Sales figures in June reported by broker members of YachtWorld.com indicated a slight improvement compared to May’s numbers, as described in our first report in this space a month ago. Historical averages show that June is often the best sales month of the year, so an improvement of a few unit sales shouldn’t be too surprising.



However, because June ’08 saw an overall decrease in boat sales relative to May ’08, we should consider that sales for the same months in ’09 certainly have some positive attributes. Better still, despite selling 12 percent fewer boats than they did a year ago, brokers reported only an 8 percent drop in valuation for June ‘09, which is a clear uptick over ‘08 and dramatically better than year-to-date sales valuations, which are off 39 percent.


While small-boat sales (under 26 feet) have been the only category down by less than 30 percent year to date (-17 percent), boats over 45 feet began to sell better in June. In June ’09, both large and small categories were slightly ahead of ’08 both in valuations and units sold.

Compared to the powerboat market, sailboat sales are lagging well behind in 2009. Power sales nationwide in June were 2,630 compared to 2,245 a year earlier, while sailboat sales declined in June from 625 in ’08 to 552 in ‘09. Most of the increase for powerboats was in the 26-foot and under range, a fact that no doubt correlates somewhat to the drop in valuation of powerboat sales in June, down from $329 million to $307 million. By comparison, as mentioned, sailboat sales in June decreased very little, from $43 million to $39 million.

—John Burnham, Editorial Director, YachtWorld.com

Note: YachtWorld.com's proprietary database, SoldBoats.com, measures boat sales reported by member yacht brokers; the data, which is unaudited, is available only to members, except in aggregated form as reported above. YachtWorld.com is owned by Dominion Enterprises, in Norfolk, Virginia.