Selling Ex-Charter Catamarans: Timing, Pricing and the Questions Buyers Ask

Every year the big charter companies retire a batch of four- and five-year-old catamarans, and some of them sit on the market far longer than they should. This guide is for fleet managers, owners at the end of a management contract and the brokers who sell for them: when to start, what surveyors look at, what to disclose, which tax papers to have ready, and how to price against the other ex-fleet boats listed next to yours.

Last checked: November 2026. Programme terms are taken from what The Moorings, Sunsail, Dream Yacht and others publish and can change; individual owner contracts take precedence. Tax and customs points are general information, not tax or legal advice. Confirm the position for a specific boat with a customs broker or tax adviser.

How charter programmes hand boats back

Most ex-charter cats reach the market because an owner’s management contract has ended. The published terms differ in the details but follow a similar pattern:

The Moorings runs a Guaranteed Income Program and an Option to Purchase Program, for sailing and power catamarans as well as monohulls. It says many owners put their yachts up for sale through its own brokerage offices once the charter term ends. Cruising World described the guaranteed-income lease as running “more or less than 60 months”, with the exact end date set so the boat does not leave the fleet in high season. BOOTE magazine (2025) gives a typical contract length of five to six years.
Sunsail offers a guaranteed monthly income or a reduced purchase price. It says its used boats go through a phase-out maintenance programme, and its brokerage offers them for sale.
Dream Yacht publishes a five-year placement. On programmes that earn charter income the yacht is phased out at the end, and the owner keeps it or sells it. On reduced buy-in programmes the owner has the option of full ownership at the end. BOOTE gives five to seven years as the term and lists a third route, moving into a new programme.
Smaller operators often sell during the boat’s last planned season. Yachting World reported that Sail Ionian typically sells its yachts at around five years old so buyers can see them working, and that larger companies may allow a phase-out period of up to a year.

Practical Sailor sums up the choice for The Moorings and Sunsail owners as keep, sell through the company’s brokerage, or trade into a new contract. For a broker, the point is that the seller has usually sailed the boat a few weeks a year at most, while the charter base knows exactly what has gone wrong with it. Get the base manager involved early.

Timing the sale around the phase-out date

The phase-out date is fixed by the contract, and every month a boat sits unsold after it costs the owner berthing, insurance and upkeep the charter company used to pay. The Catamaran Company advises charter-managed owners to list six to nine months before phase-out for exactly that reason. Navigare, writing for its own owners, says exit preparation starts a full year ahead.

Before phase-out	What to do
12 months	Read the phase-out clauses in the management agreement. Decide keep, sell or trade.
6–12 months	Confirm the boat’s tax and customs status, insurance after phase-out, and whether it will move (Caribbean to Europe or the US, for example).
6–9 months	List the boat. Buyers can see it working in the fleet and plan a survey around its charter calendar.
2–3 months	Haul-out and survey, so the base has time to fix what is found before handover.
About 2 months	Sea trial. Navigare warns against doing it much earlier, or you may have to repeat it.

Season matters on both ends

In the Caribbean, fleets want boats working through the winter season. On the buyer’s side, the Atlantic hurricane season runs from 1 June to 30 November, according to the US National Hurricane Center, so a buyer closing in late spring needs named-storm cover and a summer plan before taking the keys, and will price that in. In the Mediterranean the charter season is the summer, and a buyer taking over in October has little sailing left before winter. A boat due off charter there in autumn should be listed by spring, while it can still be seen working.

Preparing the boat: what buyers and surveyors look at

Sail magazine reported that fleets such as The Moorings and Dream Yacht have boats checked by a surveyor before sale and usually fix major problems, and presented that as a reason for buyers to look at boats from the big fleets. Use it as a selling point only if it is true for your boat and you have the invoices.

The items that come up on almost every ex-charter catamaran survey:

Upholstery, canvas and the tender. Yachting World’s sources put the replacement point for upholstery and canvas at around five years, with the dinghy often due as well. Check whether the dinghy and outboard actually belong to the owner. At Navigare they do not, and they stay with the fleet.
Heads. Calcified outflow hoses are a classic charter fault. A delivery skipper quoted by Yachting World suggests replacing them every couple of years. On a four-cabin, four-head cat that is four sets of hoses.
Saildrives and engines. Seals, oil condition and service intervals on both sides. Navigare recommends an oil analysis, though not straight after an oil change.
Sails and running rigging. Yachting World’s source expected sails to be in good condition at five years. Check for furling damage and worn UV strips all the same.
Underwater and structural. Bulkhead tabbing, the forward crossbeam and bridgedeck, rudders and stocks, and the hulls for impact damage and blisters. Navigare’s line on fair wear and tear is useful in negotiations: cosmetic scuffs are normal, but it does not count torn sails, dead electronics, cracked rigging, large hull blisters or corroded through-hulls as wear and tear.

Navigare says cosmetic items such as cushions and woodwork are often negotiated between owner and base manager. Settle them before listing, not after the buyer’s surveyor writes them up.

Cruising upgrades: fit them or price them

Many charter cats leave the fleet without some of the gear cruising owners want, such as a watermaker, more solar or offshore safety kit. Navigare notes the charter company can often source upgrades at better rates than the owner. If competing boats of the same model already have them, fitting may cost less than the discount buyers will ask for. If not, list the boat as it is and let the buyer specify.

Disclosure: damage history, logbooks, engine hours

An ex-charter specialist quoted in Yachting World reported seeing yachts, supposedly surveyed already, with undeclared hurricane damage and signs of hard groundings. Buyers have read those stories, and a documented history is worth more than any line in the description.

Incidents. List groundings, collisions and storm events with dates, and attach the yard’s repair invoices. Sail magazine notes that a boat with an accident and repair in its past holds its value less well, which is a reason to price it accordingly, not to leave it out.
Maintenance records. Request the full maintenance log from the base. Navigare’s service platform, for example, lets owners download the maintenance history at resale. Not every operator keeps records that thorough. Yachting World warns that charter boats are often fixed quickly between charters with little paperwork, so say what exists and what does not.
Engine hours. State the hours for each engine and the generator separately, with the date of reading. Sail magazine put charter cats at 800 to 1,000 engine hours a year against 100 to 400 for private boats. Navigare says boats it rents for up to seven seasons may reach about 4,000 hours, against a rebuild interval it puts at 8,000 to 10,000 hours for Yanmar and Volvo diesels. High hours on their own need not kill a sale; unexplained hours, or a big gap between the two engines, raise harder questions.
Charter commitments. If the boat still has bookings after the sale date, say so. In the BVI, a broker guide notes that existing bookings can pass to the buyer along with the obligation to fulfil them.

Our catamaran survey guide doubles as a checklist for the pre-sale walk-round.

VAT and customs papers buyers will ask for

Tax status is a common sticking point, because a fleet boat may sit under a charter licence or temporary-import status that does not pass to a private buyer. Have these ready before the first serious enquiry:

Chain of title and registration. Builder’s certificate, all bills of sale, current registration, and a plan for the deletion certificate at closing. A BVI broker guide stresses that most flag states want originals for re-registration.
EU status. The European Commission’s April 2026 guidance note for pleasure craft lists what customs accepts as proof that a boat has Union status, including a T2L or T2LF, or the original invoice or sales contract showing VAT was paid. Union status survives resale as long as the VAT was paid. If the boat’s history is complicated, ask customs in the berthing country for a T2L before you list.
Boats outside the EU. The same note confirms that a boat imported into the EU generally pays import duty and VAT. Returned goods relief needs the boat back within three years, and for the VAT exemption it must be re-imported by the same person who exported it, so a new owner cannot use it. Non-EU-registered boats owned by people established outside the EU can use temporary admission, normally 18 months at a time.
Local duty and licences. In the BVI, import duty applies to vessels brought in permanently, and many yachts there are on temporary import status, so a buyer keeping the boat locally will want the duty position in writing. The commercial charter licence does not transfer on sale.
CE documentation. If the boat is heading into the EU, have the EU declaration of conformity. Under the Recreational Craft Directive (2013/53/EU, Article 19), a private importer of a boat whose manufacturer did not carry out the conformity assessment must have a post-construction assessment done before putting it into service.

State the tax status in the listing itself, in plain words: “EU VAT paid, invoice available”, “VAT not paid, lying in Tortola under temporary import”, and so on. A vague answer puts off exactly the buyers who would have to import the boat.

Pricing against comparable listings

Ex-fleet boats are compared with each other very directly, because the same model, year and layout can be listed by several sellers at once. A buyer looking at a four-cabin Leopard 45 will have every other one open in another tab.

There is no agreed depreciation figure, and published ones vary. Sail magazine (2015) estimated that a charter cat loses about 40% of its value in four to five years. Practical Sailor (2025) cited experienced buyers reporting about 50% over a five-year programme. A charter specialist quoted in Yachting World (2022) advised buyers not to pay more than 60% of the new price, while admitting many did in a supply-short market. Treat these as markers; current comparable listings are a better guide, and a broker quoted by Sail argued that market value is a broker’s call, not a surveyor’s.

How we would set the number:

Pull every listing of the same model within two model years, and note layout (three or four cabins, owner’s version or charter version), location, tax status and engine hours. Our ex-charter vs owner’s version guide explains why layout moves the price.
Adjust for location and status. A VAT-paid boat in the Mediterranean and a duty-unpaid one in the Caribbean are not the same product, even if the hull number is next door.
Adjust for documented work. Sail magazine’s example is worth showing sellers: at $350,000 with about $30,000 of work to do, a boat can still beat one at $400,000. Buyers do that arithmetic, so do it first.
Price to be in the first page of results for the model, not the last. The Catamaran Company’s seller guide warns that an uncompetitive price usually means waiting until the better-priced boats have sold or been withdrawn.

Mistakes that slow ex-charter sales

Listing after phase-out instead of before, so the owner pays for the boat while it waits.
“Engine hours: low” instead of two numbers and a date.
Leaving the tender and outboard in the listing when they belong to the fleet.
No answer to the VAT question until the buyer’s lawyer asks it.

At handover, record meter readings, keys and inventory in writing. Our catamaran handover protocol is built for that.

Listing ex-fleet stock on catamarket

catamarket lists catamarans only, sail and power. The dealer package costs €99 one-off for up to 25 listings, each online for 12 months, with no commission; stock can be imported from a feed or spreadsheet on request. Brokers who join before 31 March 2027 get the first three months free, including the import. Details are on the broker page; current stock is in the marketplace.

Related guides

Sources

Cover photo: Dmytro Glazunov on Unsplash.