Safe Harbor Marinas

JB MARSHALL said:
You certainly don’t see new marinas opening up and boating costs will continue to go up as marinas continue to disappear.
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Exactly ..... let’s say you could build a brand new 200 boat marina with heated storage for everyone. I am only saying heated to make the revenue more...include a clubhouse, bath house... pool... playground... gas dock and it costs $10M new....just to make the math easy
your monthly payments are $85k/month....total for the year is $1M for a 10 year loan

If you could charge everyone $3k for the summer and $4k for heated storage in the winter ... your income is $1.4M

$400k is left.... and you haven’t paid employees, benefits, insurance, taxes, expenses or made a profit....

These are rough numbers but add here take away there and in the end a new marina will never work
 
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douglee25 said:
The interesting thing is, if Sun is truly looking to build condos on marina land at some point, I think they're going to have a difficult time because many marinas are Army Core land. That land can't be developed from my understanding.
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Floating trailer parks :)
 
I agree on the numbers. I've ran them before and I can't see how it works either. I belong to 1000 boat marina. It has a restaurant, fuel dock, rentals, a full repair/sales dealer, another in water sales agency, etc. I know the marina charges all contractors 30% for conducting business on their property. Their fees for the restaurant are high (I know the owners). The marina is making money somehow.
 
Blueone said:
Exactly ..... let’s say you could build a brand new 200 boat marina with heated storage for everyone. I am only saying heated to make the revenue more...include a clubhouse, bath house... pool... playground... gas dock and it costs $10M new....just to make the math easy
your monthly payments are $75k/month....total for the year is $900,000 for a 10 year loan

If you could charge everyone $3k for the summer and $4k for heated storage in the winter ... your income is $1.4M

$500k is left.... and you haven’t paid employees, benefits, insurance, taxes, expenses or made a profit....

These are rough numbers but add here take away there and in the end a new marina will never work
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It's closer to 4K for my slip and 6K for heated winter storage for my 400DB...
 
I'm surprised there aren't more CSR members that belong to yacht clubs. Some are actually very nice with many amenities and cost a fraction of what commercial marinas charge.
 
JimT said:
Safe Harbor rolled up a hundred or so mom and pop marinas with private equity money, cut costs, raised fees and sold out at the top of the boating market. Sun Communities will look at the available land around the marinas that they can develop with condos, etc.. The marinas that can't be exploited will be sold in parts.
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It's a throw-back to the Vulture (Venture) Capital days of old!!!!
 
highslice said:
Private Equity investors usually have an exit plan before they ever enter an investment. That could be what is going on here. Just spit ballin. But I have worked with a lot of private equity guys over the years, and that is the basic MO
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You've nailed it!!! We're M&A in CA and understand this industry well.
 
hottoddie said:
I'm surprised there aren't more CSR members that belong to yacht clubs. Some are actually very nice with many amenities and cost a fraction of what commercial marinas charge.
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Can you explain this one to me. I belonged to the Waukegan Yacht Club is Waukegan Harbor, IL for many years as well as to the Kenosha club. But these were simple boating clubs with activities, meals and some entertainment. Neither one OWNED the marina. From wat I remember, these marinas were state owned and had private management companies doing the management.

In southern CA, most of these are also state owned and managed with several smaller one privately owned.

Is it different in the east?





Joel Lindenberg, Senior Vice President
Los Angeles | Chicago | New York | Shanghai
O 310-405-7044 | M 310-309-1770
vCard | Bio | LinkedIn
 
I belong to a yacht club. It's not an equity club but rather a marina with a country club like clubhouse with restaurants/banquet facilities, pool, showers, etc. There is a joining fee and monthly social dues on top of the slip rental. Social memberships only are also sold. No charge for water or electric. The docks and the facilities are very well maintained. The staff is very professional. We love it.

Two months ago the club was bought by Safe Harbor. They bought two other marinas on the lake in the past two years. This past winter I needed needed bellows and outdrive service on my B3s. Getting major service on our lake is a chore. The local Sea Ray Marine Max is not on the lake. There is only one travel on lift on the lake but its not part of full service repair facility but more of a haul and launch yard.

So the yard I have been getting service at for the past 12 years is on the water but no travel lift. They have forklifts but none big enough to pick up my boat. In the past they would put it on a trailer and pull it into the garage which is 300 yards away. Never charged for this. This winter they sent me the outdrive estimate and it included an $800 haul charge. I politely told my SA there was a mistake, had never been charged a haul out fee over the past 12 years. We went back and forth up to service manager. Eventually I was told it was a new charge instituted by the new owner, Safe Harbor. More back and forth but I was basically told to take it or leave it. I really didn't have any other option so I sucked it up.

If your marina is bought by Safe Harbor expect the worst. The merger with Sun is part of a larger plan to build up the business find out a way to exploit the assets whether its spinning of the real estate or prettying up the financials and selling off to some Chinese company trying to get a foothold in the US.
 
Just For Fun said:
Can you explain this one to me. I belonged to the Waukegan Yacht Club is Waukegan Harbor, IL for many years as well as to the Kenosha club. But these were simple boating clubs with activities, meals and some entertainment. Neither one OWNED the marina. From wat I remember, these marinas were state owned and had private management companies doing the management.

In southern CA, most of these are also state owned and managed with several smaller one privately owned.

Is it different in the east?





Joel Lindenberg, Senior Vice President
Los Angeles | Chicago | New York | Shanghai
O 310-405-7044 | M 310-309-1770
vCard | Bio | LinkedIn
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The Yacht Club I belong to is one of the few that own the land, building and dock basin (no moorings). Many are on town/state owned land and have few amenities. We have a full time steward, large clubhouse with inground pool, floating docks with bout 110 boats and 4000ft of dock space. We also have fuel dock, a travel lift bay with land storage for about 2000ft of boats. We also water store about 1000ft of boats and run 100 "ice eaters" and have a resident full time mechanic.

My 39ft Sea Ray cost me a total of $3500 year including membership, dockage, land storage and electric fees. We have an 8 hour "work party requirement. Another plus is we can do all our own maintenance including shrink wrap and bottom paint or hire outside venders to do it for us.

If it weren't for belonging to a yacht club I couldn't justify the cost of owning a boat.
 
hottoddie said:
The Yacht Club I belong to is one of the few that own the land, building and dock basin (no moorings). Many are on town/state owned land and have few amenities. We have a full time steward, large clubhouse with inground pool, floating docks with bout 110 boats and 4000ft of dock space. We also have fuel dock, a travel lift bay with land storage for about 2000ft of boats. We also water store about 1000ft of boats and run 100 "ice eaters" and have a resident full time mechanic.

My 39ft Sea Ray cost me a total of $3500 year including membership, dockage, land storage and electric fees. We have an 8 hour "work party requirement. Another plus is we can do all our own maintenance including shrink wrap and bottom paint or hire outside venders to do it for us.

If it weren't for belonging to a yacht club I couldn't justify the cost of owning a boat.
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That is an awesome deal up here in MA.
 
hottoddie said:
The Yacht Club I belong to is one of the few that own the land, building and dock basin (no moorings). Many are on town/state owned land and have few amenities. We have a full time steward, large clubhouse with inground pool, floating docks with bout 110 boats and 4000ft of dock space. We also have fuel dock, a travel lift bay with land storage for about 2000ft of boats. We also water store about 1000ft of boats and run 100 "ice eaters" and have a resident full time mechanic.

My 39ft Sea Ray cost me a total of $3500 year including membership, dockage, land storage and electric fees. We have an 8 hour "work party requirement. Another plus is we can do all our own maintenance including shrink wrap and bottom paint or hire outside venders to do it for us.

If it weren't for belonging to a yacht club I couldn't justify the cost of owning a boat.
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WOW!!! Very nice. Wish we had something akin to that in our market.
 
Inquired about the floating condo, boat thing today. It’s in Charleston right now...soon to start in Miami next...interesting. First time I heard of Barton & Gray....http://www.bartonandgray.com/ a Hinckley would be fun for a day

Dear Safe Harbor Member,

Thank you so much for your inquiry about the Safe Harbor Water Suites in Charleston, SC. Please confirm your desired dates and I’d be happy to check on availability for you as well as answer any other questions you may have. Our member rate is $550 per night and we have a 3 night minimum stay. Included in that nightly rate is private use of a Moke electric vehicle as well as Beau Lake paddleboards. Additionally, you will have access to a Barton & Gray signature yacht, pending availability, for an additional cost as well as many other specially curated amenities in and around Charleston.

A few details about the Water Suites: Each suite consists of a king sized bed, ensuite bathroom as well as an interior sitting area and private upper deck terrace. There are two suites per boat and they may be booked separately or if scheduling permits, you can have the option to book both suites. We do require a 50% deposit at the time of booking. This is fully refundable up until 14 days prior to your stay.

I’ve attached some additional photos and details and I’ve included a short virtual tour as a sneak peek into our Water Suites Experience. Click Here: Water Suites Virtual Tour<
>

Again, thank you for your inquiry.

Kind Regards,
Isabella
 
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I also didn't realize that these floating hotel rooms were duplexes. I would imagine that the noise resonates a lot more when on a boat than in a traditional land-based hotel room. I would think just walking around could be felt and heard by the other cabin, not to mention any other noises generated during your 'romantic' getaway. I'll be very curious to hear feedback once people actually stay on one.

Also our marina was recently purchased by SH. They immediately raised the rent and our service fees have skyrocketed. They're also implementing additional fees for smaller items like paying a monthly rent charge for the PWC floats we all have and own but are attached to their dock. I haven't seen a lick of real improvement for the slip owners yet.
 
copb8tx said:
Also our marina was recently purchased by SH. They immediately raised the rent and our service fees have skyrocketed. They're also implementing additional fees for smaller items like paying a monthly rent charge for the PWC floats we all have and own but are attached to their dock. I haven't seen a lick of real improvement for the slip owners yet.
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“Don’t rock the boat” really applies here.... we are two years in now under SH ownership. The only price increase we have seen is heated storage went up $0.05/sqft this year. Still almost $1.50/sqft cheaper then some other places around. They have invested in floating docks in a few places..... so not any real issues with them
 
At another marina in the area that they purchased they just implemented parking fees for guests/visitors. Caused quite the ruckus and inconvenience.
 
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