Boat Brokerage Fees in the USA

[Zanshin]

I have a question on broker fees in the USA. I've been told that they are a flat 10%, but somehow I have trouble seeing how the effort and work involved in selling a $10,000 boat is 50x more when selling a $500,000 boat. Are the percentage rates fixed or are they negotiable?

[night0wl]

Everything is negotiable...however as with any transaction, you often pay for what you get. If price is such a big deal, you could try selling the boat on your own. Craigslist, Google Base....local advertising, Boat Trader, Used Boat, etc.

[bljones]

Keep in mind that the costs to sell a $500K boat are higher- Bigger price tag means that owners expect bigger ads in the mags and more of them, and since the boat will most likely be on the market far longer than a properly priced $10K boat, those costs will add up.
Besides, I would bet that many times a broker will break even or lose money on the $10K and sub $10K boat. Not to defend brokers, but most don't earn a salary, and their expenses come out of their own pocket, and most don't sell many $500K boats in a career, let alone a year.

[Zanshin]

bljones - I agree that the brokers are probably losing money on the small boats, I'll modify my original example a bit: selling a $150K boat earns the broker $15,000 and I can see how the time and effort involved on the brokers for that type of sale is justified. But the next size up, or same boat but brand new and not 6 years old selling at $300K doesn't involve significantly more effort and I would think that somewhere along the line an absolute $$ cap should be reached instead of continually scaling with the boat price. I have seen 5% brokerage fees offered in the UK and Australia (online on the web, who knows how truthful those really are) and was curious if options existed in the USA as well.

[xort]

Many brokers have a minimum fee for selling low priced boats.

Many brokers will ask for 10%, to be split 50/50 with the listing/buyer brokers. But they will often give some back during the negotiations to make the sale. The thought is that if a buyer is willing to pay the full monte; great, everybody feeds at the trough. But if the deal is in jeprody, 8% now is much better than 0% later. But you never know, some brokers have their heels dug in and will screw up a deal real good in more ways than one.

I hate dealing with brokers!

[xort]

IIRC, there are a few brokers who will get you listed on yachtworld for a fee and then let you do your own deal. I don't know what the ramifactions are for either party.

[olson34]

A) a really good hard-working broker is probably worth the commonly-quoted 10%.

B) The other 80% of the brokers are worth a lot less -- and in the bottom 25% are the ones that are only in it for the tee times and liquor.

C) It takes as much (or more...) time to complete the sale on an 8' dinghy as it does a 30 footer. People just seem to agonize more over smaller stuff and $. This drives the good ones crazy.
Agreed that "low priced" boats are the hardest ones to make any $ on.

D) Sometimes a local surveyor can give you a short list of good brokers. Ditto other sailors.

When we were shopping hard, with cold cash in hand, we found some that were really hard working and quite a few that..... well.....


The guy that completed the sale to us was worth whatever the seller paid him. He was honest and helpful.

Nowadays I'm retired from my day job, and once masqueraded as a yacht broker for a few years, several decades ago. I loved meeting the sailors, but it was a difficult way to put food on a table, on a year-round basis.

Good luck!

L