Opinions wanted. . . will the price of new boats fall in light of gas & the economy? Are they already falling? Just curious what y'all think??

My guess would be they won't fall. Costs go up for the boat dealers too.

I finally learned to buy one or two year old boats anyway, save thousands and get a perfectly clean boat. There is always somebody that changes their mind and sells their new boat for some reason.

Search boattrader.com for boats in Southeast region where drought conditions have forced dealers to drop prices. Then use that as a negotiating tool. Of course, if the local dealer won't match the price you may have to drive 12 hours to buy the boat in Georgia. Our dealer didn't match the price but did reduce the price substantially when we showed him the printout.

The cost to build a boat seem to be going up, and demand seems to be falling. I think used 1-2 yr old boat prices will decrease. New will stay the same or go higher. Thats just my opinion, I know most manufacture's are hinting at prices increases for 09 models.

what kinda prices on what models? C'mon ... quit the tease!


I had a buddy buy a boat from Geargia back in '95 and they delivered it here for a fee.

The Houston Boat Show a couple of weeks ago showed some decent discounts, but the bottom line is approximately $3K per foot of boat is too high for me. The last time I bought a new boat it was about $1K per foot, and I thought that was way too high. From now on, it's used boats for me, that's for sure.

I know times may get hard, but I can't see them coming down. Lot of items are petroleum based. And I believe it is used in making Fiberglass.

I don't think they would fall as quickly or as soon as prices on gas guzzler cars and trucks. We are in Texas and people hold their boats near and dear. However, if it continues, I would think the new boat sales would eventually start to go down which may cause a decrease in price. Probably not by much. If it did happen, I would think the dealer would still pay the same price on them but would cut his profit margin to drop the sale price in an attempt to boost sales. At some point it would not be worth the sale to the dealer. He has to maintain a certain percentage of profit.

If you don't mind hunting & shopping on traderonline.com, you can often find a bargain on a new boat that's 1 or 2 years old (leftover inventory). I've been searching for a Glacier Bay to see what the bewst price available is, and the leftovers are sometimes 30% to 35% less.