Free: Free Advice from an actively-looking buyer

[mvmojo]

Thanks for looking and thanks for the feedback. I really tried to see/show the boat in the eyes of a buyer and what they might want to see/know about everything. Appreciate your comments!

[Icarus]

I purchased several yacht during the last 35 years or so....generally i look for a tidy interior...if there are faults and missing bits and pieces i like to see it...if the engine is loosing its paint i dont mind...cosmetic improvements can be nice but they are superficial.
Bottom line is i rather look at a honest as is then an a doctored image.
Selling real estate people even rent fancy furniture to spruce up the house...I rather look at an empty house...furniture and strateglity placed ornaments have in my opinion the opposite evect...at least for me.
These days a lot of people are bamboozled by advertising hype.

[missionary]

Originally Posted by PAlter

This is certainly an interesting discussion from buyers point of view. I am both a seller and buyer and would be curious to hear some feedback from folks about how I have positioned "Sequitur", my 38' sloop, a LeComte NE 38 built in Holland in 1968 which I am offering for sale at $ 39,500. She is located in Bristol, Rhode Island.

I generally agree that it is often astounding to see some of the low quality and debris filled photos people have posted on their "boat-for-sale" documents and hard to understand how anyone might think this would be appealing to potential buyers. However, from a buyer's perspective, one might find a great deal from a seller that has neither the time or inclination to market the boat properly, especially in the case of an estate sale and especially if the boat has a good pedigree.

In any case, this thread has been a good read for me so I am motivated to join in. With regard to Sequitur, I have owned her for 20 years, taken good care of her and sailed her all over the US New England coast from Sag Harbor, NY to Maine with great enjoyment and success. She has been a great boat - seaworthy, comfortable and beautiful.

My reason for selling now is to move onto a larger boat in the 44 - 46 foot range and I would be happy to send anyone of you actively looking buyers that might be interested in such a boat - a 10 page brochure I have set up. Even if this boat is not of particular interest to you, perhaps you could comment on the structure and content of the brochure. If anyone turns out to have interest, I have also taken the initiative to commission a survey to establish an impartial evaluation of the overall condition of the boat as she is 50 years old. This made sense to me and was also a recommendation of my broker.

See attached a few select photos. If there is interest in the boat, or interest in commenting on the brochure and marketing strategy, please do not hesitate to send me a direct email with your email address so I can send you the brochure and other supplemental photos.

Thanks, best wishes, and good luck to all of you actively looking buyers!!!

As a buyer, IMHO, the photos don’t provide me with the ability to be aboard the boat. I prefer a walk around both in and out. For example, I prefer a few shots of the hull the last time she was hauled out, that includes any repairs that were done.

Photos, as one poster stated, should perhaps be uploaded in bulk, to a cloud, providing a more in-depth viewing.

In addition, photos which as the one dipcting the coiled line adjacent to a shot of the boats rigging; this photo should perhaps be produced with a higher resolution. The point is to give me the buyer, the ability to zoom in on the finite condition of the rigging.

The coiled line says the owner has kept her tidy, but the inability to zoom in on detail creates mystery.

The v-berth shot taken at 90 degrees of horizontal, again IMHO, is a no-no. Often I’m looking via my iPhone and when I turn my phone to view, it flips, requiring me to change my phone settings.

The vessel has beautiful lines as seen in the distance shot, but again, megapixels are key. A buyer wants to zoom in to see if that’s a radar hanging on the mast or TV antenna.

Myself, I’m looking for that perfect boat that is described in detail which includes details maintenance as well as what may need attention in the near future. Aircraft hunting has consumed a lot of my online window shopping. Unlike the housing market as a comparison, aircraft share a lot
With boats, especially with respect to safety. Therefore sellers usually put most of their emphasis on structural and mechanical integrity of the airframe and engine as well as the compliment of instruments. This is all backed up by detailed log sheets.

I close with this. Perspective is everything. I once sold vehicle , that only listed for a couple days. I live in modest accommodations and any backdrop I could provide for the photo shoot, told the potiential buyer “this guy doesn’t seem to have the needed income for regular maintenance”. But the reality is that not only do I stick to a strict maintenance schedule of my vehicles, I also maintain records.

In order to safeguard myself from conveying the wrong perspective, I simply choose my photo shoot at a relatives home who, unlike my wife and I, chooses to invest his money in curb appeal as opposed to savings.

The outcome gave me the price I asked and the buyer got a vehicle, complete with maintenance logs. The only “deception” was the backdrop, the vehicle was solid.

[Bensdad]

Mojo-

Ditto to dparker's reply - nicely done. I like the use of PDF format for at least 2 reasons: 1. It allows you to describe what I'm seeing. If I have to guess and get it wrong, you're not helping yourself and 2. The pages scroll easily. I've gotten frustrated and quit looking many times when the browser pages are slow to load or skip past a picture and I have to go back to it.

Also, you've kept the data and pictures objective telling me in words and pictures the boat's features and benefits.

Now going from your specific situation to a more general one, you've gotten me thinking about the whole boat selling strategy.

An earlier poster mentioned how we've evolved into a digital world and become accustomed to sharing pictures of everything meaning there's little excuse not to have plenty of pictures of your boat. And dparker said here that the PDF seem to work well for a unique boat like MOJO, but maybe not as well for the more typical production ones we see in the market.

But why not? There are many newbies reading this forum and are hungry to learn from the experience of other members. Why wouldn't they want to see as much detail and explanation of the pictures of a typical production Hunter or Sea Ray as we did with unique MOJO?

Obviously a lot of time was put into MOJO's website but not a lot of sophistication meaning that today's IT tools make it easy for you to build something like that. If you put your boat with a broker, why not ask him/her if they will also include a link to a website you're going to create TO HELP THEM HELP YOU SELL YOUR BOAT? If they're a successful broker, they won't have the time or inclination to build that website but you do.

The broker has access to a market and a broker's network that the single seller will never penetrate, so you need them to get your boat noticed. But you can help the broker (and yourself) by following MOJO's example and make it easy for a prospective buyer to appreciate your boat just by following a link to your site.

Imagine this. Suppose you want to sell your 20 year old, 32' production boat for $X and you live in Florida. A prospective buyer looking for something like that will find at least two dozen boats when they search for boats 1999 or newer, your production type, 30'-35', southeast and gulf coast regions on Yachtworld. What would make yours stand out from all of the rest?

But if you had a link to your site that really took them on a guided tour AND EXPLANED WHAT THEY WERE SEEING as MOJO has done, your boat would instantly become memorable. And memorable means they come back again and again as they start sharing their boat discoveries with any other decision-makers with a stake in the search.

And once the "dreamer" (husband usually) has identified a few boats to share with any other "deciders" (spouse, kids) in the selection process, the better the boat presentation, THE BETTER THEY UNDERSTAND WHAT THEY'RE SEEING AND WHY IT'S IMPORTANT (features and benefits), the better the chance they select your boat.

(Sorry for rambling but now I'm really getting into this...)
Once your're selling it, is it priced realistically? Can you separate your personal memories associated with the boat from the fact that it's actually a declining (in value) asset?

You'll never forget how it got you home safely, scared, and shaken after that squall line suddenly popped up out on the gulf. A priceless memory of your family's first adventure on an overnight trip.

But that's your priceless memory and does not change the fact that it's a 20 year old production boat that looks a lot like the 2 dozen other ones I'm looking at in my search for my new (to me) boat. Don't let your irreplaceable memories of that weekend when your boat became a dear family member make you think it's worth 20% more than every other boat that looks just like it.

And please don't be offended if I don't share that connection when I make an offer that's about 10% less than market (making it 30% below yours).

OK, I'm done. Anyone else.....?

[dparker]

Hey Bensdad, I wasn't clear enough and therefore misled you.

I agree that mvmojo's excellent approach would have value for any boat. My poorly worded comment on production boats was more of a reference to the lack of control that you have of the text and pictures that appear on the mass market listing pages. If you can ensure that your link gets published, then all is well. In many cases that isn't going to happen because the listing site restricts these in order to control and track activity.

So, my not yet thought out idea is maybe to try to provide text for the pictures as mvmojo does, but as a direct part of the photo. It is a poor substitute for his comprehensive approach, but maybe better than the heap of unexplained images that you usually find.

My impression about how you get on those sites is that some broker uses their special connection to the site to provide the info, and they don't have much control or opportunity to audit ("preview") the results. So even a friendly and motivated broker might not be able to help.

On the basis of the assumption, I am trying to figure out how to get some of mvmojo's results within those constraints.

[TWB]

I agree with the OP. When I see pictures with crap everywhere, I always move on. I assume sloppy housekeeping equals sloppy maintenance.


Maybe that's why my last two boats were new.


Tim

[TWB]

Maybe I should add, that with clean photos and a realistic price, I've had a contract within a week on every boat I've sold. Without a broker.

The photos were important, but a realistic price from day one was most important.

Tim

[Ruso]

My free advises to a sellers in San Carlos, Baja.
Clean-up your boat after you dumped her on the hard. When I see a boat neglected when moved to the hard - I am sure she was neglected on the waters.
Then my offer comes with 50% - 60% of asking price. Don't get offended with low ball offer - you did not do you homework and you pay for it. As a buyer sitting on cash I expect almost instant reply during the offer negotiation (hours - not days). A always ask a broker to confirm a seller available on certain dates to work on negotiation process.
Your boat sitting on hard (some of them over the year) loosing the value as well - be realistic with your listing price.

[DeValency]

Originally Posted by Ruso

My free advises to a sellers in San Carlos, Baja.
Clean-up your boat after you dumped her on the hard. When I see a boat neglected when moved to the hard - I am sure she was neglected on the waters.
Then my offer comes with 50% - 60% of asking price. Don't get offended with low ball offer - you did not do you homework and you pay for it. As a buyer sitting on cash I expect almost instant reply during the offer negotiation (hours - not days). A always ask a broker to confirm a seller available on certain dates to work on negotiation process.
Your boat sitting on hard (some of them over the year) loosing the value as well - be realistic with your listing price.

Makes a lot of sense. I was able to sell my past 4 boats actually before offering to sell. Always well maintained in and out and other sailors at my marina were actually waiting for me to sell...

As a buyer, the experience is different for me right now. What I frequently see is:
- way overpriced boats that stay on the market (and on the hard) for years.
- poorly maintained boats compared to pristine boats in price...
I’m not even sure many sellers really want to sell or just expect a sucker to come by...

[MondayNever]

Originally Posted by DeValency

- Cellphones today make great pictures (I don't mean a "NEW (1995)" cellphone...), use it and PLEASE! - DO NOT USE WIDE ANGLE, FISH EYE lenses - these may impress the idiots and idiots will never buy your boat anyway...

I agree with all of your points except this one - wide angle lenses absolutely have a place in marketing a boat. I understand that you don't want sellers to misrepresent the interior as more spacious than it is in reality - fair enough. However, it's almost impossible to capture the feel of a small boat, particularly the interior, using a normal lens. You can only see small chunks of the interior at a time, thereby losing the context for where everything is located and the "flow" of the boat. I can't tell you how many listings I look at in which I can't piece together the layout, particularly when a layout diagram is not included. And god help me when people stick a regular camera into an engine bay and snap a random shot that shows half an alternator and a quarter of a heat exchanger. Use a damn fisheye lens and capture the whole engine if it's in a confined space.


I think morst people understand wide angle photos as a tool to get a more complete scene (more like what your own eyes would see), rather than get fooled into thinking the boat is bigger than it is.



You can see the photos I took of our last boat at the link below - I don't think they misrepresent the boat at all. And she had at least 20 showings in the first week and ended up selling to the first guy that called 15 mins after I posted here.


http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...ed-169549.html

[LeeV]

We sold our trimaran a few months ago and we’ve been searching for our “final” cat to cruise the eastern seaboard a few months at a time, so we’re going through all that. A few things our experience taught/is teaching us (sorry for any redundancy):

1. First empty the boat of EVERYTHING that doesn’t convey. I disagree that I should have to “look through the clutter.” If it’s a live aboard and you really want to sell, move out if you can; you’ll have to anyway. An empty boat reveals every area, and says, “we have nothing to hide.”

2. By all means take a few wide-angle shots (no fish-eye please) that can show the composition of an entire area, BUT make sure you also have a variety of regular shots of all the same area.

3. If you have any MAJOR problems, fix them or declare them. If a buyer discovers something you failed to reveal, you’ll most likely lose the sale. If it’s a section of delamination discovered in survey, that’s different, as you might not have known.

4. Please provide a reasonable way to board the boat; my 57 yr old wife is in pretty fair shape but couldn’t have to climb an old narrow rope ladder. Inspection was over.

5. If you have spares, etc, clean them, label them and get a new clean box/drawer to show.

6. Depending on the size/age/value, consider having the boat detailed unless you can do so yourself. If you’re selling a 150k boat a few hundred dollars may be worth spending.

As always, just my $.02 worth!

Best regards, and maybe we’ll see some of you in Miami!

[dparker]

Hey LeeV, care to list a few of the models you've looked at? I am curious about the type of cat a former Corsair owner would consider.

[LeeV]

Originally Posted by dparker

Hey LeeV, care to list a few of the models you've looked at? I am curious about the type of cat a former Corsair owner would consider.

I would, but you wouldn’t be satisfied or like the answer! 😀

Health (adv Osteoarthritis in my 65 yr old hands/arms) now require an elec winch, a wife of 3 yrs who’s a novice sailor, and an overall desire to slow down, not clamber about unless it’s required for safety, host our 4 grown kids with partners (and future grandkids) and a budget that rules out most nice Catanas of ample size and all Outremers...puts us in the category of looking at 4-8 yr old 44-46’ cats from the big 3 for cruising the east coast a few months at a time.

Sorry I didn’t delight with an answer laden with “cool cats!” 😉 I get that question all the time.

Best regards,

[LeeV]

Originally Posted by dparker

Hey LeeV, care to list a few of the models you've looked at? I am curious about the type of cat a former Corsair owner would consider.

Btw, before the Corsair 37 was an F31 and a Condor 40, so it’s been a long road filled with performance. Just for perspective.

Regards

[dparker]

Thanks for the answer Lee, you didn't disappoint. I was not looking for cool, I am more interested in how people cope with their changing needs, so your answer was spot on.

My changing needs have some overlap (age related limitations) but intended us also means my current cat is not big enough. We're planning on the same use as you are, so similar boats are in our list, though a bit older to lower the budget a bit. The big three are not perfect, but they are the big three for good reasons. Though we are including the Voyage 440 in our list.

Thanks, and good luck with your search.