letsgosailing said:
After 5 or 6 years, you take posession of the boat, and can do what you want with it.... assuming it is still in working order. The rental boats have a hard life, with inexperienced skippers, and so on. As long as youa re comfortable with "Charter wear and tear" then it is a great program. After 5 years, the boats are typically due for refit. IMHO.
Moorings and Sunsail do a "phase-out" after the boat's charter life where they ensure that everything will be in working order and they fix or replace it if it's not. Obviously they can't make the boat new again, but if you monitor their work closely (especially with a surveyor), you can get a good result. They won't fix "wear & tear" issues like some idiot's scratching the chart desk's top with divider points or the cleaning ladies spilling bleach on the head's wooden floor panel, but they will fix everything else. The boats definitely should not need a "refit" after the phase-out. Many people buy these phased out boats and move them directly into a smaller charter company's fleet (where more wear and tear happens). We did that and have been happy with the results.
Timrim, we looked at buying with Sunsail (similar to buying with Moorings) about 5 years ago. Two big factors in the decision are what you plan to do with the boat after 5 years and how much vacation time you have to go sailing. If you can't do sailing vacations at least 3 weeks a year (preferably more, actually), then you're better off just chartering each time you sail instead of buying. Then, if you want a boat in 5 years, buy one out of the Moorings that is selling for 50% of it's original cost. (Yes, I know, that's a gross over-simplification of the decision, but I felt that was what it boiled down to.)
.
