings on the state level and perhaps even foreign registries may also affect the vessel's ownership and lien standings. The Coast Guard makes it very clear that vessel documentation is not conclusive evidence of ownership with respect to any hidden claims or filing digressions. You may also wish to visit our premier BoatScope database which offers numerous search options in addition to this preliminary resource. These include lookups by the builder's name or code, hailing port, vessel dimensions, build year, vessel type, and usages just to name a few. The service also provides historical information on auctioned, stolen, damaged, and recalled boats.

Visit our database page for the nation's premier boat history report with a full compliment of title search resources. Includes eight maritime databases all rolled into one convenient interface. A must-have service for any prospective buyer, marine lender, or maritime professional.

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Boat VIN / HIN Lookup

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Over 16 years in the boating industry, a boat's history affects its value.

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A boat's history is an essential factor in determining a boat's estimated market value. In addition to age and hours, other things to check for include whether the boat has ever been in an accident, deemed a total loss, and whether it was used in fresh versus salt water. All of these elements will factor into what the boat is worth and how much you should be willing to pay.

Damage to the boat, especially fiberglass boats, can be repaired very easily with almost no trace of its previous damage. Don't get caught off guard by boats with a history of damage and accidents- this could lead to many future problems and thousands in repair costs.

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- Hurricane Damage

Hurricane Sandy resulted in over $650 million in damages to recreational boats.

Hurricane damaged boats are often sold with a clean title.

Most states do not recognize salvage and damaged titles for boats. Therefore, storm damaged boats are auctioned off to be restored and re-sold to unknowing individuals, with clean titles. These boats may have spent significant time submerged under salt water resulting in detrimental damage that could result in loss later on. Boat History Report® is the only way to know the real truth about the boat, as once repaired- these boats can look better than new to an unsuspecting buyer.

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Know when a boat has been in an accident.

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Use Boat History Report® to insure that you don't buy a boat that has been damaged in an accident and then repaired. Boats that have been severely damaged have a low resale value and may not be safe for you and your family.

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Boats frequently run aground due to a miscalculation of the water's depth.

Running aground can be one of the most costly problems a boat can endure.

Not only can running aground cause hidden structural damage to the boat, if environmental damage was caused, the new owner could be responsible for the previous owners negligence, as these fines stay with the boat and not the reckless boater. Don't put yourself at risk - Boat History Report® can help you avoid purchasing a boat that has run aground.

- Total Loss

Boats are deemed a total loss when the cost to repair is greater than a set percentage of the boat’s value.

Unlike cars, boats have no uniform salvage titling law.

These boats are usually repaired and resold with clean titles, without disclosing previous total loss events. Boat History Report® helps uncover events like these in a boat’s history.

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Many boats manufactured often contain dangerous, potentially fatal flaws. Is your boat safe?

Open (unfixed) safety recalls can result in serious injury and sometimes death.

Due to safety concerns, manufacturers report recalls every month; however, numerous flawed boats remain in the marketplace. Check our national database to see if your boat has been issued a safety recall as part of your report from Boat History Report®.

- Submersion & Sinking

Sinkings and flooding occur more frequently than you may realize.

Boats that have been submerged sustain damage that can take months to surface.

Not only are boats swamped or capsized while in use, but many sink dockside as a result of heavy rains, storm surge, faulty drains or poor sealing thru-hull fittings. The damage is not noticeable immediately, but as corrosion sets in, costly issues will continue to surface. Let Boat History Report® help save you from a boat that could jeopardize your families safety while costing you thousands of dollars to repair.

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Boats are constantly seized by U.S. Customs due to illegal activities.

Boat dealers and yacht brokers are not required to report seizure information to customers.

Many times these boats incur serious damage during the seizing activity. Don't unknowingly buy one of these damaged boats - Run a report from Boat History Report® before you buy.

- Boat Fires

In addition to cosmetic damage, boat fires can also cause hidden structural damage.

Due to skilled fiberglass work, boats involved in fires may appear undamaged to the naked eye.

Once the cosmetic issues are fixed you may never know a fire had occurred. That’s what Boat History Report® is for!

- Collisions

Avoid buying a boat that has been in a collision and then cosmetically repaired.

Similar to cars, boats can sustain structural damage that cannot be seen by the naked eye.

Collisions cause structural damage that can jeopardize safety and will lower the resale value of the boat. Don’t lose thousands by purchasing a damaged boat- run a Boat History Report® and be informed.

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Hull identification number (hin) / boat vin.

What's a HIN (boat VIN) and where do I find it?

The Hull Identification Number (HIN) serves as the boat’s unique identifier, similar to the VIN or vehicle serial number of a car. If the dealer or broker listing the boat has not provided you with a report from Boat History Report®, ask them to provide you with the boat’s HIN so that you can run your own report.

The HIN is affixed or stamped into the back of the boat's hull also known as the transom in the uppermost right corner or under the swim platform. Also, the HIN may be stated on the state title, state registration, USCG Documentation, and insurance documents. For boats 1984 and newer, Federal regulations mandate the HIN must follow the format in the image below. For additional HIN formats and a more detailed explanation, be sure to check out our HIN Troubleshooting Guide.

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The hin (hull identification number).

The Hull Identification Number (HIN) serves as the boat’s unique identifier, similar to the VIN of a car. If the dealer or broker listing the boat has not provided you with a report from Boat History Report®, ask them to provide you with the boat’s HIN so that you can run your own.

The HIN may be found on the back of the boat in the uppermost right corner or under the swim platform. Also, the HIN may be stated on the title, registration, and insurance documents. For boats 1984 and newer, Federal regulations mandate the HIN must follow the format in the image below. For additional HIN formats and a more detailed explanation, be sure to check out our HIN Troubleshooting Guide.

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Owner's advice: Top tips for buying your first yacht

Buying your first yacht isn’t something anyone should enter into lightly. Without knowledge or experience, it is easy to find yourself led astray by the  inspiring yacht concepts  of boundary-pushing designers or talked into building a  super-fast yacht  with technical capabilities you’ll never use.

With this in mind, BOAT spoke to a number of experienced serial yacht owners who know a thing or two about the buying and building process. Here are their top tips on what to look out for, what to avoid and how to make sure you get the yacht you really want.

Consider all of your options

When Steve Sidwell , owner of 34 metre Ascente , began looking for his perfect yacht he had his dream vessel in mind - but couldn't find her anywhere. “I went to the Monaco Yacht Show and I came to the Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show maybe three years in a row. I looked at all the different boats and none of them fit,” he says. “It’s a million-dollar-a-year operating budget. I don’t want to spend that. It means one or two engineers on board as well and I don’t want that. A big crew, I don’t want that. I want my kids and me to be able to operate the boat."

Having done the rounds of all the turnkey yachts on the market it was time to consider a different route to life on the waves. “I wasn’t intent on doing a refit , but I never really found anything that was a good fit for me in my price range, and then I found this boat and within 20 minutes I thought, ‘That’s it.’” A lot of, admittedly, hard work and determination later, Sidwell now has the family-friendly yacht he'd always wanted and the memories of round-the-world adventures to go with it.

Aesthetics aren't everything

When a fire on their yacht Camarina Royale put Jack and Mary McClurg in the market for a new superyacht there were some big aesthetic obstacles Mary had to get past when Jack suggested Marcato (now Friendly Confines) . “We’d been running around looking at boats all day and our broker said we could get on Marcato that afternoon, but Mary refused to go,” Jack explains. And, while he immediately fell in love, Mary couldn't stand her but, as she explains, “I knew he loved it. If the price was right, then so be it. I couldn’t be the reason he didn’t have it.”

Don't be afraid of impulse buys

When Elizabeth and Rory Brooks came to make their first yacht purchase, it was an impulse buy that led them to classic Feadship Heavenly Daze . “We were in the South of France chartering a motor yacht, and it broke down,” says Elizabeth. “And so we were stuck in the marina at Port Cogolin. There was this boat moored next to us, which was a very pretty classic yacht, and my husband persuaded the captain to talk to their captain and we had a look around.” That yacht, of course, was Heavenly Daze and, as Elizabeth explains, "The first thing you fall in love with is very often the right thing.”

Buy the right yacht for the trip you plan to take

When Tara Getty bought the classic yacht Blue Bird it was with one thing in mind: an epic round-the-world adventure including a search for buried treasure on the remote Cocos Islands. And how better to get there than in a boat built by Sir Malcolm Campbell specifically for the journey - albeit 67 years earlier? "We did it – we finished the journey Campbell started,” Getty says. “The vision for the trip was my children. My eldest son finished school in South Africa in December 2014 and was starting in England the following September. So we had that December to September period. It was the most amazing opportunity to do something with the children.” Of course, Getty and his family did enjoy a few modern upgrades on board Blue Bird - including zero speed stabilisers for that often rocky Pacific crossing. “I wanted two of everything," Getty explains. "Watermakers, washing machines, dryers, so if something breaks we can continue. At one point our hydraulic pack broke but we had enough redundancies to carry on.”

Think about the purpose of your yacht before design begins

Serial sailing yacht owner Mike Slade faced the issue of creating regatta-ready charter yachts with every one of his new builds. His advice – know what you want before the design process has even begun. "The question is, how do you mix the chartering and the racing?,” he told Boat International of the build of Leopard 3 . “You are going to be heavy, so it's up to the designer to offset that heaviness and reduce the disadvantage - so upwind we'll pull out [distance on the opposition]."

Even if you have a distinct dream or vision for your yacht, chances are the designers and builders you employ may not quite understand it – as Patti Seery discovered when she set about building her traditional Indonesian phinisi Silolona . "I wanted to do a phinisi because I knew they could be better and safer if purpose-built for chartering; plus I love the element of history and the sheer joy of sailing on a wooden ship,” Seery explains. The only problem was finding a Western designer who could work the traditional Indonesian craftsmen – an issue which would take a lot of patience on Seery’s part.

"I went through four naval architects trying to find someone who understood my vision before meeting Michael Kasten . I [had also] befriended a group of traditional Konjo boat builders from the tiny village of Ara who build the majority of large wooden cargo boats in Indonesia. There was one small problem. They had never built a boat to plans before Silolona .” The answer, she says, was a hands-on approach, “I knew the only way I'd be successful was if I put the full-on Western approach aside. So I went out to the boat graveyard and saw the problems for myself."

Know your limits

When sailing yacht and charter business owner Barry Houghton ordered Salperton II – the biggest yacht ever built by Alloy Yachts at the time – for racing, he thought she was his dream vessel. The truth, however, was that she was just too much for him. “I sold her as she was too big for me,” he explains. “The flybridge was too far from the water and you don’t get the real feeling of sailing. I sold her well and decided to go for something in the 40 to 45 metre range.” The result was the 44 metre Dubois -designed Salperton III (now Mes Amis ), which was built at Fitzroy Yachts in New Zealand but she too proved to be a costly learning curve for Houghton. “Immediately before I took delivery, I ordered another as I could see things that I could improve,” he says. “Unfortunately I lost money but it was the right decision.”

Determination and passion are everything

When Sir Charles Dunstone chose to undertake the huge restoration project that was classic yacht Shemara , many of his fellow owners thought he was crazy. Shemara was in a state after languishing in a derelict dockyard for years but Dunstone's passion for the project kept him going.

“I see Shemara and I think how amazing it could be,” he explains. “My mind has a very bad habit of just disregarding everything that’s going to be awful and thinking, ‘Come on, we can do this, we’ll find a way, it’ll be OK.’ In a funny way, the bigger the project is, the more enthusiastic I am.”

“We rented the shed ourselves, we hired the naval architects and then tendered each job,” he says of his unique approach to the restoration. “You don’t know what you’re going to find with a project like Shemara - there’s no way anyone could give a quote for this boat. And once your boat is in pieces in their yard, you’re just going to be completely held to ransom.”

Charter first to find out what you like

When fashion designer Giorgio Armani set about building his first boat he was helped a great deal by previous yachting experiences. “Sometimes they’d belong to people I knew, sometimes they were just chartered. Invariably they were not my style – too white, too much lighting, too much marble, crystal and mahogany,” he explains.

Armani’s yacht, the 65 metre Codecasa Main , was far from your average gleaming white hull. “Painting Maìn green was a choice made to camouflage her at sea, so it doesn’t appear too flashy,” he says. “I designed Main entirely, taking inspiration from particular military vessels that looked very practical, and from the optimisation of space that is a characteristic of old ships. Notably, I set out to rid the decks of all superstructures that might break up the purity of line.”

Find a designer who understands your vision

Aside from the builder there is perhaps no other party that has quite such a large impact on your yacht than the designer. Whether you're building from scratch for the first time or the fifth, it's important you find a designer who understands your vision, lifestyle and what your hopes are for your new superyacht. Pier Luigi Loro Piana , a serial sailing yacht owner, explains this eloquently in his relationship with famed yacht designer Mario Pedol , “He is a boat designer who has an engineering company. He works with more specialist architects, like Bruce Farr, like Vrolijk. He is the number one in Italy in my opinion."

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How to buy a boat: your guide to buying a yacht

• Duncan Kent
• October 17, 2023

Buying a yacht, especially your first, can be a daunting experience. Duncan Kent offers expert guidance on how to get it right

The process of buying a sailing yacht can sometimes be long-winded and stressful, especially if it’s your first time considering boat ownership. To avoid it being too daunting the first step is to think the whole thing through very carefully and then make a proper plan.

First and foremost, decide what type of sailing you will actually do, as it will be an important indicator as to what size and type of boat you should aim to buy. If you’re still learning to sail then it’s advisable not to buy too big a boat as the bigger it is the more problems and costs you will acquire. It’s often better to buy a used boat that you can practise in and make mistakes on, as accidents can be expensive in a bigger, more valuable boat.

What type of boat?

A trailer-sailer will save on marina fees and can be big enough for cruising. Photo: Graham Snook

Trailer-sailers

Key factors to look for in a trailer-sailer are size, weight and ease of rigging, launch and retrieval. Trailer-sailer masts are usually designed to be raised manually using an A-frame and tackle, and in many cases these will be provided with the boat. Being launched from a trailer means that it will most likely have a retractable keel and rudder, as well as a removable outboard motor.

Although it is possible to trail a small bilge-keeled boat, they are almost impossible to launch and recover without a crane, given the depth of water required for them to float on and off. If you’re planning on sailing with the family, bear in mind a retractable keel, whether it lifts or swings up, will nearly always impinge on the cabin in some way.

Above 750kg/16ft LOA you will need a larger (possibly four-wheel) trailer, with a more powerful towing vehicle and a few extra crew to help you rig and launch. In return, though, you’ll have a boat that you can live aboard in reasonable comfort for long weekends, or even the occasional week-long sailing trip.

Ideally, a cruising trailer-sailer would be no more than 24ft long and 1,500kg dry weight all up. If you’re going to be coastal cruising over long distances, however, you’ll probably prefer something bigger like a ‘trailer-able’ boat. These can be craned onto a larger, double-axled trailer and taken home or stored somewhere inland for the winter, saving marina berth costs or boatyard storage rates.

Not only does this make good economic sense, but it could also enable you to tow her to a new cruising destination each season. Probably the largest boat you could self-trail would be around 28ft, depending on its weight, beam and size of the towing vehicle.

Inshore sailing makes sense in a capable, affordable yacht like the Westerly Centaur. Photo: David Harding

Inshore/Coastal cruisers

Calling a yacht an inshore or coastal cruiser can be somewhat misleading, but since the EU introduced the RCD ‘Category’ system, the designations seem to have stuck. To my mind, any yacht that is seaworthy, properly maintained and has a skilled crew, is very likely to be capable of being sailed pretty much anywhere. A larger yacht may be more comfortable at sea and able to take on more crew and provisions, but a seaworthy boat should be just what it says.

If you plan to simply potter along within sight of land, stopping overnight in a sheltered anchorage or in a marina berth, then it obviously isn’t vital to have a boat that can withstand a storm at sea. You will rarely, if ever, experience storm conditions when you’re never more than a few miles from a safe refuge. That said, some still prefer an ocean-going yacht for coastal cruising ‘just in case’, and there’s nothing wrong with that, provided you can afford the extra maintenance and running costs.

Some experienced sailors swear by lightweight, high-performance yachts for coastal and offshore sailing. There’s a certain logic to this in that a quick boat stands more chance of reaching shelter before the worst of a challenging weather system hits.

My ideal coastal cruising yacht, however, is a compromise between a boat that’s reasonably fast and fun to sail, and one that can withstand the occasional Force 8 and 3m-high waves without frightening or risking the safety of my crew or family.

An Arcona 345 is a highly capable offshore yacht, but probably isn’t large enough be a true ‘bluewater’ yacht. Photo: Richard Langdon

Offshore/Ocean yachts

A true offshore/ocean-rated yacht will be strong, seaworthy and safe but, equally, it should exhibit a sea-kindly, predictable and well-balanced motion at sea, such that the crew remain able to sail, cook, eat and sleep regardless of stormy sea conditions.

What makes a yacht sea-kindly? First and foremost is its motion through, or over the waves. Many modern, lightweight yachts with flat, shallow underwater sections tend to slam into oncoming waves rather than slice through them. This not only jars the crew’s nerves and hurls everything out of the lockers below, but it also puts increased strain on the entire yacht as each thud shakes the hull and rig relentlessly on a long windward passage. Slamming doesn’t just test the integrity of the yacht to its limits, it drags the crew’s morale down and prevents them sleeping, cooking, eating or relaxing while off watch.

As with most aspects of sailing, there are many different schools of thought with offshore yacht design, but it is generally accepted that ocean-crossing yachts should be of a higher displacement than coastal cruisers and that they should have a deeper, vee-shaped forefoot to enable the hull to slice through oncoming waves.

A so-called bluewater cruiser is simply an offshore/ocean cruising yacht that has provision for living on board for extended periods of time under a wide variety of different circumstances. Usually, they will be better equipped with items like watermakers, generators, freezers, solar panels and sat-comms, but the style and design of the yacht itself will mostly be identical to an offshore/ocean-class yacht.

Stowage is an overlooked but vital consideration when assessing a cruising yacht. Photo: Graham Snook

What to consider

Accommodation.

Does the boat you’re looking at suit the style of sailing you plan to do? If you’re only going to day sail along the coast then don’t worry about sea berths, for instance, although it’s useful to have at least one long, straight berth you can fix a lee cloth to in case someone becomes ill. Big, central double berths are great at anchor, but of little use under sail.

Separate cabins are crucial if you have kids on board, so as not to keep them awake in the evening when the adults are still up. Private heads are important too, particularly if you are planning to have friends on board regularly.

Stowage is also a vital consideration for cruising that new buyers often overlook. It’s really annoying to have to remove half the contents of a vast stowage bin to reach a single item at the bottom – so look out for easily accessible lockers, especially near the galley.

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It’s important when family sailing to have the mainsail control lines led back near the helm, so the boat can be safely sailed singlehanded if necessary. Try sitting by the helm and operating a headsail sheet winch. Is the mainsheet nearby so you can dump the main in a gust? Is the mainsheet track positioned where young fingers can easily get trapped? Are there plenty of harness attachments? Is there stowage for larger items like dinghies?

Rig and sails

Unless you’re planning on racing, look for a sail plan that’s easily handled. Nowadays most cruisers choose sloop rigs with in-mast furling mainsails; in fact they can often be standard. You will lose a little performance, though, so if speed and pointing ability are vital then opt for a fully battened mainsail with single-line reefing. Virtually all new cruising yachts these days will come with a furling genoa.

Will a wheel or tiller suit you best? And is the mainsheet within reach? Photo: David Harding / SailingScenes.com

Wheel or tiller? Most older boats under 32ft have tillers, whereas most new boats over 26ft offer wheel steering. If you like to ‘feel’ the boat more then go for a tiller. If a wheel seems more natural then go for it but expect to lose a little of the feedback a tiller offers.

You can put a cat on a beach for a barbecue or to inspect and give the hulls a scrub. Photo: Yachting Monthly

Monohull or multihull?

Most new boat buyers start by looking at monohulls, with few giving multihulls a second thought. However, it’s worth stepping on board a few catamarans or trimarans before dismissing them. Better still, give them a try. You might find the level sailing, greater deck space and higher speeds worth the drawbacks of having a larger boat to park and reduced load-carrying capacity.

Cruising cats have increased in popularity hugely in recent years due to the extra space they offer. They also draw very little, so you can get right in close to the shore or creep up shallow creeks where fin keeled monohulls dare not venture. They take the ground easily too, so you can actually park up on a beach.

Shopping for a new boat is all part of the fun but beware of hidden costs. Photo: Messe Düsseldorf / ctillmann

New or used?

It’s great to own a brand-new yacht but there are many good reasons for choosing a cared-for used boat. Most will have had any initial faults rectified and are likely to come with all the necessary cruising kit. The downside is not knowing how well she’s been maintained. Depending on age, essentials such as the rig and engine could require expensive replacement.

Privately owned boats under five years old tend to be well shaken down, but not worn to the point of imminent repair. Older boats might well have gone through the first wear/replacement stage and have new sails, rigging and engine.

Most equipment, especially engines, lasts longer if the boat is used regularly. The exception is with charter boats, where everything will be well worn.

A charter yacht will endure ten times the wear and tear of a private one, despite being regularly maintained. Never buy an ex-charter yacht without getting a thorough, detailed survey.

Buying a yacht new

Before buying a new boat bear in mind you’ll need considerable additional kit that’s not included. Don’t get carried away with the options list while forgetting equipment essentials. A good guide is to allow a further 15-20% of the list price to fully equip her for cruising.

It’s also worth noting that the price displayed at a boat show may exclude delivery and commissioning, which can add another chunk to the bottom line.

When you find a boat that ticks all your boxes, go somewhere quiet and add up the real cost including any ‘essential’ options. If there’s anything left in your budget, tick off any ‘luxury’ items you’d like in order of preference, until the pot is empty. You might prefer to opt for a slightly smaller boat but equip it to a higher standard.

A word of warning: if you buy the biggest boat you can afford with the intention of adding goodies later, it will almost always cost considerably more than having them fitted at the factory or during commissioning.

No matter how much you like a boat, always engage a professional marine surveyor. Photo: Graham Snook

Buying a yacht used

Never make an offer on a boat before seeing it. Even if you’re not an expert it’s worth looking for obvious things before engaging a surveyor. Check for hull cracking, gelcoat blisters, evidence of collisions, squashy decks, dodgy wiring, damaged sails, water in the bilges, seized pumps and so on. If the boat is untidy and uncared for it’s likely to have been neglected in its previous life.

Get an idea of the value of that type of boat in basic form by checking prices of similar craft online. If they range from £20-£35,000, for example, start with the lower figure and add on the value of any extra equipment. For instance, if she has new sails, raise the base ‘value’ by £2,000. For a new engine, add £3,000, and so on. When you reach a figure you think is about right, offer the vendor 20% less and see what happens.

Always make your offer subject to survey, then if problems are discovered you can reduce your offer by the cost of any remedial work required. Once a deal is agreed, if she’s out of the water, retain 10% until she is launched and the powertrain is tested.

How well will the boat reverse and manoeuvre in tight marina spaces?

The test sail

I would never buy any boat without first taking it for a test sail unless it’s dirt cheap. Some sellers won’t want the hassle, but if she’s had a good survey and you’re really keen the owner should realise this and go along with it. If ashore, the launch/retrieval costs will be yours, as will the surveyor’s bill. If you agree to purchase immediately after the test sail you might not need to crane her back out again.

If buying new the broker should have a demonstrator in the water for you to sail. It might not be equipped to your specification, but it’ll be the same model.

If you’re new to sailing, take an experienced friend or surveyor along if possible. Take your family or your partner along too, to get their opinions.

From the moment you step on board keep your senses alert. How easy is it to get on board from the pontoon? How much does the boat tip over with your weight on the sidedeck? How easy is it to walk around the decks without tripping?

Take a camera and notebook and jot down anything you’re not sure about so you can double-check it later.

Checking the engine

The first thing to test is the engine. If it’s a used boat then pull the dipstick before starting it to check the colour of the oil – any whiteness could be water and is a sign of a problem. Make sure the preheat works and that it starts easily. Marine diesels often smoke a bit at first but should clear once the engine has warmed up. Check the exhaust to ensure it’s emitting a steady stream of water.

Try some simple manoeuvres ahead and astern to get the feel of how she handles under power. Some will have noticeable prop wash, especially those with a fixed-blade propeller, but you can often use this to your advantage once you know how strong and in which direction it acts.

Once on the move go up through the revs just to check there are no flat spots and that she revs to the correct level. Few skippers ever use full revs but it’s a good indicator that all’s well with the engine, transmission and prop. Return to cruising revs and go below to hear how much noise is evident, especially in the aft cabin.

Check the condition of the sails closely, especially along the seams

Inspecting the rig

Ask the owner to show you where all the sail controls are, don’t just let them sail you around. Helping to hoist sail will show how easy or difficult it is and make handling or gear problems obvious. If it’s hard to hoist a halyard, ask why. The solution might be simple (often a lack of maintenance in a used boat), but it need not be insurmountable.

Check the headsail furler if it has one, by unfurling and refurling it. If it’s stiff to furl, check the swivels for wear. It could simply be poor maintenance, or it might be something more serious like halyard wrap or failed bearings.

Once the sails are hoisted give them a good inspection, particularly along the seams and around the clew, tack and reefing cringles (metal grommets for control lines).

Laminate sails, such as these FibrePath Enduro sails from Ullman, utilise the boat’s pointing ability and rig controls. Photo: Richard Langdon

Once you’re sailing, ask to take the helm or have your experienced mate take over. You’re looking to see how well balanced she is (assuming the sails are trimmed correctly), and how reactive the steering is.

Ideally, the helm ‘feel’ should be light but positive. It should feel like you’re just there to change direction if needed, not to keep permanent pressure on to hold her on course.

If the steering is noticeably heavy, you have too much sail up or they’re not trimmed correctly, but it’s worth asking the owner or the rep about it.

All points of sail

Put in a few tacks to see how quickly she comes around and how well the deck gear functions. Try her on every point of sail – close-hauled, reaching and running, to see what she’s capable of and if she has any particular foibles.

Depending on the sea conditions, see how she handles with a bit too much sail up and if possible how she copes in strong gusts. Then find out how easy it is to put a reef in.

Check the navigation instruments are all functioning as they should and, if it’s a particularly complicated system, ask the owner or the rep to go through all the nav instruments with you. Finally, hand the controls over to someone else and go below to see what it’s like under sail. Take note of steps, grab handles or bars and fiddles, and then simulate going to the loo, preparing a meal, lying in a berth or plotting a fix at the chart table.

For ocean sailing a yacht with a longer keel is best for comfort in heavy seas

Buying a long keel yacht

The extra drag created by their large wetted area makes them relatively slow compared to more modern designs, but they provide a comfortable ride in heavy seas, with the fullness of the keel limiting leeway and helping to keep the boat on a straight course downwind with little or no adjustment to the helm. Popular for ocean cruising but poor at manoeuvring under power in tight marinas.

A fin keel should make a boat faster and more agile

Buying a fin keel yacht

Cutting away the forefoot of a long keel reduces the hull’s resistance to tacking and manoeuvring, while also lessening hydrodynamic drag and thereby increasing speed. Many have ballast bulbs at the bottom to lower the yacht’s centre of gravity (CoG). The resulting short, deep keel makes a boat much more agile.

An obvious advantage of a twin keel is its ability to take the ground

Buying a twin keel yacht

Also called bilge keels they provide low draught for shallow water cruising and allow a yacht to take the ground upright without supporting legs. One drawback is increased leeway when sailing hard on the wind, due to the reduced wetted surface, and a propensity to heel more readily, due to the higher CoG. Often kept on drying moorings which can put the keel/hull joint under repeated pressure, so check for GRP cracks.

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Tips for Buying a Yacht or Boat: What to Look for Before You Buy

If you’re in the market for a yacht or boat, there are several things to keep in mind before making a purchase. In this article, we’ll take a look at some key factors to consider to ensure that you make the right choice.

Checking the Condition of the Body

One of the first things to do before buying a yacht or boat is to thoroughly inspect the body. Look for scratches, dents, and star-shaped cracks which could indicate that the boat has been involved in a collision. Bubbles on the surface of the body could also indicate that water has seeped under the protective coating, causing damage. Additionally, a fresh coat of paint could be a sign that the owner was trying to cover up chips or other imperfections. By tapping gently on the body, you can listen for a dull sound which could indicate the presence of bubbles and voids in the coating.

Exploring the Deck

The deck is another important area to inspect. If it has warped, it could be a sign that the boat was not stored properly during the winter months. When walking on the deck, it should not give way or feel spongy. Take a walk along the entire length of the deck, jumping a bit to test its resilience. Also, inspect the junction of the cabin and deck for cracks.

Checking out the Cabin

The cabin is where you’ll be spending most of your time, so it’s important to ensure that it’s in good condition. Even if everything looks fine, an unpleasant smell could be a sign that the boat is damp or leaking. Check inside cabinets for mold stains, and inspect portholes to make sure they don’t leak. If you plan to take long trips, make sure the cabin has enough headroom to allow you to stand upright. Check that all doors close tightly, locks are functioning correctly, and all necessary systems like plumbing and toilets are working properly.

Checking the Engine

The engine is a crucial component of any boat, so it’s important to check its condition before buying. When testing the engine, listen for smooth, vibration-free operation without any strange noises. There should be no oil stains in the water, and smoke should be minimal. You can also check for oil leaks by inspecting the engine with a clean rag. Check the engine serial number against the one on the owner’s ship’s ticket and ask about the engine’s usage history and when it was last inspected. Keep in mind that the more powerful the engine, the higher the fuel consumption will be.

Inspecting the Sails and Running Rigging

The sails and running rigging are other important areas to inspect. Lay out the sails and check for mold, bad odors, and scuffs from improper storage. Scratch the surface with your fingernail to test the strength of the fibers. The running rigging should also be free from any noticeable signs of wear, and winches should rotate smoothly without wobbling from side to side.

Test Drive the Boat

Finally, before making a purchase, take the boat out for a test drive. Make sure the engine turns on smoothly without any issues, and pay attention to how easily the steering wheel moves. After the test drive, inspect the engine again to ensure there are no leaks.

Buying a yacht or boat can be an exciting process, but it’s important to take the time to ensure that you make the right choice. By following these tips and thoroughly inspecting the boat before making a purchase, you can help ensure that your investment is a wise one.

Related Posts

Setting sail: tips for future ship owners, yacht financing: overview of financing schemes in europe, brokerage services and fees: what you need to know when choosing and buying a yacht.

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VIDEO: Take a look inside Below Deck season 6 superyacht ‘My Seanna’

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By Rebecca Bradbury   13 September 2018

Before the brand new season of Below Deck premieres on Bravo TV on 2 October, we take a closer look at the 56m/185ft season six superyacht ‘My Seanna’ .

Filming for Below Deck season six set in Tahiti began in February aboard My Seanna , a Delta Marine superyacht which is among the most opulent in the global charter fleet.

As you can see from the video above and photos below, she provides an exceptional setting for the popular reality TV series which chronicles the lives of crew members working aboard a luxury yacht.

Invited on board at the Antigua Charter Yacht Show, YachtCharterFleet can confirm first-hand what an excellent charter platform she is and you can read the My Seanna yacht review for even more details.

When Below Deck airs next month, viewers will be able to take in the yacht’s magnificent interiors and luxe deck areas as Captain Lee Rosbach and Chief Stewardess Kate Chastain head up a crew of new faces and welcome aboard guests for a Tahiti yacht charter  in French Polynesia . 

At 56 metres, My Seanna is the largest motor yacht to ever appear on Below Deck and its spin-off series Below Deck Mediterranean. She has been a popular charter option since her 2001 launch, but a major transformation and extension in 2014 has boosted her allure even further.

One of the key reasons for her appeal is the grand interior design which, headed up by Joseph Leone, is defined by rich wood, Italian white marble and ornate fittings brushed with 22-carat gold leaf.

The styling is found across the interior's guest living areas, from the main salon with its lounge and formal dining area to the skylounge, featuring a bar and game’s table, to the six staterooms.

Made up of a full-beam master suite on the main deck, an upper deck VIP suite and two double cabins and two twin cabins on the lower deck, the accommodation line-up can sleep up to 12 guests on a charter vacation .

Alongside her attractive interior, luxury yacht My Seanna features a variety of inviting outdoor spaces. A favourite place for charterers to hang out during the day is the large sundeck home to a Jacuzzi with a swim-up bar, teak loungers, a movie screen, a four-person sauna and gym equipment.

A staircase from here leads up to the crow’s nest, where guests can take in stunning panoramic views of the region while enjoying a drink in the seating area or unwinding on the oversized sun pad.

The upper deck aft is primed for alfresco dining with a large table capable of seating the entire charter party and further relaxation or entertainment is to be had in the chic beach club, equipped with a wet bar, seating area, TV and the capability to transform into a water-side nightclub.  

Rounding up the deck spaces is a luxe seating area on the aft deck, which serves as the perfect space to greet guests as they step aboard - this is if they haven't arrived by helicopter and landed on the sundeck's helipad.

To discover more about all the superyachts that have starred in the reality TV show, read our article on the  Below Deck yacht names and how much it costs to rent them . 

Charter yacht 'My Seanna' provides an exceptional setting for popular reality TV series Below Deck

For more information on M/Y My Seanna, speak to your preferred charter broker .

Alternatively, view all luxury yachts available for charter in French Polynesia .

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56m Delta Marine 2001 / 2021

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Jeff Bezos' $500 Million Yacht: A Look at the World's Largest Private Vessel

Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, is known for his extravagant lifestyle and love for luxury yachts. In April 2023, Bezos took delivery of his newest and largest yacht, Koru, which cost a staggering $500 million or more. At 417 feet, Koru is the world's largest sailing yacht, surpassing the previous record holder, the 106-meter Black Pearl.

Built by Oceanco in the Netherlands, Koru is a three-masted sailing yacht that features a sleek and modern design. Unlike other yachts owned by billionaires, Koru is powered by wind and sails, rather than diesel engines. It is reported that the yacht has a range of 7,000 nautical miles and can accommodate up to 36 guests and 60 crew members. The yacht is also equipped with a helipad, a swimming pool, a spa, and a gym.

The delivery of Koru has sparked controversy and criticism, with some arguing that the money spent on the yacht could have been put to better use. However, Bezos has defended his purchase, stating that he plans to use the yacht for scientific research and exploration. Regardless of the controversy, there is no denying that Koru is a stunning and impressive vessel that will undoubtedly turn heads wherever it sails.

Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, has recently taken delivery of his new sailing yacht, Koru, after it completed its initial sea trials. The vessel is reportedly worth $500 million, making it one of the most expensive yachts in the world. This section will provide an overview of the yacht, the builder, and the cost.

Koru is a three-masted sailing yacht that is 417 feet long, making it the largest sailing yacht in the world. It was built by Oceanco, a Dutch shipyard that has built many superyachts for wealthy clients. The yacht has a steel hull and a superstructure made of aluminum. It is equipped with all the luxury amenities that one would expect from a yacht of this caliber, including a pool, a support vessel, and a range of water toys.

The Builder

Oceanco is a leading superyacht builder based in the Netherlands. The shipyard has built many of the world's most impressive yachts, including the Black Pearl, which is one of the largest sailing yachts in the world. Oceanco has a reputation for building high-quality yachts that are both luxurious and innovative.

Koru reportedly cost $500 million to build, which makes it one of the most expensive yachts in the world. The yacht was built in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, and was delivered to Bezos in May 2023. The cost of the yacht has been a source of controversy, with some critics arguing that it is an excessive display of wealth.

In conclusion, Koru is a stunning sailing yacht that is equipped with all the luxury amenities that one would expect from a yacht of this caliber. It was built by Oceanco, a leading superyacht builder based in the Netherlands. The yacht reportedly cost $500 million to build, making it one of the most expensive yachts in the world.

Design and Features

Jeff Bezos' yacht, Y721, boasts an impressive design and features that make it stand out from other superyachts. The yacht has been under construction at the Oceanco shipyard in Rotterdam since 2019 and is set to be delivered in 2022.

Layout and Amenities

The Y721 is a 127-meter sailing yacht that will become the largest sailing yacht in the world upon delivery. The yacht features a sleek black hull with classic lines and a uniquely designed bowsprit - a custom spar extending forward from the ship's bow to which her forestays are fastened. The yacht's layout includes six decks, with ample space for guests and crew.

The yacht's interior is designed by Nuvolari Lenard and features a contemporary style with a focus on natural light and open spaces. The yacht has several lounges, including a main salon, a sky lounge, and a beach club. The beach club is located at the stern and includes a swimming pool, a cinema, and a gym.

Support Vessel

The Y721 also comes with a support vessel, the YS7512, which is a 75-meter Damen Yacht. The support vessel is designed to carry additional equipment, such as helicopters, tenders, and water toys. The support vessel also includes accommodation for additional guests and crew.

Toys and Entertainment

The Y721 is equipped with a range of toys and entertainment options to keep guests entertained during their stay. The yacht has a variety of water toys, including jet skis, paddleboards, and kayaks. The yacht also has a submarine, which can take guests on underwater excursions.

In addition to the water toys, the yacht has a cinema and a selection of board games and books. The yacht also has a wooden sculpture on display, adding to the yacht's artistic appeal.

Overall, the Y721 is an impressive yacht with a range of features that make it stand out from other superyachts. From the spacious layout to the range of amenities and toys on offer, the yacht is sure to provide guests with a memorable experience.

Media Coverage

News coverage.

Jeff Bezos' new yacht has been the subject of much media attention since its completion. Major news outlets such as The New York Times, BBC News, and CNN have all reported on the yacht, with some referring to it as a "superyacht" and others as a "megayacht". The yacht, named Koru, is reportedly worth $500 million and is 417 feet long.

News coverage of the yacht has focused on its size, luxury, and the fact that it is owned by one of the world's wealthiest individuals. Some reports have also speculated about the yacht's environmental impact, given its size and the fact that it is a sailing yacht rather than a motor yacht.

Social Media

The yacht has also generated significant buzz on social media platforms such as Twitter and Instagram. Many users have shared photos and videos of the yacht, expressing awe at its size and opulence. Some have also criticized Bezos for spending so much money on a yacht, arguing that the funds could be put to better use elsewhere.

The yacht has also been the subject of memes and jokes on social media, with some users poking fun at its size and the fact that it reportedly requires a smaller yacht to transport its support equipment.

Overall, media coverage of Jeff Bezos' new yacht has been extensive, with both traditional news outlets and social media users weighing in on the yacht's significance. While some have praised the yacht as a symbol of personal growth and renewal for Bezos, others have criticized it as a display of excessive wealth and indulgence.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the name of jeff bezos' yacht.

Jeff Bezos' yacht is called "Koru".

How big is Jeff Bezos' yacht?

Koru is a three-masted sailing yacht that is 127 meters (417 feet) long.

Who designed Jeff Bezos' yacht?

Koru was designed by the Dutch yacht builder, Oceanco.

What is the cost of Jeff Bezos' yacht?

The estimated cost of Koru is $500 million.

Where was Jeff Bezos' yacht built?

Koru was built in the Netherlands by Oceanco.

How many crew members are on Jeff Bezos' yacht?

It is not clear how many crew members are on Koru, but it is expected to have a large crew to maintain and operate the yacht.

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Home » Blog » Buy a boat » Used boat values guide

Used boat values guide

By Author Robin Urquhart

Posted on Last updated: August 18, 2023

Understanding used boat values should be like understanding car prices, right? Just look up the NADA or Kelley blue book value and you’re on your way.

Unfortunately, it’s not that easy! Why? Because many personal watercraft and boat models aren’t listed in boat value guides.

How do I find the value of my boat?

There are a few different ways to find out what a boat is worth .

• Hire a professional. Pay a surveyor or broker to tell you what your boat is worth
• Use online calculators. If you have a common boat make and model, there are several sites you can use to look up used boat values. These are especially helpful if you’re interested in popular and new models, but less useful for uncommon and old boats.
• Do your own boat value calculation . We’ll show you how to roughly estimate the value of a boat and walk you through an example. Don’t worry, the math is easy and we’ve provided a free downloadable calculator at the end of this post.

Hire a professional: marine surveyors, boat brokers, marine mechanics

While there’s no substitute for doing your own research, sometimes it’s helpful to get a professional opinion. Here are some of the service providers that can help you value a used boat.

Marine surveyors

What does a marine surveyor do.

A marine surveyor will physically inspect the boat and tell you what they think the boat is worth. Usually, this takes place on the dock or in a boatyard and doesn’t include sea trials.

How much should a marine survey cost?

Boat survey cost varies depending on the type of survey being performed. A purchase survey may cost upwards of $18 per foot of boat length , whereas a less detailed insurance condition and valuation survey may cost upwards of $16 per foot.

What is involved in a marine survey?

• Purchase condition and valuation ($18+ per foot). This involves a deep 3-6 hour inspection. The surveyor will ask to see the boat both in the water and out of the water. The final report for purchase surveys will list both a “replacement value” and a “market value” as well as any deficiencies.
• Insurance condition and valuation ($16+ per foot): This survey is less expensive and less detailed. It’s more for boat owners who are looking to insure their boats. Most insurance companies ask owners to submit a recent survey of the vessel. While not as detailed as the previous survey, it will still provide you with a suggested boat market value.

Do I really need to hire a professional marine surveyor?

It comes down to your boat knowledge, the complexity of the boat, and your financial risk tolerance.

If you’re new to boating you’ll want an experienced eye to help you assess the boat for safety and help you figure out a fair price.

If you’re buying something small and simple like a kayak or dinghy, a visual inspection will likely reveal any potential problems.

However, boat systems can be extremely complex on larger vessels and that’s where a professional marine surveyor’s opinion will pay dividends .

Keep in mind, that while a boat survey may seem expensive, it could actually save you money over the course of the sales transaction. A surveyor will be able to spot problems with the boat that you might miss which can help you negotiate a lower purchase price .

Generally speaking, if you’re spending more than $5,000 on a boat , or plan on financing it through a boat loan it’s probably worth having it professionally surveyed.

How do I find a good boat surveyor?

Your best bet is to look for surveyors affiliated with the National Association of Marine Surveyors (NAMS) or the Society of Accredited Marine Surveyors (SAMS) . You can search for a surveyor in your area on the NAMS and SAMS websites.

Ask other boaters for a  recommendation on a marine surveyor in your area. Some surveyors are more experienced, knowledgeable, and expensive than others.

For example, there is a surveyor in the Pacific Northwest who earned the nickname “Dr. Doom” by being so thorough that he almost always finds problems with a boat.

Interview potential surveyors and ask what type of boat they specialize in . Some will be more familiar with sail, while others may have a specialty like pontoon boats, houseboats, or wooden hulls.

Boat brokers

A boat broker or boat dealer is the equivalent of a realtor in the boating world . They can be very helpful in determining used boat values, not only because brokers have an experienced eye and a sense for the local market, but also because they have access to a very special data set.

Boat dealers who advertise on YachtWorld (which most do) have access to a massive private database that shows the actual selling prices for boats (not just the list prices that regular users see).

Should I use a boat broker to buy a boat?

While boat brokers generally represent the selling party, you can hire one to represent you as a buyer.

If you don’t hire a broker it’s still worth calling their offices to get their thoughts on the value of your boat or a boat you’re interested in. Usually, they’re very friendly and happy to share their knowledge. They may even point you in the direction of a good deal that you’d missed.

How much is a boat broker?

A broker is paid a commission by the seller (usually in the neighborhood of 10% of the selling price).

Marine mechanics

Used boat values are heavily impacted by the condition of a boat’s engine because engines are so expensive to replace. In some situations, a boat might be worth next to nothing if the engine is shot.

While engine hours can be a useful indicator, even a brand-new engine could have lurking issues. For that reason, some potential buyers will hire a marine mechanic to inspect the outboard motor or engine before purchasing a boat.

If you’re concerned about a boat’s engine you can also take a sample of the boat’s fuel and send it off to a fuel lab, they’ll send you a report with valuable information on the condition of the engine.

Check an online boat value calculator

There are a few boat pricing guides that allow you to look up used boat values. These can be helpful for finding average prices on relatively new boats.

• J.D. Power NADA Guides
• Kelley Blue Book (personal watercraft only)

While online calculators like the NADA boat guide may be able to provide you with a boat book value, they pose a couple of issues:

• Your boat may not be listed. The problem with the NADA boat prices calculator is that the National Automobile Dealers Association (NADA) only has listings for the most popular boat types , makes, and models . If you’re researching a common boat, you might be able to use this to look up prices. However, anything else is unlikely to be listed.
• The listed prices are averages and don’t consider individual deficiencies (or upgrades) specific to a particular boat. Even if you find a used boat price listed in NADA, it doesn’t mean that it’s an accurate price for your particular boat.

How to estimate a boat’s value (when it’s not listed on NADA Boat values)

Boat value guides like NADA and Kelley Blue Book can offer useful data points. However, it’s important to do your own research.

We’ll share how we estimate a boat’s value but bear in mind that our process may not apply in your situation. Do your research, use your judgment, and seek out a professional opinion (see above).

STEP 1: Evaluate the list price

We always take the listed price with a few grains of salt. From talking to yacht broker friends and from our own experiences, we’ve found that boats often don’t sell for the list price . In fact, most of our first offers have been in the range of 70-80% of the list price. 

Craigslist is especially useful for finding cheap boats, we share the  secrets for searching out great deals on Craigslist .

If we are interested in a boat, one of the first things we do is ask for a copy of the most recent yacht survey. The survey will tell us a bit about the boat’s history and what the boat was worth at the time of the survey.

Beware of sellers who use 10-year-old survey reports to justify their current asking price!

I go on Craigslist and find a Dufour 35 sailboat from 1979, listed at $20,000. I contact the seller and ask for the most recent survey. They send me a 15-year-old survey that lists the boat’s value as $45,000.

STEP 2: Do some comparison shopping

We always start by comparing the boat we’re interested in with similar boats, both locally and around the world .

There are dozens of sites you can check, but in general, we find these to be the best places to buy a used boat .

Looking at the sales prices in the local area is a good place to start. We first check out the used boats in our local area by searching yacht brokers, classified ads, Craigslist, and Kijiji w ithin a 500-mile radius.

Next, we search on Yachtworld and Sailboat Listings of the boat’s exact year and model.

There are three important things to consider when comparing used boats

• The condition. Some boats are better maintained than others. A boat in good condition will command a higher price than a boat in poor condition.
• The location. Some boat markets are cheaper than others (e.g., boats cost less in Mexico and more in Australia)
• The year the boat was built. As with cars, expect lower prices for older boats (e.g., a 20-year-old fishing boat should be worth less than one build last year)

If you can’t find more than one or two comparable boats of the same model, you could expand your search to include slightly larger or smaller boats made by the same boat manufacturer. Failing that you could look at similar boat types and sizes made by other boat manufacturers.

I search for Dufour 35s on Craigslist, Kijiji, Yachtworld, and Sailboat Listings, and here are the results:

STEP 3: Use a price curve to estimate the market value of a used boat over time

In evaluating a particular boat we have as gone as far as making depreciation curves. Don’t worry—it sounds complicated, but it’s not. You can download our free calculator at the bottom of this post .

We collect all the listings for comparable boats in Excel and then plot them on a scatter-plot graph.

For example, if we are looking at a 41’ Beneteau, we search for all Beneteaus in the 40-43’ range. We put the age and price of every boat into an Excel document and plot them on a scatter-plot graph.

Next, we add a trend line (usually polynomial, order 2) to fit the data. This will give us an idea of what the price of the boat is doing over time and we can project where the price will be going in the next few years.

If we were planning to sell in a few years we would want to keep the boat resale values in mind and choose a year near the beginning of a low slope segment of the trend line.

Sometimes the trend line is skewed by overly-idealistic sellers or junk boats, which we consider outliers and often strike from the data.

I plug the prices I find into the Calculator (download yours for FREE at the end of this post) and I get the following trend line. The more data points (comparable boats) you add to the Excel sheet the better your estimate will be! Having only five data points is not great, but it’s all I could find for a Dufour 35. Based on this curve line I should assume that a 1979 Dufour 35 (the boat I’m thinking of buying) is worth ~ $29,000.

STEP 4: Estimate what it will cost to get the boat to “fair” condition

When we go to inspect a boat, we  write down any projects and repairs that will need to be done (see our boat inspection checklist ).

Our goal is to list all the boat systems that need work and any parts that should be repaired or replaced. If you’re not experienced with boat systems and mechanics, hire a professional or bring a friend who is.

Next, we assign a material and labor cost to each project.

In general, we don’t add normal maintenance costs because that would skew the value and be unfair to the seller. The exception is if the seller hasn’t been maintaining the boat and we would be playing catch up.

We add all of the repair costs to the list price for a total (which is usually depressingly high). We often multiply the repair costs by 1.25 as we’ve found we are usually optimistic about price and time.

It’s also a good idea to ask the owner what they’ll be taking off the boat. Sometimes owners will want to exclude electronics or outboard motors from the sale, which can amount to a fair chunk of change.

Upon inspecting the Dufour 35 I discover there is some work to be done! The GPS doesn’t work ($1,000 replacement cost), the mainsail is wrecked beyond repair ( $2,000 replacement cost) and the furler needs to be replaced ($3,000). I’ll have to spend at least $6,000 fixing up the boat, which I multiply by a factor of 1.25 (because there will likely be additional fixes!). So, I estimate it will be $7,500 to get the boat into “fair” condition.

STEP 5: Putting it all together

When you combine the list price and the cost of repairs you’ll be left with the actual price of the boat . Compare this to the comparable estimated price (Step 2) and you’ll have a sense of whether the boat is priced too high, too low, or just right!

If it’s in the right price range, it’s a good time to start thinking about transportation, taxation, and financing costs. You can often score a great deal if you search farther afield but you have to factor in any moving costs and taxes. Ask yourself:

• Will you have to ship the boat?
• Does the price include a boat trailer?
• Will you pay taxes or duties?
• Will you need to finance your boat? If so, have you looked into boat loans?

If you’re thinking of buying abroad, you might want to learn about sailboat arbitrage —the art of buying and selling boats in the right markets. Some people have even managed to sail around the world for free by buying and selling their boats in the right geographies.

When I take the list price ($20,000) and add the repair costs ($7,500) I realize the boat will cost me $27,500 in total. When I compare that to my comparable estimated price of $29,000, I can see that this boat is in the right ballpark and probably fairly priced. 

A COUPLE OF ADDITIONAL THINGS TO CONSIDER

Emotional pricing.

Sometimes owners put so much money and hard work into a boat that they value the boat higher than the market does. It takes time and a few offers to wear down the emotional seller to a more rational price point.

Sometimes, the seller sets an idealistic price and won’t budge because they don’t really want to sell.  We have encountered this a few times and we move on to the next boat.

Emotional buying

The corollary to emotional pricing is emotional buying.

Sometimes we fall in love with a boat; something about the interior layout or the lines or the color of the hull, even the name can have a profound influence.

We can’t help but let our emotions into the decision-making process, but we have found that they should be reserved for the final decision. To minimize our emotions, we try to quantify everything in terms of numbers and put it in an Excel sheet.

A final note: Determining used boat values is more art than science. Take all of this with a grain of salt and USE YOUR JUDGMENT! The calculator and recommendations above are in no way meant to be a substitute for professional advice.

As Publilius Syrus wrote: “Something is only worth  what someone is  willing to pay  for it”. Good luck and happy boat buying!

Ready to make an offer? Make sure you read about  making an offer on a boat  and how to get the best price without losing the deal .

Download your FREE Boat Pricing Calculator

Robin was born and raised in the Canadian North. His first memory of travel on water was by dogsled across a frozen lake. After studying environmental science and engineering he moved to Vancouver aboard a 35’ sailboat with his partner, Fiona, with the idea to fix up the boat and sail around the world. He has written for several sailing publications including SAIL, Cruising World, and was previously a contributing editor at Good Old Boat.

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• Yachting World
• Digital Edition

Video: See inside 9 of the most amazing modern sailing superyachts

• September 10, 2020

Sailing superyacht technology has come on in leaps and bounds in recent years - we take a closer look at nine of the most stunning examples...

1. Aquarius

The brief for Aquarius included that she should be, ‘an elegant, muscular sailing yacht with a classic profile for family enjoyment.’ But that barely scratches the surface of the main requirements for this giant ketch. The owners also wanted a yacht that would combine good seakeeping characteristics with performance, reliability and quality.

Essential features included relative simplicity, robustness of systems and a contemporary interpretation of elegant, classic lines, with a clean and uncomplicated appearance. Aquarius ’s graceful lines and timeless shape belie a rugged world cruiser configured to be self-sufficient for extended periods when voyaging well beyond the popular Med and Caribbean circuits. In addition, the yacht is welcoming for family and friends, while providing sufficient performance to compete in superyacht regattas.

Specifications

LOA: 56.18m (184ft 4in) LWL: 41.17m (135ft 1in) Beam: 9.51m (31ft 2in) Draught: 4.80m (15ft 9in) Displacement: 264 tonnes (591,360lbs) Mainsail: 520m2 (5,597ft2) Mizzen: 440m2 (4,736ft2) Blade: 430m2 (4,628ft2) Air draught: 58.50m (192ft 11in) Spars: Rondal carbon with Rondal/Carbo-Link continuous standing rigging Builder: Royal Huisman Launched: 2017

Photo: Baltic Yachts

2. Pink Gin VI

The Baltic 175 Pink Gin may have captured most of the headlines for her sheer size and cleverly engineered topside balconies, but below decks a collection of Cuban art and some phenomenal styling demand equal attention.

Mark Tucker’s team at Design Unlimited in the UK worked closely with the yacht’s owner, Professor Hans Georg Näder, with whom they had co-operated on his previous Pink Gin , to produce an unusual exercise in interior styling.

LOA: 53.90m (176ft 10in) LWL: 45.27 m (148ft 6in) Beam: 9.55 m (31ft 4in) Draft: 4.50-7.00 m (14ft 9in – 22ft 12in) Displacement: 250 tons (560,000lbs) Ballast: 79 tons (176,960lbs) Naval architect: Judel/Vrolijk & co Interior: Design Unlimited Builder: Baltic Launched: 2017

Article continues below…

Liara: The Baltic 112 superyacht designed to cruise the world in supreme comfort

Over the past decade we’ve been treated to the rise of the custom built cruiser-racer. Arguably inspired by the success…

Aquarius: Modern classic masterpiece makes for a surprisingly sensible superyacht

A demanding brief for Aquarius from experienced sailors has produced a masterpiece from some of the most experienced and talented…

The Baltic 142 Canova  may not be using the hydrofoils popularised by the America’s Cup , but her 29ft 6in long (9m) horizontal sliding foil employs the same principle of lift to reduce heel and boost speed. The designers of the Dynamic Stability System (DSS) say it could improve the performance of this super-cruiser by 20 per cent, delivering a sustained 25 knots – not bad for a superyacht that displaces 146 tonnes. This is the first time the DSS has been used in superyachting, but its benefits will be used for comfortable, fast long-distance cruising rather than gaining an edge on the racecourse.

With styling and interior design by Lucio Micheletti as well as the in-house team, Canova  sports a sleek, low deck saloon with a hard, fixed bimini extending over the forward cockpit area. Below, her vast deck saloon, providing panoramic views, forms the focal point of her luxury accommodation.

Unusually, the owner’s suite is located almost amidships, where motion is at its least, with further accommodation for six guests in three cabins. Other features include a Rondal rig with electric in-boom furling, a lifting keel and a propeller leg rotating through 180 degrees.

LOA: 43.3m (142ft 1in) LWL: 41.6m (136ft 6in) Beam: 9.m (29ft 6in) Draft: 3.8-6.5m (12ft 6in-21ft 4in) Displacement: 146.5 tons (328,160lbs) Naval architect: Farr Yacht Design Interior design: Baltic Yachts / Lucio Micheletti Exterior design: Lucio Micheletti Builder: Baltic Launched: 2019

Photo: Perini Navi

Part of the world’s largest sailing yacht series by length, Seven is hull number 3 in Perini Navi’s 60m ketch series, after Seahawk and Perseus 3 . Launched in 2017, she was feted for her groundbreaking interior lighting design throughout all five guest cabins. A powerful motor-sailer, her twin MTU engines and 47,000-litre fuel capacity mean a globe-trotting range of 3,600nm when motoring at 12 knots.

LOA: 60m (197ft) LWL: 50.4m (165ft 4in) Beam: 11.4m (37ft 4in) Draft: 4.3m-12.3m (14ft 1in – 40ft 4in) Mast height: 62.2m (204ft) Total sail area: 2,097 m2 (22,572ft2) Displacement: 575 tonnes (1,288,000 lbs) Naval architect: Ron Holland / Perini Navi Builder: Perini Navi Launched: 2017

Photo: Gilles Martin-Raget / Wally

This may be the fourth 100ft yacht designed to the Wallycento box rule, but it’s one that raises the bar with regard to combining form and functionality with outrageously cool aesthetics. Considering that Wally is yachting’s deity of style, that’s saying something.

Tango is at the very forefront of modern fast monohull design and advanced technology. Its stealthy black livery and long, low lines combine with a bold reverse sheerline to create a potent, powerful look. The ruthlessly clean deck is signature Wally. The image of the single helmsman on deck, with all that power and beauty controlled simply by the touch of a network of buttons on the pedestals, has become an icon for the Italian brand.

LOA: 30.48m (100ft) Beam: 7.20m (23ft 7in) Draught: 4.4-6.2m (14ft 5in-20ft 4in) Displacement (light): 47,500kg (104,720lb) Upwind sail area: 640m2 (6,889ft2) Downwind sail area: 1,398m2 (15,048ft2) Naval architecture: Mills Design Exterior design: Wally / Mills Design Interior design: Pininfarina Builder: Persico Marine Launched: 2017

Photo: Breed Media

The owner’s brief for Ngoni would be challenging for any size of yacht: “Build me a beast. Don’t build me a sheep in wolf’s clothing. This has to be an edgy and innovative weapon; fast and furious.” When the boat in question is a giant 58m (190ft) sloop with a displacement of nearly 400 tonnes this project was always going to push hard against existing boundaries of design, deck hardware and materials technology.

“The owner wanted me to take a fresh look at large yacht design,” Dubois recalled before his untimely death four years ago. “He wanted me to go back to my roots in the late 1970s and ’80s when we were designing race boats, but he also knew we had designed a number of high-performance yachts that were nevertheless seaworthy and comfortable cruisers. So I had to reset my internal computer, if you like, and look hard at how we could save weight and add strength.

“That’s how the reverse sheer came about. I was worried he might not like it. The next time we met in London I showed him the design and he loved it – in fact he gave me a big bear hug!”

LOA: 58.15m 190ft 9in LWL: 51.20m 167ft 12in Beam: 9.54m 31ft 4in Draught: 5.3m-81m (17ft 5in-26ft 7in) Displacement: 353 tons (778,224lb) Upwind sail area: 1,950m2 (20,989ft2) Downwind sail area: 3,093m2 (33,293ft2) Air draught: 75m (247ft) Naval architect: Ed Dubois Interior design: Paul Morgan / Rick Baker Builder: Royal Huisman Launched: 2017

Photo: Vitters Shipyard

Ahimsa is a 216ft sloop-rigged aluminum yacht, designed by the late Ed Dubois. Built with a combination of innovation and advanced technical craftsmanship, Ahimsa boasts a low superstructure and deck clean. Key features include the ability to hoist her mainsail in less than two minutes and tack the boat within 30 seconds.

The 83m carbonfibre mast is the largest ever produced by Southern Spars and had to be transported to The Netherlands in two pieces. As if that wasn’t impressive enough, Ahimsa ‘s Code 1 sail is the world’s largest artwork on canvas, designed by the Norwegian artist Magne Furuholmen.

LOA: 66m (216ft 6in) Mast height: 83m (272ft 4in) Naval architect: Ed Dubois Builder: Vitters Launched: 2012

Svea , the newest addition to the now nine-strong J Class fleet, is one of the most outstanding new yachts of modern times – a harmonious meeting of historic and modern design; a blend of J Class lines and maxi grand prix yacht technology.

All Js dazzle on the water, but Svea simply stops you in your tracks. Her lines and deck are kept spectacularly clean, thanks to the compact wheelhouse, sunken wheel and wonderfully low boom.

Her dark metallic grey hull and black and red sail wardrobe lend her timeless lines a slightly menacing appearance – a purposeful racing look that belies the luxurious interior below decks. The aggressive aesthetics are in keeping with her name, a Viking word (it means Swede).

LOA: 43.6m (143ft 1in) Interior design: Pieter Beeldsnijder / deVos deVries design Builder: Vitters/Bloemsma Launched: 2017

Not only is Liara a masterpiece of style, thanks to UK-based super designers Malcolm McKeon and Adam Lay combining to stunning effect, but she clearly represents a formidable amount of experience. And that all stems from the boss.

This is the fourth Liara for British serial yacht owner Tony Todd, who is now in his seventies. His initial brief was for a safe, comfortable family cruising yacht for circumnavigating the globe , hence the deep and well-protected cockpit. However, Todd has been racing yachts all his life, and once his competitive side kicked in and the odd regatta was mentioned, the speed, weight and deck layout to make this possible became critical features. The result is Liara , the definitive multi-role superyacht.

Specification

LOA: 112ft 0in (34.14m) LWL: 105ft 0in (32.00m) Beam: 25ft 11in (7.90m) Draught: 13ft 0in-20ft 2in (3.95m-6.15m) Displacement (light): 88 tonnes (194,000 lbs) Design: Malcolm McKeon / Adam Lay Builder: Baltic Launched: 2019

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The Haves and the Have-Yachts

In the Victorian era, it was said that the length of a man’s boat, in feet, should match his age, in years. The Victorians would have had some questions at the fortieth annual Palm Beach International Boat Show, which convened this March on Florida’s Gold Coast. A typical offering: a two-hundred-and-three-foot superyacht named Sea Owl, selling secondhand for ninety million dollars. The owner, Robert Mercer, the hedge-fund tycoon and Republican donor, was throwing in furniture and accessories, including several auxiliary boats, a Steinway piano, a variety of frescoes, and a security system that requires fingerprint recognition. Nevertheless, Mercer’s package was a modest one; the largest superyachts are more than five hundred feet, on a scale with naval destroyers, and cost six or seven times what he was asking.

For the small, tight-lipped community around the world’s biggest yachts, the Palm Beach show has the promising air of spring training. On the cusp of the summer season, it affords brokers and builders and owners (or attendants from their family offices) a chance to huddle over the latest merchandise and to gather intelligence: Who’s getting in? Who’s getting out? And, most pressingly, who’s ogling a bigger boat?

On the docks, brokers parse the crowd according to a taxonomy of potential. Guests asking for tours face a gantlet of greeters, trained to distinguish “superrich clients” from “ineligible visitors,” in the words of Emma Spence, a former greeter at the Palm Beach show. Spence looked for promising clues (the right shoes, jewelry, pets) as well as for red flags (cameras, ornate business cards, clothes with pop-culture references). For greeters from elsewhere, Palm Beach is a challenging assignment. Unlike in Europe, where money can still produce some visible tells—Hunter Wellies, a Barbour jacket—the habits of wealth in Florida offer little that’s reliable. One colleague resorted to binoculars, to spot a passerby with a hundred-thousand-dollar watch. According to Spence, people judged to have insufficient buying power are quietly marked for “dissuasion.”

For the uninitiated, a pleasure boat the length of a football field can be bewildering. Andy Cohen, the talk-show host, recalled his first visit to a superyacht owned by the media mogul Barry Diller: “I was like the Beverly Hillbillies.” The boats have grown so vast that some owners place unique works of art outside the elevator on each deck, so that lost guests don’t barge into the wrong stateroom.

At the Palm Beach show, I lingered in front of a gracious vessel called Namasté, until I was dissuaded by a wooden placard: “Private yacht, no boarding, no paparazzi.” In a nearby berth was a two-hundred-and-eighty-foot superyacht called Bold, which was styled like a warship, with its own helicopter hangar, three Sea-Doos, two sailboats, and a color scheme of gunmetal gray. The rugged look is a trend; “explorer” vessels, equipped to handle remote journeys, are the sport-utility vehicles of yachting.

If you hail from the realm of ineligible visitors, you may not be aware that we are living through the “greatest boom in the yacht business that’s ever existed,” as Bob Denison—whose firm, Denison Yachting, is one of the world’s largest brokers—told me. “Every broker, every builder, up and down the docks, is having some of the best years they’ve ever experienced.” In 2021, the industry sold a record eight hundred and eighty-seven superyachts worldwide, nearly twice the previous year’s total. With more than a thousand new superyachts on order, shipyards are so backed up that clients unaccustomed to being told no have been shunted to waiting lists.

One reason for the increased demand for yachts is the pandemic. Some buyers invoke social distancing; others, an existential awakening. John Staluppi, of Palm Beach Gardens, who made a fortune from car dealerships, is looking to upgrade from his current, sixty-million-dollar yacht. “When you’re forty or fifty years old, you say, ‘I’ve got plenty of time,’ ” he told me. But, at seventy-five, he is ready to throw in an extra fifteen million if it will spare him three years of waiting. “Is your life worth five million dollars a year? I think so,” he said. A deeper reason for the demand is the widening imbalance of wealth. Since 1990, the United States’ supply of billionaires has increased from sixty-six to more than seven hundred, even as the median hourly wage has risen only twenty per cent. In that time, the number of truly giant yachts—those longer than two hundred and fifty feet—has climbed from less than ten to more than a hundred and seventy. Raphael Sauleau, the C.E.O. of Fraser Yachts, told me bluntly, “ COVID and wealth—a perfect storm for us.”

And yet the marina in Palm Beach was thrumming with anxiety. Ever since the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, launched his assault on Ukraine, the superyacht world has come under scrutiny. At a port in Spain, a Ukrainian engineer named Taras Ostapchuk, working aboard a ship that he said was owned by a Russian arms dealer, threw open the sea valves and tried to sink it to the bottom of the harbor. Under arrest, he told a judge, “I would do it again.” Then he returned to Ukraine and joined the military. Western allies, in the hope of pressuring Putin to withdraw, have sought to cut off Russian oligarchs from businesses and luxuries abroad. “We are coming for your ill-begotten gains,” President Joe Biden declared, in his State of the Union address.

Nobody can say precisely how many of Putin’s associates own superyachts—known to professionals as “white boats”—because the white-boat world is notoriously opaque. Owners tend to hide behind shell companies, registered in obscure tax havens, attended by private bankers and lawyers. But, with unusual alacrity, authorities have used subpoenas and police powers to freeze boats suspected of having links to the Russian élite. In Spain, the government detained a hundred-and-fifty-million-dollar yacht associated with Sergei Chemezov, the head of the conglomerate Rostec, whose bond with Putin reaches back to their time as K.G.B. officers in East Germany. (As in many cases, the boat is not registered to Chemezov; the official owner is a shell company connected to his stepdaughter, a teacher whose salary is likely about twenty-two hundred dollars a month.) In Germany, authorities impounded the world’s most voluminous yacht, Dilbar, for its ties to the mining-and-telecom tycoon Alisher Usmanov. And in Italy police have grabbed a veritable armada, including a boat owned by one of Russia’s richest men, Alexei Mordashov, and a colossus suspected of belonging to Putin himself, the four-hundred-and-fifty-nine-foot Scheherazade.

In Palm Beach, the yachting community worried that the same scrutiny might be applied to them. “Say your superyacht is in Asia, and there’s some big conflict where China invades Taiwan,” Denison told me. “China could spin it as ‘Look at these American oligarchs!’ ” He wondered if the seizures of superyachts marked a growing political animus toward the very rich. “Whenever things are economically or politically disruptive,” he said, “it’s hard to justify taking an insane amount of money and just putting it into something that costs a lot to maintain, depreciates, and is only used for having a good time.”

Nobody pretends that a superyacht is a productive place to stash your wealth. In a column this spring headlined “ A SUPERYACHT IS A TERRIBLE ASSET ,” the Financial Times observed, “Owning a superyacht is like owning a stack of 10 Van Goghs, only you are holding them over your head as you tread water, trying to keep them dry.”

Not so long ago, status transactions among the élite were denominated in Old Masters and in the sculptures of the Italian Renaissance. Joseph Duveen, the dominant art dealer of the early twentieth century, kept the oligarchs of his day—Andrew Mellon, Jules Bache, J. P. Morgan—jockeying over Donatellos and Van Dycks. “When you pay high for the priceless,” he liked to say, “you’re getting it cheap.”

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In the nineteen-fifties, the height of aspirational style was fine French furniture—F.F.F., as it became known in certain precincts of Fifth Avenue and Palm Beach. Before long, more and more money was going airborne. Hugh Hefner, a pioneer in the private-jet era, decked out a plane he called Big Bunny, where he entertained Elvis Presley, Raquel Welch, and James Caan. The oil baron Armand Hammer circled the globe on his Boeing 727, paying bribes and recording evidence on microphones hidden in his cufflinks. But, once it seemed that every plutocrat had a plane, the thrill was gone.

In any case, an airplane is just transportation. A big ship is a floating manse, with a hierarchy written right into the nomenclature. If it has a crew working aboard, it’s a yacht. If it’s more than ninety-eight feet, it’s a superyacht. After that, definitions are debated, but people generally agree that anything more than two hundred and thirty feet is a megayacht, and more than two hundred and ninety-five is a gigayacht. The world contains about fifty-four hundred superyachts, and about a hundred gigayachts.

For the moment, a gigayacht is the most expensive item that our species has figured out how to own. In 2019, the hedge-fund billionaire Ken Griffin bought a quadruplex on Central Park South for two hundred and forty million dollars, the highest price ever paid for a home in America. In May, an unknown buyer spent about a hundred and ninety-five million on an Andy Warhol silk-screen portrait of Marilyn Monroe. In luxury-yacht terms, those are ordinary numbers. “There are a lot of boats in build well over two hundred and fifty million dollars,” Jamie Edmiston, a broker in Monaco and London, told me. His buyers are getting younger and more inclined to spend long stretches at sea. “High-speed Internet, telephony, modern communications have made working easier,” he said. “Plus, people made a lot more money earlier in life.”

A Silicon Valley C.E.O. told me that one appeal of boats is that they can “absorb the most excess capital.” He explained, “Rationally, it would seem to make sense for people to spend half a billion dollars on their house and then fifty million on the boat that they’re on for two weeks a year, right? But it’s gone the other way. People don’t want to live in a hundred-thousand-square-foot house. Optically, it’s weird. But a half-billion-dollar boat, actually, is quite nice.” Staluppi, of Palm Beach Gardens, is content to spend three or four times as much on his yachts as on his homes. Part of the appeal is flexibility. “If you’re on your boat and you don’t like your neighbor, you tell the captain, ‘Let’s go to a different place,’ ” he said. On land, escaping a bad neighbor requires more work: “You got to try and buy him out or make it uncomfortable or something.” The preference for sea-based investment has altered the proportions of taste. Until recently, the Silicon Valley C.E.O. said, “a fifty-metre boat was considered a good-sized boat. Now that would be a little bit embarrassing.” In the past twenty years, the length of the average luxury yacht has grown by a third, to a hundred and sixty feet.

Thorstein Veblen, the economist who published “The Theory of the Leisure Class,” in 1899, argued that the power of “conspicuous consumption” sprang not from artful finery but from sheer needlessness. “In order to be reputable,” he wrote, “it must be wasteful.” In the yachting world, stories circulate about exotic deliveries by helicopter or seaplane: Dom Pérignon, bagels from Zabar’s, sex workers, a rare melon from the island of Hokkaido. The industry excels at selling you things that you didn’t know you needed. When you flip through the yachting press, it’s easy to wonder how you’ve gone this long without a personal submarine, or a cryosauna that “blasts you with cold” down to minus one hundred and ten degrees Celsius, or the full menagerie of “exclusive leathers,” such as eel and stingray.

But these shrines to excess capital exist in a conditional state of visibility: they are meant to be unmistakable to a slender stratum of society—and all but unseen by everyone else. Even before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the yachting community was straining to manage its reputation as a gusher of carbon emissions (one well-stocked diesel yacht is estimated to produce as much greenhouse gas as fifteen hundred passenger cars), not to mention the fact that the world of white boats is overwhelmingly white. In a candid aside to a French documentarian, the American yachtsman Bill Duker said, “If the rest of the world learns what it’s like to live on a yacht like this, they’re gonna bring back the guillotine.” The Dutch press recently reported that Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, was building a sailing yacht so tall that the city of Rotterdam might temporarily dismantle a bridge that had survived the Nazis in order to let the boat pass to the open sea. Rotterdammers were not pleased. On Facebook, a local man urged people to “take a box of rotten eggs with you and let’s throw them en masse at Jeff’s superyacht when it sails through.” At least thirteen thousand people expressed interest. Amid the uproar, a deputy mayor announced that the dismantling plan had been abandoned “for the time being.” (Bezos modelled his yacht partly on one owned by his friend Barry Diller, who has hosted him many times. The appreciation eventually extended to personnel, and Bezos hired one of Diller’s captains.)

As social media has heightened the scrutiny of extraordinary wealth, some of the very people who created those platforms have sought less observable places to spend it. But they occasionally indulge in some coded provocation. In 2006, when the venture capitalist Tom Perkins unveiled his boat in Istanbul, most passersby saw it adorned in colorful flags, but people who could read semaphore were able to make out a message: “Rarely does one have the privilege to witness vulgar ostentation displayed on such a scale.” As a longtime owner told me, “If you don’t have some guilt about it, you’re a rat.”

Alex Finley, a former C.I.A. officer who has seen yachts proliferate near her home in Barcelona, has weighed the superyacht era and its discontents in writings and on Twitter, using the hashtag #YachtWatch. “To me, the yachts are not just yachts,” she told me. “In Russia’s case, these are the embodiment of oligarchs helping a dictator destabilize our democracy while utilizing our democracy to their benefit.” But, Finley added, it’s a mistake to think the toxic symbolism applies only to Russia. “The yachts tell a whole story about a Faustian capitalism—this idea that we’re ready to sell democracy for short-term profit,” she said. “They’re registered offshore. They use every loophole that we’ve put in place for illicit money and tax havens. So they play a role in this battle, writ large, between autocracy and democracy.”

After a morning on the docks at the Palm Beach show, I headed to a more secluded marina nearby, which had been set aside for what an attendant called “the really big hardware.” It felt less like a trade show than like a boutique resort, with a swimming pool and a terrace restaurant. Kevin Merrigan, a relaxed Californian with horn-rimmed glasses and a high forehead pinked by the sun, was waiting for me at the stern of Unbridled, a superyacht with a brilliant blue hull that gave it the feel of a personal cruise ship. He invited me to the bridge deck, where a giant screen showed silent video of dolphins at play.

Merrigan is the chairman of the brokerage Northrop & Johnson, which has ridden the tide of growing boats and wealth since 1949. Lounging on a sofa mounded with throw pillows, he projected a nearly postcoital level of contentment. He had recently sold the boat we were on, accepted an offer for a behemoth beside us, and begun negotiating the sale of yet another. “This client owns three big yachts,” he said. “It’s a hobby for him. We’re at a hundred and ninety-one feet now, and last night he said, ‘You know, what do you think about getting a two hundred and fifty?’ ” Merrigan laughed. “And I was, like, ‘Can’t you just have dinner?’ ”

Among yacht owners, there are some unwritten rules of stratification: a Dutch-built boat will hold its value better than an Italian; a custom design will likely get more respect than a “series yacht”; and, if you want to disparage another man’s boat, say that it looks like a wedding cake. But, in the end, nothing says as much about a yacht, or its owner, as the delicate matter of L.O.A.—length over all.

The imperative is not usually length for length’s sake (though the longtime owner told me that at times there is an aspect of “phallic sizing”). “L.O.A.” is a byword for grandeur. In most cases, pleasure yachts are permitted to carry no more than twelve passengers, a rule set by the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea, which was conceived after the sinking of the Titanic. But those limits do not apply to crew. “So, you might have anything between twelve and fifty crew looking after those twelve guests,” Edmiston, the broker, said. “It’s a level of service you cannot really contemplate until you’ve been fortunate enough to experience it.”

As yachts have grown more capacious, and the limits on passengers have not, more and more space on board has been devoted to staff and to novelties. The latest fashions include IMAX theatres, hospital equipment that tests for dozens of pathogens, and ski rooms where guests can suit up for a helicopter trip to a mountaintop. The longtime owner, who had returned the previous day from his yacht, told me, “No one today—except for assholes and ridiculous people—lives on land in what you would call a deep and broad luxe life. Yes, people have nice houses and all of that, but it’s unlikely that the ratio of staff to them is what it is on a boat.” After a moment, he added, “Boats are the last place that I think you can get away with it.”

Even among the truly rich, there is a gap between the haves and the have-yachts. One boating guest told me about a conversation with a famous friend who keeps one of the world’s largest yachts. “He said, ‘The boat is the last vestige of what real wealth can do.’ What he meant is, You have a chef, and I have a chef. You have a driver, and I have a driver. You can fly privately, and I fly privately. So, the one place where I can make clear to the world that I am in a different fucking category than you is the boat.”

After Merrigan and I took a tour of Unbridled, he led me out to a waiting tender, staffed by a crew member with an earpiece on a coil. The tender, Merrigan said, would ferry me back to the busy main dock of the Palm Beach show. We bounced across the waves under a pristine sky, and pulled into the marina, where my fellow-gawkers were still trying to talk their way past the greeters. As I walked back into the scrum, Namasté was still there, but it looked smaller than I remembered.

For owners and their guests, a white boat provides a discreet marketplace for the exchange of trust, patronage, and validation. To diagram the precise workings of that trade—the customs and anxieties, strategies and slights—I talked to Brendan O’Shannassy, a veteran captain who is a curator of white-boat lore. Raised in Western Australia, O’Shannassy joined the Navy as a young man, and eventually found his way to skippering some of the world’s biggest yachts. He has worked for Paul Allen, the late co-founder of Microsoft, along with a few other billionaires he declines to name. Now in his early fifties, with patient green eyes and tufts of curly brown hair, O’Shannassy has had a vantage from which to monitor the social traffic. “It’s all gracious, and everyone’s kiss-kiss,” he said. “But there’s a lot going on in the background.”

O’Shannassy once worked for an owner who limited the number of newspapers on board, so that he could watch his guests wait and squirm. “It was a mind game amongst the billionaires. There were six couples, and three newspapers,” he said, adding, “They were ranking themselves constantly.” On some boats, O’Shannassy has found himself playing host in the awkward minutes after guests arrive. “A lot of them are savants, but some are very un-socially aware,” he said. “They need someone to be social and charming for them.” Once everyone settles in, O’Shannassy has learned, there is often a subtle shift, when a mogul or a politician or a pop star starts to loosen up in ways that are rarely possible on land. “Your security is relaxed—they’re not on your hip,” he said. “You’re not worried about paparazzi. So you’ve got all this extra space, both mental and physical.”

O’Shannassy has come to see big boats as a space where powerful “solar systems” converge and combine. “It is implicit in every interaction that their sharing of information will benefit both parties; it is an obsession with billionaires to do favours for each other. A referral, an introduction, an insight—it all matters,” he wrote in “Superyacht Captain,” a new memoir. A guest told O’Shannassy that, after a lavish display of hospitality, he finally understood the business case for buying a boat. “One deal secured on board will pay it all back many times over,” the guest said, “and it is pretty hard to say no after your kids have been hosted so well for a week.”

Take the case of David Geffen, the former music and film executive. He is long retired, but he hosts friends (and potential friends) on the four-hundred-and-fifty-four-foot Rising Sun, which has a double-height cinema, a spa and salon, and a staff of fifty-seven. In 2017, shortly after Barack and Michelle Obama departed the White House, they were photographed on Geffen’s boat in French Polynesia, accompanied by Bruce Springsteen, Oprah Winfrey, Tom Hanks, and Rita Wilson. For Geffen, the boat keeps him connected to the upper echelons of power. There are wealthier Americans, but not many of them have a boat so delectable that it can induce both a Democratic President and the workingman’s crooner to risk the aroma of hypocrisy.

The binding effect pays dividends for guests, too. Once people reach a certain level of fame, they tend to conclude that its greatest advantage is access. Spend a week at sea together, lingering over meals, observing one another floundering on a paddleboard, and you have something of value for years to come. Call to ask for an investment, an introduction, an internship for a wayward nephew, and you’ll at least get the call returned. It’s a mutually reinforcing circle of validation: she’s here, I’m here, we’re here.

But, if you want to get invited back, you are wise to remember your part of the bargain. If you work with movie stars, bring fresh gossip. If you’re on Wall Street, bring an insight or two. Don’t make the transaction obvious, but don’t forget why you’re there. “When I see the guest list,” O’Shannassy wrote, “I am aware, even if not all names are familiar, that all have been chosen for a purpose.”

For O’Shannassy, there is something comforting about the status anxieties of people who have everything. He recalled a visit to the Italian island of Sardinia, where his employer asked him for a tour of the boats nearby. Riding together on a tender, they passed one colossus after another, some twice the size of the owner’s superyacht. Eventually, the man cut the excursion short. “Take me back to my yacht, please,” he said. They motored in silence for a while. “There was a time when my yacht was the most beautiful in the bay,” he said at last. “How do I keep up with this new money?”

The summer season in the Mediterranean cranks up in May, when the really big hardware heads east from Florida and the Caribbean to escape the coming hurricanes, and reconvenes along the coasts of France, Italy, and Spain. At the center is the Principality of Monaco, the sun-washed tax haven that calls itself the “world’s capital of advanced yachting.” In Monaco, which is among the richest countries on earth, superyachts bob in the marina like bath toys.

The nearest hotel room at a price that would not get me fired was an Airbnb over the border with France. But an acquaintance put me on the phone with the Yacht Club de Monaco, a members-only establishment created by the late monarch His Serene Highness Prince Rainier III, whom the Web site describes as “a true visionary in every respect.” The club occasionally rents rooms—“cabins,” as they’re called—to visitors in town on yacht-related matters. Claudia Batthyany, the elegant director of special projects, showed me to my cabin and later explained that the club does not aspire to be a hotel. “We are an association ,” she said. “Otherwise, it becomes”—she gave a gentle wince—“not that exclusive.”

Inside my cabin, I quickly came to understand that I would never be fully satisfied anywhere else again. The space was silent and aromatically upscale, bathed in soft sunlight that swept through a wall of glass overlooking the water. If I was getting a sudden rush of the onboard experience, that was no accident. The clubhouse was designed by the British architect Lord Norman Foster to evoke the opulent indulgence of ocean liners of the interwar years, like the Queen Mary. I found a handwritten welcome note, on embossed club stationery, set alongside an orchid and an assemblage of chocolate truffles: “The whole team remains at your entire disposal to make your stay a wonderful experience. Yours sincerely, Service Members.” I saluted the nameless Service Members, toiling for the comfort of their guests. Looking out at the water, I thought, intrusively, of a line from Santiago, Hemingway’s old man of the sea. “Do not think about sin,” he told himself. “It is much too late for that and there are people who are paid to do it.”

I had been assured that the Service Members would cheerfully bring dinner, as they might on board, but I was eager to see more of my surroundings. I consulted the club’s summer dress code. It called for white trousers and a blue blazer, and it discouraged improvisation: “No pocket handkerchief is to be worn above the top breast-pocket bearing the Club’s coat of arms.” The handkerchief rule seemed navigable, but I did not possess white trousers, so I skirted the lobby and took refuge in the bar. At a table behind me, a man with flushed cheeks and a British accent had a head start. “You’re a shitty negotiator,” he told another man, with a laugh. “Maybe sales is not your game.” A few seats away, an American woman was explaining to a foreign friend how to talk with conservatives: “If they say, ‘The earth is flat,’ you say, ‘Well, I’ve sailed around it, so I’m not so sure about that.’ ”

In the morning, I had an appointment for coffee with Gaëlle Tallarida, the managing director of the Monaco Yacht Show, which the Daily Mail has called the “most shamelessly ostentatious display of yachts in the world.” Tallarida was not born to that milieu; she grew up on the French side of the border, swimming at public beaches with a view of boats sailing from the marina. But she had a knack for highly organized spectacle. While getting a business degree, she worked on a student theatre festival and found it thrilling. Afterward, she got a job in corporate events, and in 1998 she was hired at the yacht show as a trainee.

With this year’s show five months off, Tallarida was already getting calls about what she described as “the most complex part of my work”: deciding which owners get the most desirable spots in the marina. “As you can imagine, they’ve got very big egos,” she said. “On top of that, I’m a woman. They are sometimes arriving and saying”—she pointed into the distance, pantomiming a decree—“ ‘O.K., I want that!  ’ ”

Just about everyone wants his superyacht to be viewed from the side, so that its full splendor is visible. Most harbors, however, have a limited number of berths with a side view; in Monaco, there are only twelve, with prime spots arrayed along a concrete dike across from the club. “We reserve the dike for the biggest yachts,” Tallarida said. But try telling that to a man who blew his fortune on a small superyacht.

Whenever possible, Tallarida presents her verdicts as a matter of safety: the layout must insure that “in case of an emergency, any boat can go out.” If owners insist on preferential placement, she encourages a yachting version of the Golden Rule: “What if, next year, I do that to you? Against you?”

Does that work? I asked. She shrugged. “They say, ‘Eh.’ ” Some would gladly risk being a victim next year in order to be a victor now. In the most awful moment of her career, she said, a man who was unhappy with his berth berated her face to face. “I was in the office, feeling like a little girl, with my daddy shouting at me. I said, ‘O.K., O.K., I’m going to give you the spot.’ ”

Securing just the right place, it must be said, carries value. Back at the yacht club, I was on my terrace, enjoying the latest delivery by the Service Members—an airy French omelette and a glass of preternaturally fresh orange juice. I thought guiltily of my wife, at home with our kids, who had sent a text overnight alerting me to a maintenance issue that she described as “a toilet debacle.”

Then I was distracted by the sight of a man on a yacht in the marina below. He was staring up at me. I went back to my brunch, but, when I looked again, there he was—a middle-aged man, on a mid-tier yacht, juiceless, on a greige banquette, staring up at my perfect terrace. A surprising sensation started in my chest and moved outward like a warm glow: the unmistakable pang of superiority.

That afternoon, I made my way to the bar, to meet the yacht club’s general secretary, Bernard d’Alessandri, for a history lesson. The general secretary was up to code: white trousers, blue blazer, club crest over the heart. He has silver hair, black eyebrows, and a tan that evokes high-end leather. “I was a sailing teacher before this,” he said, and gestured toward the marina. “It was not like this. It was a village.”

Before there were yacht clubs, there were jachten , from the Dutch word for “hunt.” In the seventeenth century, wealthy residents of Amsterdam created fast-moving boats to meet incoming cargo ships before they hit port, in order to check out the merchandise. Soon, the Dutch owners were racing one another, and yachting spread across Europe. After a visit to Holland in 1697, Peter the Great returned to Russia with a zeal for pleasure craft, and he later opened Nevsky Flot, one of the world’s first yacht clubs, in St. Petersburg.

For a while, many of the biggest yachts were symbols of state power. In 1863, the viceroy of Egypt, Isma’il Pasha, ordered up a steel leviathan called El Mahrousa, which was the world’s longest yacht for a remarkable hundred and nineteen years, until the title was claimed by King Fahd of Saudi Arabia. In the United States, Franklin Delano Roosevelt received guests aboard the U.S.S. Potomac, which had a false smokestack containing a hidden elevator, so that the President could move by wheelchair between decks.

But yachts were finding new patrons outside politics. In 1954, the Greek shipping baron Aristotle Onassis bought a Canadian Navy frigate and spent four million dollars turning it into Christina O, which served as his home for months on end—and, at various times, as a home to his companions Maria Callas, Greta Garbo, and Jacqueline Kennedy. Christina O had its flourishes—a Renoir in the master suite, a swimming pool with a mosaic bottom that rose to become a dance floor—but none were more distinctive than the appointments in the bar, which included whales’ teeth carved into pornographic scenes from the Odyssey and stools upholstered in whale foreskins.

For Onassis, the extraordinary investments in Christina O were part of an epic tit for tat with his archrival, Stavros Niarchos, a fellow shipping tycoon, which was so entrenched that it continued even after Onassis’s death, in 1975. Six years later, Niarchos launched a yacht fifty-five feet longer than Christina O: Atlantis II, which featured a swimming pool on a gyroscope so that the water would not slosh in heavy seas. Atlantis II, now moored in Monaco, sat before the general secretary and me as we talked.

Over the years, d’Alessandri had watched waves of new buyers arrive from one industry after another. “First, it was the oil. After, it was the telecommunications. Now, they are making money with crypto,” he said. “And, each time, it’s another size of the boat, another design.” What began as symbols of state power had come to represent more diffuse aristocracies—the fortunes built on carbon, capital, and data that migrated across borders. As early as 1908, the English writer G. K. Chesterton wondered what the big boats foretold of a nation’s fabric. “The poor man really has a stake in the country,” he wrote. “The rich man hasn’t; he can go away to New Guinea in a yacht.”

Each iteration of fortune left its imprint on the industry. Sheikhs, who tend to cruise in the world’s hottest places, wanted baroque indoor spaces and were uninterested in sundecks. Silicon Valley favored acres of beige, more Sonoma than Saudi. And buyers from Eastern Europe became so abundant that shipyards perfected the onboard banya , a traditional Russian sauna stocked with birch and eucalyptus. The collapse of the Soviet Union, in 1991, had minted a generation of new billionaires, whose approach to money inspired a popular Russian joke: One oligarch brags to another, “Look at this new tie. It cost me two hundred bucks!” To which the other replies, “You moron. You could’ve bought the same one for a thousand!”

In 1998, around the time that the Russian economy imploded, the young tycoon Roman Abramovich reportedly bought a secondhand yacht called Sussurro—Italian for “whisper”—which had been so carefully engineered for speed that each individual screw was weighed before installation. Soon, Russians were competing to own the costliest ships. “If the most expensive yacht in the world was small, they would still want it,” Maria Pevchikh, a Russian investigator who helps lead the Anti-Corruption Foundation, told me.

In 2008, a thirty-six-year-old industrialist named Andrey Melnichenko spent some three hundred million dollars on Motor Yacht A, a radical experiment conceived by the French designer Philippe Starck, with a dagger-shaped hull and a bulbous tower topped by a master bedroom set on a turntable that pivots to capture the best view. The shape was ridiculed as “a giant finger pointing at you” and “one of the most hideous vessels ever to sail,” but it marked a new prominence for Russian money at sea. Today, post-Soviet élites are thought to own a fifth of the world’s gigayachts.

Even Putin has signalled his appreciation, being photographed on yachts in the Black Sea resort of Sochi. In an explosive report in 2012, Boris Nemtsov, a former Deputy Prime Minister, accused Putin of amassing a storehouse of outrageous luxuries, including four yachts, twenty homes, and dozens of private aircraft. Less than three years later, Nemtsov was fatally shot while crossing a bridge near the Kremlin. The Russian government, which officially reports that Putin collects a salary of about a hundred and forty thousand dollars and possesses a modest apartment in Moscow, denied any involvement.

Many of the largest, most flamboyant gigayachts are designed in Monaco, at a sleek waterfront studio occupied by the naval architect Espen Øino. At sixty, Øino has a boyish mop and the mild countenance of a country parson. He grew up in a small town in Norway, the heir to a humble maritime tradition. “My forefathers built wooden rowing boats for four generations,” he told me. In the late eighties, he was designing sailboats when his firm won a commission to design a megayacht for Emilio Azcárraga, the autocratic Mexican who built Televisa into the world’s largest Spanish-language broadcaster. Azcárraga was nicknamed El Tigre, for his streak of white hair and his comfort with confrontation; he kept a chair in his office that was unusually high off the ground, so that visitors’ feet dangled like children’s.

In early meetings, Øino recalled, Azcárraga grew frustrated that the ideas were not dazzling enough. “You must understand,” he said. “I don’t go to port very often with my boats, but, when I do, I want my presence to be felt.”

The final design was suitably arresting; after the boat was completed, Øino had no shortage of commissions. In 1998, he was approached by Paul Allen, of Microsoft, to build a yacht that opened the way for the Goliaths that followed. The result, called Octopus, was so large that it contained a submarine marina in its belly, as well as a helicopter hangar that could be converted into an outdoor performance space. Mick Jagger and Bono played on occasion. I asked Øino why owners obsessed with secrecy seem determined to build the world’s most conspicuous machines. He compared it to a luxury car with tinted windows. “People can’t see you, but you’re still in that expensive, impressive thing,” he said. “We all need to feel that we’re important in one way or another.”

In recent months, Øino has seen some of his creations detained by governments in the sanctions campaign. When we spoke, he condemned the news coverage. “Yacht equals Russian equals evil equals money,” he said disdainfully. “It’s a bit tragic, because the yachts have become synonymous with the bad guys in a James Bond movie.”

What about Scheherazade, the giant yacht that U.S. officials have alleged is held by a Russian businessman for Putin’s use? Øino, who designed the ship, rejected the idea. “We have designed two yachts for heads of state, and I can tell you that they’re completely different, in terms of the layout and everything, from Scheherazade.” He meant that the details said plutocrat, not autocrat.

For the time being, Scheherazade and other Øino creations under detention across Europe have entered a strange legal purgatory. As lawyers for the owners battle to keep the ships from being permanently confiscated, local governments are duty-bound to maintain them until a resolution is reached. In a comment recorded by a hot mike in June, Jake Sullivan, the U.S. national-security adviser, marvelled that “people are basically being paid to maintain Russian superyachts on behalf of the United States government.” (It usually costs about ten per cent of a yacht’s construction price to keep it afloat each year. In May, officials in Fiji complained that a detained yacht was costing them more than a hundred and seventy-one thousand dollars a day.)

Stranger still are the Russian yachts on the lam. Among them is Melnichenko’s much maligned Motor Yacht A. On March 9th, Melnichenko was sanctioned by the European Union, and although he denied having close ties to Russia’s leadership, Italy seized one of his yachts—a six-hundred-million-dollar sailboat. But Motor Yacht A slipped away before anyone could grab it. Then the boat turned off the transponder required by international maritime rules, so that its location could no longer be tracked. The last ping was somewhere near the Maldives, before it went dark on the high seas.

The very largest yachts come from Dutch and German shipyards, which have experience in naval vessels, known as “gray boats.” But the majority of superyachts are built in Italy, partly because owners prefer to visit the Mediterranean during construction. (A British designer advises those who are weighing their choices to take the geography seriously, “unless you like schnitzel.”)

In the past twenty-two years, nobody has built more superyachts than the Vitellis, an Italian family whose patriarch, Paolo Vitelli, got his start in the seventies, manufacturing smaller boats near a lake in the mountains. By 1985, their company, Azimut, had grown large enough to buy the Benetti shipyards, which had been building enormous yachts since the nineteenth century. Today, the combined company builds its largest boats near the sea, but the family still works in the hill town of Avigliana, where a medieval monastery towers above a valley. When I visited in April, Giovanna Vitelli, the vice-president and the founder’s daughter, led me through the experience of customizing a yacht.

“We’re using more and more virtual reality,” she said, and a staffer fitted me with a headset. When the screen blinked on, I was inside a 3-D mockup of a yacht that is not yet on the market. I wandered around my suite for a while, checking out swivel chairs, a modish sideboard, blond wood panelling on the walls. It was convincing enough that I collided with a real-life desk.

After we finished with the headset, it was time to pick the décor. The industry encourages an introspective evaluation: What do you want your yacht to say about you? I was handed a vibrant selection of wood, marble, leather, and carpet. The choices felt suddenly grave. Was I cut out for the chiselled look of Cream Vesuvio, or should I accept that I’m a gray Cardoso Stone? For carpets, I liked the idea of Chablis Corn White—Paris and the prairie, together at last. But, for extra seating, was it worth splurging for the V.I.P. Vanity Pouf?

Some designs revolve around a single piece of art. The most expensive painting ever sold, Leonardo da Vinci’s “Salvator Mundi,” reportedly was hung on the Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman’s four-hundred-and-thirty-nine-foot yacht Serene, after the Louvre rejected a Saudi demand that it hang next to the “Mona Lisa.” Art conservators blanched at the risks that excess humidity and fluctuating temperatures could pose to a five-hundred-year-old painting. Often, collectors who want to display masterpieces at sea commission replicas.

If you’ve just put half a billion dollars into a boat, you may have qualms about the truism that material things bring less happiness than experiences do. But this, too, can be finessed. Andrew Grant Super, a co-founder of the “experiential yachting” firm Berkeley Rand, told me that he served a uniquely overstimulated clientele: “We call them the bored billionaires.” He outlined a few of his experience products. “We can plot half of the Pacific Ocean with coördinates, to map out the Battle of Midway,” he said. “We re-create the full-blown battles of the giant ships from America and Japan. The kids have haptic guns and haptic vests. We put the smell of cordite and cannon fire on board, pumping around them.” For those who aren’t soothed by the scent of cordite, Super offered an alternative. “We fly 3-D-printed, architectural freestanding restaurants into the middle of the Maldives, on a sand shelf that can only last another eight hours before it disappears.”

For some, the thrill lies in the engineering. Staluppi, born in Brooklyn, was an auto mechanic who had no experience with the sea until his boss asked him to soup up a boat. “I took the six-cylinder engines out and put V-8 engines in,” he recalled. Once he started commissioning boats of his own, he built scale models to conduct tests in water tanks. “I knew I could never have the biggest boat in the world, so I says, ‘You know what? I want to build the fastest yacht in the world.’ The Aga Khan had the fastest yacht, and we just blew right by him.”

In Italy, after decking out my notional yacht, I headed south along the coast, to Tuscan shipyards that have evolved with each turn in the country’s history. Close to the Carrara quarries, which yielded the marble that Michelangelo turned into David, ships were constructed in the nineteenth century, to transport giant blocks of stone. Down the coast, the yards in Livorno made warships under the Fascists, until they were bombed by the Allies. Later, they began making and refitting luxury yachts. Inside the front gate of a Benetti shipyard in Livorno, a set of models depicted the firm’s famous modern creations. Most notable was the megayacht Nabila, built in 1980 for the high-living arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi, with a hundred rooms and a disco that was the site of legendary decadence. (Khashoggi’s budget for prostitution was so extravagant that a French prosecutor later estimated he paid at least half a million dollars to a single madam in a single year.)

In 1987, shortly before Khashoggi was indicted for mail fraud and obstruction of justice (he was eventually acquitted), the yacht was sold to the real-estate developer Donald Trump, who renamed it Trump Princess. Trump was never comfortable on a boat—“Couldn’t get off fast enough,” he once said—but he liked to impress people with his yacht’s splendor. In 1991, while three billion dollars in debt, Trump ceded the vessel to creditors. Later in life, though, he discovered enthusiastic support among what he called “our beautiful boaters,” and he came to see quality watercraft as a mark of virtue—a way of beating the so-called élite. “We got better houses, apartments, we got nicer boats, we’re smarter than they are,” he told a crowd in Fargo, North Dakota. “Let’s call ourselves, from now on, the super-élite.”

In the age of oversharing, yachts are a final sanctum of secrecy, even for some of the world’s most inveterate talkers. Oprah, after returning from her sojourn with the Obamas, rebuffed questions from reporters. “What happens on the boat stays on the boat,” she said. “We talked, and everybody else did a lot of paddleboarding.”

I interviewed six American superyacht owners at length, and almost all insisted on anonymity or held forth with stupefying blandness. “Great family time,” one said. Another confessed, “It’s really hard to talk about it without being ridiculed.” None needed to be reminded of David Geffen’s misadventure during the early weeks of the pandemic, when he Instagrammed a photo of his yacht in the Grenadines and posted that he was “avoiding the virus” and “hoping everybody is staying safe.” It drew thousands of responses, many marked #EatTheRich, others summoning a range of nautical menaces: “At least the pirates have his location now.”

The yachts extend a tradition of seclusion as the ultimate luxury. The Medici, in sixteenth-century Florence, built elevated passageways, or corridoi , high over the city to escape what a scholar called the “clash of classes, the randomness, the smells and confusions” of pedestrian life below. More recently, owners of prized town houses in London have headed in the other direction, building three-story basements so vast that their construction can require mining engineers—a trend that researchers in the United Kingdom named “luxified troglodytism.”

Water conveys a particular autonomy, whether it’s ringing the foot of a castle or separating a private island from the mainland. Peter Thiel, the billionaire venture capitalist, gave startup funding to the Seasteading Institute, a nonprofit group co-founded by Milton Friedman’s grandson, which seeks to create floating mini-states—an endeavor that Thiel considered part of his libertarian project to “escape from politics in all its forms.” Until that fantasy is realized, a white boat can provide a start. A recent feature in Boat International , a glossy trade magazine, noted that the new hundred-and-twenty-five-million-dollar megayacht Victorious has four generators and “six months’ autonomy” at sea. The builder, Vural Ak, explained, “In case of emergency, god forbid, you can live in open water without going to shore and keep your food stored, make your water from the sea.”

Much of the time, superyachts dwell beyond the reach of ordinary law enforcement. They cruise in international waters, and, when they dock, local cops tend to give them a wide berth; the boats often have private security, and their owners may well be friends with the Prime Minister. According to leaked documents known as the Paradise Papers, handlers proposed that the Saudi crown prince take delivery of a four-hundred-and-twenty-million-dollar yacht in “international waters in the western Mediterranean,” where the sale could avoid taxes.

Builders and designers rarely advertise beyond the trade press, and they scrupulously avoid leaks. At Lürssen, a German shipbuilding firm, projects are described internally strictly by reference number and code name. “We are not in the business for the glory,” Peter Lürssen, the C.E.O., told a reporter. The closest thing to an encyclopedia of yacht ownership is a site called SuperYachtFan, run by a longtime researcher who identifies himself only as Peter, with a disclaimer that he relies partly on “rumors” but makes efforts to confirm them. In an e-mail, he told me that he studies shell companies, navigation routes, paparazzi photos, and local media in various languages to maintain a database with more than thirteen hundred supposed owners. Some ask him to remove their names, but he thinks that members of that economic echelon should regard the attention as a “fact of life.”

To work in the industry, staff must adhere to the culture of secrecy, often enforced by N.D.A.s. On one yacht, O’Shannassy, the captain, learned to communicate in code with the helicopter pilot who regularly flew the owner from Switzerland to the Mediterranean. Before takeoff, the pilot would call with a cryptic report on whether the party included the presence of a Pomeranian. If any guest happened to overhear, their cover story was that a customs declaration required details about pets. In fact, the lapdog was a constant companion of the owner’s wife; if the Pomeranian was in the helicopter, so was she. “If no dog was in the helicopter,” O’Shannassy recalled, the owner was bringing “somebody else.” It was the captain’s duty to rebroadcast the news across the yacht’s internal radio: “Helicopter launched, no dog, I repeat no dog today”—the signal for the crew to ready the main cabin for the mistress, instead of the wife. They swapped out dresses, family photos, bathroom supplies, favored drinks in the fridge. On one occasion, the code got garbled, and the helicopter landed with an unanticipated Pomeranian. Afterward, the owner summoned O’Shannassy and said, “Brendan, I hope you never have such a situation, but if you do I recommend making sure the correct dresses are hanging when your wife comes into your room.”

In the hierarchy on board a yacht, the most delicate duties tend to trickle down to the least powerful. Yacht crew—yachties, as they’re known—trade manual labor and obedience for cash and adventure. On a well-staffed boat, the “interior team” operates at a forensic level of detail: they’ll use Q-tips to polish the rim of your toilet, tweezers to lift your fried-chicken crumbs from the teak, a toothbrush to clean the treads of your staircase.

Many are English-speaking twentysomethings, who find work by doing the “dock walk,” passing out résumés at marinas. The deals can be alluring: thirty-five hundred dollars a month for deckhands; fifty thousand dollars in tips for a decent summer in the Med. For captains, the size of the boat matters—they tend to earn about a thousand dollars per foot per year.

Yachties are an attractive lot, a community of the toned and chipper, which does not happen by chance; their résumés circulate with head shots. Before Andy Cohen was a talk-show host, he was the head of production and development at Bravo, where he green-lighted a reality show about a yacht crew: “It’s a total pressure cooker, and they’re actually living together while they’re working. Oh, and by the way, half of them are having sex with each other. What’s not going to be a hit about that?” The result, the gleefully seamy “Below Deck,” has been among the network’s top-rated shows for nearly a decade.

To stay in the business, captains and crew must absorb varying degrees of petty tyranny. An owner once gave O’Shannassy “a verbal beating” for failing to negotiate a lower price on champagne flutes etched with the yacht’s logo. In such moments, the captain responds with a deferential mantra: “There is no excuse. Your instruction was clear. I can only endeavor to make it better for next time.”

The job comes with perilously little protection. A big yacht is effectively a corporation with a rigid hierarchy and no H.R. department. In recent years, the industry has fielded increasingly outspoken complaints about sexual abuse, toxic impunity, and a disregard for mental health. A 2018 survey by the International Seafarers’ Welfare and Assistance Network found that more than half of the women who work as yacht crew had experienced harassment, discrimination, or bullying on board. More than four-fifths of the men and women surveyed reported low morale.

Karine Rayson worked on yachts for four years, rising to the position of “chief stew,” or stewardess. Eventually, she found herself “thinking of business ideas while vacuuming,” and tiring of the culture of entitlement. She recalled an episode in the Maldives when “a guest took a Jet Ski and smashed into a marine reserve. That damaged the coral, and broke his Jet Ski, so he had to clamber over the rocks and find his way to the shore. It was a private hotel, and the security got him and said, ‘Look, there’s a large fine, you have to pay.’ He said, ‘Don’t worry, the boat will pay for it.’ ” Rayson went back to school and became a psychotherapist. After a period of counselling inmates in maximum-security prisons, she now works with yacht crew, who meet with her online from around the world.

Rayson’s clients report a range of scenarios beyond the boundaries of ordinary employment: guests who did so much cocaine that they had no appetite for a chef’s meals; armed men who raided a boat offshore and threatened to take crew members to another country; owners who vowed that if a young stew told anyone about abuse she suffered on board they’d call in the Mafia and “skin me alive.” Bound by N.D.A.s, crew at sea have little recourse.“We were paranoid that our e-mails were being reviewed, or we were getting bugged,” Rayson said.

She runs an “exit strategy” course to help crew find jobs when they’re back on land. The adjustment isn’t easy, she said: “You’re getting paid good money to clean a toilet. So, when you take your C.V. to land-based employers, they might question your skill set.” Despite the stresses of yachting work, Rayson said, “a lot of them struggle with integration into land-based life, because they have all their bills paid for them, so they don’t pay for food. They don’t pay for rent. It’s a huge shock.”

It doesn’t take long at sea to learn that nothing is too rich to rust. The ocean air tarnishes metal ten times as fast as on land; saltwater infiltrates from below. Left untouched, a single corroding ulcer will puncture tanks, seize a motor, even collapse a hull. There are tricks, of course—shield sensitive parts with resin, have your staff buff away blemishes—but you can insulate a machine from its surroundings for only so long.

Hang around the superyacht world for a while and you see the metaphor everywhere. Four months after Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, the war had eaten a hole in his myths of competence. The Western campaign to isolate him and his oligarchs was proving more durable than most had predicted. Even if the seizures of yachts were mired in legal disputes, Finley, the former C.I.A. officer, saw them as a vital “pressure point.” She said, “The oligarchs supported Putin because he provided stable authoritarianism, and he can no longer guarantee that stability. And that’s when you start to have cracks.”

For all its profits from Russian clients, the yachting industry was unsentimental. Brokers stripped photos of Russian yachts from their Web sites; Lürssen, the German builder, sent questionnaires to clients asking who, exactly, they were. Business was roaring, and, if some Russians were cast out of the have-yachts, other buyers would replace them.

On a cloudless morning in Viareggio, a Tuscan town that builds almost a fifth of the world’s superyachts, a family of first-time owners from Tel Aviv made the final, fraught preparations. Down by the docks, their new boat was suspended above the water on slings, ready to be lowered for its official launch. The scene was set for a ceremony: white flags in the wind, a plexiglass lectern. It felt like the obverse of the dockside scrum at the Palm Beach show; by this point in the buying process, nobody was getting vetted through binoculars. Waitresses handed out glasses of wine. The yacht venders were in suits, but the new owners were in upscale Euro casual: untucked linen, tight jeans, twelve-hundred-dollar Prada sneakers. The family declined to speak to me (and the company declined to identify them). They had come asking for a smaller boat, but the sales staff had talked them up to a hundred and eleven feet. The Victorians would have been impressed.

The C.E.O. of Azimut Benetti, Marco Valle, was in a buoyant mood. “Sun. Breeze. Perfect day to launch a boat, right?” he told the owners. He applauded them for taking the “first step up the big staircase.” The selling of the next vessel had already begun.

Hanging aloft, their yacht looked like an artifact in the making; it was easy to imagine a future civilization sifting the sediment and discovering that an earlier society had engaged in a building spree of sumptuous arks, with accommodations for dozens of servants but only a few lucky passengers, plus the occasional Pomeranian.

We approached the hull, where a bottle of spumante hung from a ribbon in Italian colors. Two members of the family pulled back the bottle and slung it against the yacht. It bounced off and failed to shatter. “Oh, that’s bad luck,” a woman murmured beside me. Tales of that unhappy omen abound. In one memorable case, the bottle failed to break on Zaca, a schooner that belonged to Errol Flynn. In the years that followed, the crew mutinied and the boat sank; after being re-floated, it became the setting for Flynn’s descent into cocaine, alcohol, orgies, and drug smuggling. When Flynn died, new owners brought in an archdeacon for an onboard exorcism.

In the present case, the bottle broke on the second hit, and confetti rained down. As the family crowded around their yacht for photos, I asked Valle, the C.E.O., about the shortage of new boats. “Twenty-six years I’ve been in the nautical business—never been like this,” he said. He couldn’t hire enough welders and carpenters. “I don’t know for how long it will last, but we’ll try to get the profits right now.”

Whatever comes, the white-boat world is preparing to insure future profits, too. In recent years, big builders and brokers have sponsored a rebranding campaign dedicated to “improving the perception of superyachting.” (Among its recommendations: fewer ads with girls in bikinis and high heels.) The goal is partly to defuse #EatTheRich, but mostly it is to soothe skittish buyers. Even the dramatic increase in yacht ownership has not kept up with forecasts of the global growth in billionaires—a disparity that represents the “one dark cloud we can see on the horizon,” as Øino, the naval architect, said during an industry talk in Norway. He warned his colleagues that they needed to reach those “potential yacht owners who, for some reason, have decided not to step up to the plate.”

But, to a certain kind of yacht buyer, even aggressive scrutiny can feel like an advertisement—a reminder that, with enough access and cash, you can ride out almost any storm. In April, weeks after the fugitive Motor Yacht A went silent, it was rediscovered in physical form, buffed to a shine and moored along a creek in the United Arab Emirates. The owner, Melnichenko, had been sanctioned by the E.U., Switzerland, Australia, and the U.K. Yet the Emirates had rejected requests to join those sanctions and had become a favored wartime haven for Russian money. Motor Yacht A was once again arrayed in almost plain sight, like semaphore flags in the wind. ♦

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