South African Cats hi priced??

[geoleo]

American friend based in Africa looking for a used Catamaran. Just looked at ads from SA . They are priced much 920-30%0 higher than europe and usa.Why is that?

[5BTM]

TIA: this is Africa

[markcouz]

My guess would be your basic supply and demand.

South Africa manufactures a number of high quality cats for the export market. Very few of the cats built in SA will remain there because very few Saffa's can afford them, and those that can are not likely to be sailors, preferring to spend their money on Ferraris, gold jewelery, designer clothing, lavish homes, game ranch, etc.

South Africa has thousands of miles of beaultiful coastline, but very few safe harbours and very testing sailing conditions between them - definitely not your common "cruising grounds". As a result the market is dominated by weekend casual sailing and racing, live aboard is rare. This type of sailing calls for monohull rather than cat.

The cats that are there will be sought after by the few (but increasing number) sailors looking for a suitable vessel to refit for cruising and cross over to the Caribbean, there are not many of these available and so those that are fetch a premium.

Note that any refit/refurbish required will cost a fraction to accomplish in SA compared to anywhere in Carib, USA or the Med. Labour is cheap with high skills available, parts and equipment freely available. When you consider that just about any used vessel purchased for cruising will go through an expensive refit, you might find that the expensive boat purchased in SA is not so expensive when ready to go.