How much should you pay for a second-hand boat?

That depends on the following factors.....

1.How popular in the market place is the make & model.

2.The current market cycle (winter-summer) & economic times...recession or boom...is it a buyers market or sellers market,with used boats it's nearly always a buyers market,never more-so than today,you will find excellent late model and near new boats at near give-away prices if you look around.

Here are some rough guidelines to price any boat up to ten years old,it's the same process with motor vehicles but they depreciate faster as they are much more common & you can use the free for private use REDBOOK car/bike valuation website for them.

As a general rule,a new boat,motor & trailer package show-room sale price will depreciate 10% to 15% on what you paid for it a soon as you tow it off the show-room floor.

Every year after that it depreciates or loses value at a rate of about 10% per year.

So a new $50,000 boat when you get it home is worth,give or take about $42,000,then next year if it's in the same condition with about 20 hours use which is regarded as minimum yearly use it's value would be $4,200 less or $37,800. 

The best & most accurate way to measure the boats current worth is to ask see the original sales documention which the seller should have along with proof of ownership & work it out from there but the seller might not want to show you this if he asking more today than what it was new four years ago,you can often find on water tests for various boats online at such places as Boatpoint & they have the price as tested,other places would be old copies of trailerboat magazine & the like.

Importantly,a four year old boat cannot be directly compared with the new model because the new model will have had improvements over the older boat,take 1980's SHARKCATS,they have had several different cabin locations over the years moving them rear-wards because of the tendency to dip their nose into waves at trolling speeds with people standing foward in the cabin area,TRAILCRAFT have now removed the extra large floor mounted battery box/seat at the transom that obstructed fishing area at the rear,most boat builders up-date according to user feed-back & improve hulls every year,sometimes it's been a major safety up-grade over the older model.  

This is only a rough guide but you can use it to determine whether a seller has a fair market price on his boat,it doesn't take into account added extras like electronics,epirbs must be a 406Mhz,any other frequency is useless now,safety gear,PFD1's are preferable & other bits but unless they are this years models or top quality they are probably out of date in more ways than one & will need replacing so they only rate a small figure,if anything.

A lot of big name money lenders or banks will not lend money on a ten year old or older boat un-less you have 50% or more of the cash,so thats a factor if you want to purchase or re-sell a large,expensive boat if the buyer will have to chase finance which can be very hard to find at the moment.

Beware of "easy" or "instant" finance arranged through a dealer un-less you are... "instantly prepared to pay top repayment rates" of 14%,sometimes more....thats not what I call "easy".

Other price factors include size of the boat,a thousand times more 3.7 meter tinnies sell than 6.6 meter half-cab plate hulls & there are less buyers at the top end of the market so there are often more big boats for sale as the are harder to store & more costly to buy,use & maintain.

REMEMBER......If you have the cash,you're in the position of power,there are many more used boats than boat buyers,make a sensible offer,if the seller won't come down to near your price be prepared to walk away & don't look back,there will be other better boats.

Don't pressured into buying a boat thats not what YOU think is good value and enjoy the sometimes hard but worthwhile experience of looking for a boat & then getting out on the water in your new found boat.

An important reminder about E.P.I.R.B's,you must have 406 Mhz frequency E.P.I.R.B as the old 121.5Mhz freq. E.P.I.R.B's is no longer being monitored,BATTERY WORLD stores will accept your old 121.5mhz for recycling.