153: Would we buy a CHARTER Boat again? Leopard Catamaran 44 from Sunsail/Moorings
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- Опубліковано 14 жов 2024
- A year ago we bought a charter boat from Sunsail and over the past year we have been asked many times, "Would you buy a charter boat again? Was it a good experience?" So, in this video, we share the pros and cons of buying a charter boat, we answer the question whether we would buy another charter boat, and we conclude with 6 pieces of advice for those who might consider buying a charter boat.
Following are the topics and sub topics that we discuss that hopefully will be of value to you :
PROS and CONS of buying a charter boat?
Would we buy a charter boat again? See our answer at the end!
Advice we have for people looking to buy a charter boat. Most important things to look for.
Importance of the LOCATION of your potential charter boat's base and how it can affect it's PRICE.
Are all charter base location reputations and capabilities equal?
Logistics of where you plan to have upgrades done.
Charter boat is a "blank slate" - what does that mean?
Is a boat being "always used" good or bad?
"4 cabin" or "owner's cabin" configuration - which one is better?
What extra items are included with a charter boat purchase?
Why do charter companies sell their boats after five years? What type of repairs can be expected?
How many generator and engine hours should you expect and why?
Red flags to watch out for.
Is a boat's cosmetics wear and tear important and why?
What do you want to do with your boat? Do you have the time, effort, skills and money?
Are cushions or enclosures included?
Are spare parts and tools included? What type of spare parts will you need? Will a boat from a private owner come with spare parts and other items?
What items needed repairing on our boat after we bought it?
What repairs, changes and discoveries were made on our first year haul out?
Following are a few related videos of ours that we recommend you seeing if you haven't already:
Episode 103: Moorings Sunsail "Phase - Out" Handover Purchase Testimonial - • 103: Moorings Sunsail ...
Episode 87: Which Will We Buy? Tour, Review, Comparison Leopard 39, Leopard 40, Leopard 44, 48, 58 Catamarans - • 87: Which Will We Buy?...
Episode 117: FKG Work Dock Project Heaven or Hell? - • 117: FKG Work Dock Pro...
Episode 120: Sailing Blown Away's All New Upgrades Tour - • 120: Sailing Blown Aw...
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We are Eileen and Brown Councill. Welcome to our channel and a glimpse into our NEW life adventure! 2020 was a year of uncertainty and change (for all of us, right?), but we overcame the challenges and decided it was time to chase our dream, to sail around the world! Did I mention that we have very little sailing experience? Before leaving Qingdao, China, our home of 4 years, we sold almost all of our earthly possessions and started our international search to find the right sailboat that we would call "home." After 5 months of unanticipated twists and turns, we found what we were looking for, a used Leopard 44' Catamaran located in St. Lucia.
So, here begins our journey, filled with unmatched excitement and honestly, a bit of trepidation as well. We have much to learn as we travel the world on our floating home and we intend to document that journey and share it with you. We are so glad you have decided to join us, and we hope that you will find our story so compelling that it will inspire you to chase your dreams too!
As a viewer, we consider you to be part of our family and look forward to getting to know you. Don't hesitate to comment on our videos and ask questions. We will do our best to answer every correspondence! All we ask is that you have patience with us as we work really hard to improve our camera/video techniques and ability to tell a story. Hopefully, you will be as BLOWN AWAY from watching, as we are in experiencing and producing our adventures!
If you wish to support our video efforts, all we ask is that you SUBSCRIBE, give a THUMBS UP, and SHARE our videos with your friends!
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Can’t believe you guys don’t have more subscribers. Your openness and honesty about your experience with sailing and your catamaran is awesome
Wow. Thank you so much for your comment! It made our day!! We appreciate your kind words! Happy New Year!!!
Thank you for posting this video and documenting your experience! I really appreciate how you associated your pros and cons with why they mattered to you. We just took delivery of a new FP 45 this Spring. It's been an adventure for sure. Even though I think I've had exceptional service and support, A new boat is not a relaxing or turn-key experience either. You may be dealing with fall-out from questionable maintenance or architecting a battery bank. A new boat has all sorts of integration issues between the factory, post factory and dealer installed systems. Even in a location like Annapolis, parts can be difficult to get and waiting for skilled labor to become available are still obstacles. One thing that I think is a misconception. 4 cabin boats cost $9k more than 3 cabin owners versions. By the time you add $ for the extra head etc. We did all of our own Chandlery and that adds up. I'm starting to wonder if the best boat to buy is a 3 year-old privately owned 4 cabin boat. Shaken out but not worn out. Still has a warranty on the Hull. Maybe no one sells theirs at 3 years. Cheers
Thank you for watching and for your insightful comment. Congratulations on your new FP45! You are in for an adventure of a lifetime. The benefit of 4 cabins is a) more storage space, b) much cheaper, c) the ability to convert one of the heads to a storage locker for things like scuba gear, or a laundry room, etc. If a privately owned boat is well cared for then yes, it is better to buy that, but if a privately owned boat is not well cared for, you will have similar issues we have dealt with. And, no matter, a boat is a boat...it will always have problems despite the care and attention of the owner. We just try to stay at least one step ahead with a lot of preventative work!
I have watched every episode you have posted in the last 10 days. I’m very grateful for your candor and you ability to know what people that know nothing want to and should learn. Really looking forward to next week. Peace.
Oh wow!! Thank you, Vita. We are so happy you are watching and enjoying our channel. Thanks for your feedback. We are grateful!! And, next week will be eye opening for sure. Have a great weekend!!
so would you suggest I get an older boat that's been privately owned since new ? say 8yrs vs 5? target similar engine hour?
@roberts8783 it’s really hard to say. Sometimes private owners don’t care for their boats similar to charter companies. If you go with 8 yrs you will have a lot of maintenance to address within a couple of years like standing and running rigging. The question is what can you afford. Go for the best taken care of boat you can afford as all boats will have issues no matter their age. Engine hours shows less wear on the sails, and hopefully they have kept your with the engine maintenance.
@@SailingBlownAway good point engine hours vs sails on boats on first sails. perhaps 3 or 4 years is better. given enough capital where would you suggest the intersection of depreciation vs repair costs and utility of newer designs is ? maybe 2 years?
In general, the charter companies sell their boats at five years because they have been continuously used by many different customers with varying levels of experience so these boats will have a lot of wear and things that need to be replaced soon after the phase out refurbishing period before sale. This boat is fully depreciated and a blank canvas to add your favorite new upgrade systems depending on what you want to do with your boat. Depending on your budget, we can also argue that buying a new boat is the way to go, but there are many variables involved and there is no short answer. When you get closer to narrowing down your options and near pulling the trigger, we’d be happy to do a consultation call to get to know you better along with your cruising goals so we can help you make the best decision.
Thank you! This was very helpful 😊 We’re years away from buying a boat but try to gather as much purchase info as possible and go in with eye wide open.
You are SO welcome. We hope that it helps anyone who watches it. Whatever you do, DO NOT buy an ex charter boat from Grenada. Investigate the bases and find out who takes care of their boats better than others. Their poor workmanship has literally cost us tens of thousands of dollars. We wish you all the best and hope to see you out here with us some day soon.
Always good to see you, Nick and Meagan sold thier genset, lost 600 pounds, additional lithium batteries and 12 volt a/c allowes use all night, possibly a path for when your genset craps out. Niki and Jason have a compost toilet for use when at anchor, no holding tank for that.
Thank you for your comments. Thanks for watching. Yes! We are happy to lose the genny. For now it’s redundancy. We can run our ac on one side for about 5 hours. Nick and Megan are golden with that!! And their new sail! And composting toilet is a possibility for sure. Maybe in the near future! We are thankful to learn from all of these channels. It’s so educational!!
Just watched this episode again after a few weeks. I have spent probably 1,000 hours researching live aboard sail boat purchase and now that I know more I realize all the nuggets you gave us in this video and others - Thanks!
Hey Jeff!! Thank you so much for your comment. It made our day!!! We want our videos to be helpful and informative and we are so pleased that it has helped you. Let us know if you have any questions!! Best wishes to you in your search! It's a tough market now!
Checking out a boat in the dark with a flashlight, I'm guilty of this to lol thanks for sharing
I am glad you get Brown’s sense of humor! Ha ha. At least we are not wearing blindfolds!! Thanks for watching and commenting!!
Very honest assessment. I follow people that bought new and boy there are a lot of problems with brand spanking new boats too.
Thank you so much for watching and commenting. Yes, new or used, you still face a lot of issues and costs! Good point!!
Thanks for posting this episode. Many times folks say never buy a charter boat. I think you gave it a fair shake for both sides of the purchase strategy. Great advice
Thank you so much for your feedback. We really appreciate it. We tried to be fair...that is most important. We learned a lot! Thanks again!
You guy's are great !! Good Advice. It really comes down to how much wear and tear is on the boat you pick....Enjoy your videos very much !! Your my wife's favorite Channel....She Keeps saying, I can relate to them and there our age, and no.... Babies !!! lol
HA HA. We LOVE your comment and so happy we are your wife's fave channel! She obviously has GREAT taste! That statement just made our day! :) Thanks for your kind feedback. You are RIGHT. It's all about the wear and tear, how hard a boat was run and how well it was maintained. We are thankful we didn't suffer any hurricane damage in our boat, but she was run really hard in charter. Have a great weekend!
We bought a 15 year old privately owned boat and agree with you. We got so much more stuff than buying a boat new and everything sea-tested. So we are in total agreement with you there. One advantage we had over you is that our previous owners did not damage the boat like charterers do.
Hey there!!! Thank you for watching and your comment! I am glad that you were able to buy a private boat. You are right, you have a huge advantage over us in wear, upgrades and also in parts included in the sale! We hope to see you n the blue sometime!! Where are you?
@@SailingBlownAway - We are currently sailing Ireland and Scotland. Cold water stuff, even in the summer. Lucky you with all that sunshine - we have the heating on
Oh wow! You are real sailors!! Well done! I couldn’t even imagine how cold it must be and the seas are much tougher. Thanks for your comments. We are sending some warm sunshine your way!
@@SailingBlownAway - it is cold today. Please send lots more sunshine 😄😄😄😄😄😄 Thanks for your kind words about our sailing, something we are always looking to improve on.
I will have a look over your other vids when I have a bit of spare time. Seeing somewhere nice and warm is what I need at the moment. I should add that the summer here can be lovely, but the winter is only for penguins!
Ha ha. Happy to do that. We are always trying to improve our sailing too, but in more mild conditions! I am sure we could learn a lot from you all! Hang in there! I am guessing you are almost always in perpetual “dusk” now! Only 3 more weeks and it’s back to more light everyday!
Just a thought on ENGINE wellness, Oil samples are a way to get all unknown issue reveled to you. Engine oil analyst is simple is will tell you what getting into the oil, what bearing my be failing or in poor condition,, weather there are fluids in the oil, and various aspects of the cooling system status based off the viscosity resistance. It is something i would recommend. Also Diesel RPM should be high enough when operating to get full use of turbo boost available to prevent carbon build up on the turbo's. Do recommend Lucas fuel treatment for your engines to help keep injectors clean.
Thank you so much!! We will check on all this and follow your suggestions! Some of this we do already. We appreciate your help! Thanks for commenting and happy new year!!
Such a great channel, thank you as always for the advice.
Hey!! Thank you, as always for watching and commenting. You are one of our most faithful! We appreciate you!
Great new episode. Can't wait for next week and the 'financials' breakdown.
Thanks so much watching and commenting. Next week will be a doozy for sure!!
I've watched all of the sailing videos and am a fan. I appreciate the videos.
Thank you so much, Thomas!! We really appreciate your support!
🤯🤯🤯 My mind is completely blown. You guys continue to amaze me...but tell me something new. 😉 😂 If I were in the market for purchasing a boat I can see how everything you shared would be extremely helpful. Looking forward to you getting everything in ship shape so those of us that have no clue about any of this will not be too much of a burden when we step foot onto Blown Away in the future. ❤️
Aw, thank you so much!!! We can’t wait to have you on board!! Thanks for believing in us! ❤️
Thanks for being so candid about this. We are on the path of acquiring a catamaran and your video was spot on for us. Looking forward to next week video! Enjoy the Abacos!
Thank you, Daniel! We are so glad to be of help to you! Best wishes on your purchase. Let us know if you have any questions we can answer for you! Next week will be an eye opener for sure! Thanks again!
Hello my dear friends
Such an amazing video. So interesting. So many details.
This one will go to my files so I can watch it many times.
I hope you are doing great.
Waiting for next week episode.
Cheers from Canary Islands ❤️
Hello Carlos!! Thanks for your always cheerful message and enthusiasm!! We are glad you enjoyed it and that it will be helpful to you in the future. Hugs to you guys! Cheers from the Abacos.
Wonderful video, thank you.
Thank you so much for watching and commenting.
Great show guys very interesting .....BOAT stands for break out another thousand but it’s worth it in the end⛵️⛵️
Thanks, Ian!! Ha ha. You are right. BOAT definitely describes it. Wait until next week’s vid! 😭
Thanks, Guys- great heads up!
Thanks for watching and commenting!! We appreciate it so much!
Long time no see😉Glad to see you two💞
Hey!! Is this Hillery from Qingdao? ❤️ we are so happy to hear from you!
Hi Hillary! It’s your office mate Brown! So good to hear from you! Please send my best to Grace, Jenny and all!
"not monetized"....but you have patrons 🤔keep it real man. good video though, lovely boat as well :)
At the time we were not monetized on YT…that’s what Brown meant. We didn’t have enough hours or subs. Of course we are now! We are glad you enjoyed the video! Thanks for your comment.
aooooo, you "tricked it out"....did you have curb feelers added"? that would help you NOT hit docks when docking...just a thought!!
Ha ha ha. That’s one thing I wish they offered! Lol! If only…
Great practical advice!
Thanks, Steve!! Thanks for watching. We hope you had a great Thanksgiving!
What a great video, thanks!!
Thank you, Bill for watching and commenting. It’s so appreciated!
Another awesome video guys and always looking forward to seeing your next video 👌👌
Thank you, Jason for watching and your kind feedback. We appreciate it so much!
Hey guys thanks for this episode I’m working towards the same route that you guys took so this is great information. Looking forward to the next episode stay safe😃👍
Hey Paul!! Thanks for watching and your comment. We are so glad you are right behind us and that our information was helpful. Let us know if you have any questions or we can help in any way! Have a great weekend.
What a great video. Very informative. Thank you for sharing your knowledge.
Thank you so much for watching and your comment. We appreciate it!
The first thing I would do is fix the broken bulkheads they forgot to tell you about,, But give them their credit they are recalling every lepard to either fix it or give the new owners supplys to fix it themself, On a boat scale of Snog, Marry, or Avoid? This one would be Avoid scale in my book, Fixing bulkheads is messy long work with half the boat being messed up just to gain access to fix it is not for me. My drream boat is a 39ft Wharrem Tiki Where you can stick it in a 40 ft container and ship it anywhere in the world for $1200 Bucks is more like my style, Screw paying them crooks to go through the panama canal, Its all filtered off as corruption and the locals see little of the rich extortion fees they charge.
Thanks for your comment. Perhaps you are confusing the Lagoon for the Leopard? Lagoons are the ones having bulkhead issues. Leopards have other issues for sure, but not bulkhead unless the vessel was put under serious strain in bad seas. I hope you are able to enjoy your dream boat.
Thanks for your videos. We even saw ourselves on your Annapolis boat tour video. We died laughing at seeing ourselves as we randomly came across your channel. So glad we did too!
I haven't heard you guys mention if you had a buyers broker or an agent helping you with the offer/buying process. Or were you guided by the Zataras? Lol. We love them too. Thanks for all you do!
Thanks for watching!! That’s hilarious that you saw yourselves in our vid. We did that on purpose! 😂 We live that you found us!! We did use a buyers broker as we were clueless as to the process. Zatara did help with a lot of things, but buying would have been helpful if Keith was with us! Have love them. Thanks for watching!!
Another great and informative video. I'd be interested to see if Moorings reaches out to you after they view it since some of the stories aren't flattering for them. Looking forward to the cost rundown next week.
Thanks for your comment! We appreciate it. We would be surprised to hear from Moorings. We are such a small fish in a big sea. Next week will be an eye opener for sure!
Great vid real eye opening ,on buying a charter ,the gen is such a high cost to replace ,when you not earning dollars.and a Good professional independent surveyor is critical ....did you do a cost of adding all the spare parts to create redundancy? Shooo that paaauuusssee before you said yes you would buy a charter boat again,,,😅😅😅
Hey Louie!! Thanks for always giving us feedback and leaving a comment. We appreciate it. Yes, the genny is a high cost to replace for sure if you are working with the Rand. It's tough all around. Yes, we did budget the cost of spare parts in our purchase, but we were stunned at how costly spare parts are and how many you need! HA! We hammed it up to have a bit of a cliff hanger for you all...leave you in suspense! :)
Like the saying home cooking Brown 😜😂😂👍
Ha - You do get his sense of humor, Ian! ;)
Good stuff. Thank you
Thanks for your comment and feedback, Rick!
Good video! Most equipment is better to be used than not..a/c you can add solar you can add. Just about anything you can add later on and won't cost as much if you diy, I find generators useless on a boat with 2 diesel engines..
Old school truckers used to run their engines for 5 to 6 months straight without turning it off..dry starts for a diesel is much worse than idling it..
So I don't get why people don't run the engines at all on these cats
ThanKs for watching and your comments. Diesels are fabulous. They are so reliable.
Thanks this is helpful.
We are so glad! Thanks for commenting!!
First to be "Blown Away" :) !!!
HA HA...and no pun intended! ;) Thanks for watching and commenting!
Awesome. Thank you
Thank you so much for your comment!!
Haha ,no swans on the beds when you bought the boat 🤣
LOL. You get Brown's sense of humor...Scary!! HA HA!
Plenty of confusion out on the high seas. First of all UA-cam pay those who choose to do what your doing per episode quintessentially per subscription and view. Here’s an article I don’t know if you’ve read regarding chartering boats.
Thanks for your comment. Would be happy to read the article but don’t see it in your comment. Can you resend?
Could you please resend that article link because it didn’t come through during your first attempt? Thanks!
In respect to things breaking and being worn. It may just be a boat thing in general. If you live on a boat full time, with kids, always travelling to new locations, its going to get worn and break things. A question could be...Whats worse, My Kids or Charter Guests.
You are absolutely right. It could be the boat, in general after 5 years of use by anyone. HA HA...I would guess the charter guests would be worse than your kids! :) Thanks so much for your comments! We appreciate it!
Very interesting stuff... thank you...How much have you put into the boat since you bought it?
Thanks, Dave! Thanks for watching and commenting. Great question. One more video and the total output will be revealed.
One more question. Let's say you were able to fly in a surveyor from Florida and they found many of the issues that you talked about like the leaking engine seal. Would that list be a price negotiation tool or do you think Moorings would have tried to fix the problems?
Great question. You can negotiate everything in phase out. The key question is who do you want to fix it? For example, the gooseneck could have been fixed by them, but we wanted it done by a reputable welder so we negotiated a price reduction for it instead. We didn’t trust that the fix at the base would be to our liking. If a surveyor found the leaking seal (nearly impossible to know without a history of the engines) they would have fixed it for us and/or negotiated a price reduction for sure.
We have our boat in Sint Maarten. Terrell is doing our solar and lithium. Did you have your cushions done there also? If so who did you use? We plan on keeping the boat there through December to get as much done as possible before we set off
Hey Robert! I hope it’s going well in SXM. Congrats!! Yes we had our cushions done by Ullman Sails/St Martin Sails. It’s a 2 min walk from FKG. Ask for Rob. They did our enclosures too and did a great job. Tell them we sent you!
Hello you two! Great info. I have a Leopard 39 and she has the exact same issue with the rudder sleeves that you guys had with your 44. Can you point me in the direction your guys found to replace the aluminum sleeves with fiberglass ones? Seems that the aluminum sleeves have a reputation for seizing and then want to turn inside it's mount in the hull which can create a small leak!
Hello Shane!! Yes! We are happy to help. The seizing issue is found on all Leopards. We caught ours before it started leaking water into the engine bay. Thankfully. We were at a boatyard and the mechanics there had ordered the fiberglass sleeves and PVC-needle nose bearings to Have a spare set as they were finding that they were changing them more often in leopards. They were well aware of the issue. Let me see if I can find the exact parts numbers for our replacements. We got lucky and didn’t have to do the research as they had already done it for us!
I just looked through all of our invoices and cannot find the parts. Let me see if Brown can find something!
Hi Shane! Here is where I'm almost positive this is the origin of our PVC rudder bearings. www.svb24.com/find?query=rudder%20bearing . With regards to the fiberglass stern tube, I think our our boat yard had those custom make based on our original aluminum tube specs.
@@SailingBlownAway You guys are remarkable! Thank you for the time you spent on this. I think I'm going to go the same way you guys did with the fiberglass sleeves. Part of the issue with the aluminum sleeves is they simply do not adhere to the hull as well as fiberglass. Safe travels you two!
@@shaneharvey1026 Yeah, fiberglass is tough stuff and with the pvc bearings there is no galvanic corrosion.
👍
Would you buy a new boat through sun sail or the motifs and KT them rent itfor you for 5 years after wh you would own it outright?
It’s funny but Brown and I just talked about this this week and he said no way. If you have the money to buy new it would be better to buy new. If you don’t then buying a charter boat is a headache but at least it’s affordable.
Cool!
Thanks, Peter!! Thanks for watching and commenting!!
when you shower on the back of the boat are you using salt water from the ocean or filtered water?
Fresh water. Made through de-sal.
👍👏👏 lots of additional information not found in other yuck-tub sailing channels. You'll get 'CONed' even in America... chain! 🤣😂🤣 **NOTE: KEEP ALL RECEIPTS!**
As for surveyers, another boat channel had two (2), one for outside & the other other for inside. Both were very wrong. You (2) are better than them. Surveyers = Scammers. ⬅️ PERIOD!
Once again, 👍 info.
Thanks for your comments, Steven! We really appreciate it and especially that it's helpful information. You are so welcome and we are grateful for your watching our channel!
👍👍👍
Thanks for the three thumbs up!!
Was it a specific site you went to to get the pdf manuals?
I always Google with the specific part brochure name and then put “pdf” at the end and they most always pop up.
Or on the Leopard Catamaran owners Facebook site!
Hi,
12 months ago, I have purchased a Tasman elite 40 Sailing Catamaran,
She was built originally as a charter vessel, and she used to be a charter sailing catamaran for the first seven years when she was built in the Whitsunday Islands
I want to charter her out again to a charter company, but this time in the Caribbean’s my problem is, I don’t know who to contact
Is there anyone out here who can help me please and give me some information and some contact details that would be so much appreciated , thank you kindly
Erwin
Congrats on buying a boat. I wish we could help you, but we don’t know any charter companies besides the Moorings/Sunsail and they use only Leopards. We hope you are able to find a smaller company that accept other kinds of vessels.
@@SailingBlownAway thank you for replying back to me, maybe if not a charter company then perhaps Airbnb
@@erwinbogner7855 I am so sorry. I wish we could help you! We wish you all the best in your search.
@@SailingBlownAway thank you for getting back to me☺️
Wooooo