Do You Need A Broker To Sell A Boat
While for sale by owner might make sense at times in the real estate world, the reality is that selling a boat is often more complex and much more time consuming than selling a home. Showing the boat and handling sea trials can be extremely time consuming. Additionally, selling your boat through a broker is much more likely to result in a quicker sale than by yourself. Ask potential brokers about their experience before selecting one to handle your sale. How many transactions have they been involved with? How quickly do they typically sell? Are they willing to show the boat any day of the week? How hungry are they to sell your boat?
Select The Right Broker
Now you might be busy with your job and other obligations, leaving you with no time to perform the tasks related to selling your boat. You might not have the time to deal with the advertising, the sea trials and showings, and negotiating with the buyers. You might also not have enough time to make the required repairs, handle the insurance and settlement, or deal with the financing and surveys. Thats why you should pick a broker to handle all this for you.
So when choosing the right broker, you need to research the boating forums to see what other boaters have to say about the local brokers. You need to select a salesperson who is driven and hungry to make a sale. Check out the brokers location because you want a more exposed area such as a marina or the side of a highway.
Work with them to fix the right pricing for your boat. Settle on a realistic price, which will help to sell it quickly. Make sure your broker prepares a quality listing for your boat, including appropriate pictures and a catchy description. Also, keep in mind that you can provide a healthy bonus to the salesperson of your boat. A good incentive always motivates them to work aggressively towards a sale.
Advertising The Boat For Sale
Creating a great listing can be just as important as preparing the actual boat for sale. Great listings start with excellent photography and even video assets depending on the potential sale price. Ensuring all the details are included in the listing is important as well. This includes things such as specifications, dimensions and all the features you believe will be crucial to communicate to possible buyers. Other things to consider are things such as services completed, upgrades done on the boat and any warranty information that might be relevant.
Brokers have a great deal of experience creating listings to sell boats. A good broker can guide and take care of all the important elements of preparing and creating a quality listing that will attract buyers. This includes getting appropriate photography done and knowing what information should be included.
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How Boat Trader Finds You The Right Buyer
Thanks to Boat Traders search filters sellers can reach interested shoppers who are able to find their listings faster and locate the exact vessel theyre looking for within a range of specified geo-targeted locations. When you list a boat as a seller, local buyers can be notified automatically if the vessel matches their criteria, helping you sell your boat faster. So, for instance, if you list your boat for sale within a geographic range of a potential buyer who is searching for something similar, they will be notified immediately.
Whether youre looking to upgrade or cash in on your investment, it is important to consider a number of items before listing your boat for sale. Here are some tips to sell your boat quickly from the experts at Boat Trader.
- Include high-definition photos and include a video to enhance your listing
Sell Your Boat Online Fast
Are you looking to cash out of your investment? Or are you considering an upgrade to a bigger boat? boats.com is here to help you sell your used boat online fast. Did you know that our paid classified boat listings deliver up to 10 times the exposure of free ads? We also offer more options for marketing your boat – including guaranteed exposure to a large audience of boat buyers, the ability to upload high resolution photos, as well as featured videos. Choose your boat listing package and start reaching boat buyers near you today!
The Premium Package is our best deal for your dollar. With Premium, your boat is featured as a sponsored listing – and will be featured higher on search results pages. In addition, with Premium, your listing will appear larger than other ads – an enhancement that generates 25% more activity. Premium also grants you the ability to add unlimited boat photos and a video to provide potential buyers plenty of information up front.
The Enhanced Package is a popular option, offering a 6-week duration and plenty of photos to show off your boats best features and equipment.
The Basic Package is perfect if your boat is priced competitively. These listings run for two weeks and include one photo and a basic description – designed to move your boat quickly!
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Where To Sell Your Boat
There are three ways to sell your boat including:
- Selling through a dealership or broker
- Selling it yourself
- Wholesale
Note that some dealers dont take trades on used boats, so you may not get a trade-in with your old boat if you plan on buying another used vessel.
Also, brokers rarely list small boats or any vessel worth less than $20,000.
The markup is too small to cover their efforts and fees, but some will do it for a flat fee which may hurt your sales price.
Selling Through a Dealership or Broker
This is the easiest way to sell a boat. If you want to sell your boat fast, a dealer or broker is your best bet. Selling a boat requires a lot of time and effort and expertise, which you probably do not have.
You have to market the boat, prepare the legal documents, negotiate, and carry out surveys and sea trials among others.
Do you have the time and connections to pull this off?
Except you are a long-time boater, you probably know little about selling boats.
So its better to leave all the heavy lifting to a dealer or broker who understands the industry and can get your boat off the market in record time.
That way, you can focus on work that really matters to your life.
As said earlier, not all brokers and dealers will sell your boat. But if the boat is big enough and the potential returns will cover their efforts, its better to go that route.
Before choosing a dealer or broker, its vital to do some research:
Are You Selling Is Perths Leading Boat Buying Team
Having purchased easily over 1000 boats and paid in excess of $902,700 to our customers over the years, its safe to say that we know what were doing. Committed to your convenience and satisfaction, we aim to make your boat selling experience as quick and painless as possible.
So whats the catch? Theres none, youve just got to make sure your boat is a 2004 model or newer and in good shape and well take it from there. With an Australia-wide network, we even come out to you so you dont have to worry about organising transportation!
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Use Free Methods On The Web
There are many websites dedicated to selling, and a number specialized in selling boats. The larger boat selling sites are mostly pay-to-list. They aren’t expensive, you can list on many of them for twenty-five to fifty dollars, but that isn’t free. So don’t look to Boattrader.com or Boats.com until you’ve exhausted your options.
List Your Boat For Sale Online
In a 2020 study, digital formats took up the majority of U.S. adults daily media consumption time, while for newspapers and magazines the average time spent was just nine and eight minutes respectively. With a decline in consumption for newspapers and magazines comes naturally less-effective classified advertisements in print to sell your boat. If you want to sell your boat quickly, safely, and for the best price, then you should sell your boat online.
Long before the world relied on Google, Boat Trader magazine was the go-to place to sell a boat. In 2008, the magazine successfully shifted from print to digital media, and today Boat Trader reaches more than 10 million visitors per month. By far the most popular websites to sell your boat range from boating-specific marketplaces like Boat Trader, boats.com, and YachtWorld, to more general marketplaces like Craigslist and eBay. We suggest casting a broad net, but also placing most of your focus on boating marketplaces!
- eBay
And on Boat Traders For Sale By Owner platform, you can list your boat for sale on the website in under three minutes!
Above Video: Boat Traders Colin Voreis walks you though how to list your boat for sale in under 3 minutes on Boat Trader.
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How To Sell A Boat: The Complete Guide
The process of selling your boat privately can be a daunting task. If youre interested in learning about the ins-and-outs of selling, then look no further! The experts at Boat Trader have compiled an extensive list of suggestions to ensure a quick sale. If youve done this before and are ready to list your boat for sale right away, then Boat Traders private sellers page is where you may want to navigate.
We begin with some basic steps to understand before you strike a deal with a buyer. It is best to review and understand each of these steps prior to listing your boat for sale. Think of it as studying for an exam. You want to know each of the steps very well prior to meeting with potential buyers. So, lets get started! Here are the seven steps to selling your boat online.
Above: Boat Traders Lenny Rudow walks through the steps to sell your boat online in this helpful video.
Showing The Boat And Reaching An Agreement
Perhaps the most difficult aspects of selling a boat without the aid of a broker are the showings, negotiations and paperwork involved in closing the transaction. If you havent sold a boat before, its really a good idea to use a broker to ensure a smooth process and transaction.
To say that showing the boat to potential buyers can be a time consuming process is an understatement. It can involve working around the schedules of potential buyers and frequently include multiple sea trials. Because of the time involved, simply handling the showing of the boat is often the most common reason that sellers use brokers. However, the negotiations and closing of the sale are perhaps even more important reasons to consider the use of a broker.
Knowing when to give and when to stand firm can be difficult decisions for sellers without experience of selling a boat. Often times, a buyer may be using a broker who is experienced at negotiating boat transactions, and without a broker, the seller might be at a disadvantage.
Lastly, ensuring the legally necessary paperwork is being done correctly can also be difficult without the experience of previous transactions. A broker can handle all of this for you and ensure that all the details are handled appropriately. Different states often have different requirements for boat transactions, and your broker can advise and handle such particulars.
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We Buy Boats Immediate Cash Purchase
When selling your boat quickly is your priority, selling your boat to us is your best option. We buy boats everyday! The benefits are:
- No cost to you for this service.
- On the spot same day payment.
- We will pay off your loan.
- No detailing and repair bills to pay.
- In most cases your boat MUST be less than 7 years old and locally popular.
Why Do Sellers Choose Us As Their Used Boat Dealer
- We specialize in selling pre-owned boats.
- We may even purchase your boat immediately!
- We welcome trades if youd like to trade your boat!
- We provide a comprehensive price analysis that will maximize your profit and decrease the length of time your boat is on
- the market.
- We sell boats worldwide and are one of the biggest used boat dealers in SC.
- We advertise in the top print and international online boat sales publications.
- We complete a certified pre-owned inspection that increases buyer confidence in your boat.
- We manage any service work needed on your boat.
- We have on-site sales staff available 6 days a week.
- We keep your boat in show-ready condition.
- We make the sale fast and easy with our turnkey process from listings to the sea trial and sale!
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Ten Tips To Make Your Boat Sell Faster
Youve had great fun with your boat, but the time has come to move on to a boat that is : larger, faster, shinier, newer. Shes been your best friend but youve got boat fever and, if youre like most boat owners, youll trade up on a regular basis. All those new boats at the boat shows caught your eye, but before a new boat arrives in your slip, youll have to sell the old one.
Here are 10 tips to make your boat a fast seller:
1. Make Her Shine.
Its a natural human trait: We draw conclusions based on visual evidence. When a potential buyer walks up to your boat and sees ratty docklines, its clear that you dont take care of essentials. When the buyer looks into the bilge and sees rusty brown water, you obviously arent a good boat keeper. If he pulls an engine dipstick and sees dirty black gunk, well, what would you think about the engine condition?
I know when I see a boat thats a floating ghetto, two things come to mind. First, I automatically assume that maintenance is equally shoddy on all the systems. Second, I immediately think about making a low-ball offer.
Go ahead, tell us which half you would rather have.
Any yacht broker will tell you that the first 30 seconds aboard are the most important, and if your buyer sees a sparkling boat, its already half sold. In real estate, the three most important words in a home are location, location, location. For boats, its looks, looks, looks.
2. Make Her Smell Good.
3. De-Junkify.
4. De-Personalize.
How Much Should I Sell My Boat For
For most people selling a boat, the priceIsnt Right. And what I mean by that is that they either set their price to low or too high .
What is essential when pricing anything, much less an item as expensive as a boat, is to research the heck out of it and then price it just a hair higher than you conclude. We will get to the why in a bit.
The most obvious starting points will be public listings. If you want to know the best places to look for boat sales try these websites first:
- BoatTrader
- Yachtrader
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Top Tips For Great Boat Photos
- Take yet another moment to look around for places you forgot to clean while also keeping an eye out for random items you may have left lying around
- Take both Wide Angles & Close Up Photos. The top boat dealers in the county know that people want to see details, but that they also want to feel the space of the boat, so their photographers will often use lenses as wide as 14mm to give people the sensation of having a lot of space. Taking a picture with a regular lens may make your boat FEEL smaller, and thats rarely ever something boat buyers are shopping for!
- Make sure to capture all of those areas you meticulously cleaned up. Focus and highlight them! You want people to look at your listing and think, Man, this person was crazy about their boat.
- Always wait for the best lighting- It may be cloudy today, it may be cloudy tomorrow, but you must wait for good lighting unless of course, you are selling a commercial fishing boat in the Grand Banks. When people are thinking about being on the water its probably a sunny day they are imagining, and thats what pictures of your boat should line up with so they can see themselves driving it on that perfect day. Another good reason to make sure you get great sunlight is so that your listings stand out on websites next to someone else who may have been in a hurry to take their pictures.
Craigslist & Social Media
Social media sells things. And social media wants to sell you advertising, but there is free advertising to be found.
Craiglist
You can sell almost anything on Craiglist, and it works well for boats and offers good regional coverage. As of this writing there is no charge to sell boats, though they have added nominal charges for some items and services. You can use a lot of pictures and text, so it’s an excellent place to get a full listing. One listing should be sufficient regional searches show nearby boats to buyers and boat buyers will use them.First one with the cash is the rule on Craiglist. Dont hold something for someone unless you get a deposit, as buyers are often unreliable and you may turn away legitimate buyers waiting for someone who never shows.
Facebook has paid advertising, but there is also the Marketplace with free listings. There are also dozens of “boats for sale” groups on Facebook where you can list your boat for free to communities of boat buyers.
You will have to Join those groups and comply with their rules. Some groups are general, such as Boats for Sale.” Others may be more much specific , with limitations on types or boats, price, or geographic location.
Facebook may prompt you to “boost” your ads. You can do it, but you can put it up there without a boost to see how it does.
Twitter, Instagram and others
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