sail2wind said:
When we looked at Mooring, the thing we liked least was, for the first 5 years it is not your boat. You can not store personal items. The alleged 12 week usage is more like 3 or 4 weeks unless your chartering in hurricane season, as they are units of vacation, not weeks.
Very True. Some owners rent storage space on the island. We just haul a couple of big bags since it doesn't cost us anything. The owner's time is allocated in "points". In high-season a day is two points (Dec 15 - April 15 in BVIs). We prefer the shoulder seasons since the sailing areas are less crowded. So we didn't mind using "less expensive" time.
One of the items that is often overlooked in discussing the Moorings program is the phaseout process. Included in the contract is an agreement to repair or replace any broken or damaged items at the end of the contract. You hire your own surveyor to generate the list of items to be repaired. This generally ensures you have a boat in decent condition after the 5 years is up. This doesn't make your boat brand new or take the hours off your engines. But it helps fix it up. Of course a big down-side of owning any charter boat is the negligence and poor seamanship of the charter crews. Several Mooring boats are run aground every year.
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