Where Will She Live?
Most buyers leave this until after the survey. I ask it on the first call, because a boat you cannot keep anywhere is a different boat. These are the yards and marinas we work in ourselves, with the three numbers that decide it: how long she can be, how much water is under her at low tide, and whether there is a slip at all. Every one has its own number on the card. Call them directly. This is here so you are not hunting for it.
The list
Marinas
East Coast of Florida
- Takes up to
- 300ft
- Slips
- 250
Foreign Trade Zone; home of the Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show
- Takes up to
- 315ft
- Slips
- 88
Rebuilt superyacht facility on the beach side of the Intracoastal
- Takes up to
- 250ft
- Takes up to
- 170ft
- Depth
- 10ft
- Slips
- 36
- Takes up to
- 550ft
- Depth
- 27ft
- Slips
- 50
Watson Island; 5,000 linear feet built for 500ft-plus vessels
- Takes up to
- 300ft
- Depth
- 25ft
- Slips
- 85
Full-service shipyard, 150-ton travel lift
- Takes up to
- 120ft
- Depth
- 5ft
- Takes up to
- 120ft
- Slips
- 55
- Takes up to
- 400ft
- Depth
- 30ft
- Slips
- 164
5,000 linear feet of dockage, 30ft alongside
- Depth
- 12ft
Mostly dockage on the New River, alongside berths for vessels to 195ft. The lift is for tenders, so a yacht comes here for a berth and for refit work, not to be hauled.
West Coast of Florida
Florida Keys
- Takes up to
- 450ft
- Depth
- 12ft
- Slips
- 288
Five miles from downtown Key West
- Takes up to
- 150ft
Bahamas
- Takes up to
- 250ft
- Depth
- 12ft
- Slips
- 63
- Takes up to
- 140ft
- Depth
- 9ft
- Slips
- 75
Port of entry; four T-heads for vessels to 130ft
Before you call
Four Things to Settle
We are brokers, not the marina. But we have put a lot of boats into slips, and these are the four that catch people.
(954) 560-2811Will she actually fit?
Two numbers, not one. Length settles the slip and the rate; draft settles whether you can get in at low water, and the depth at the entrance is often shallower than the depth at the berth. Ask for both, and ask at mean low water rather than at the tide they happened to measure on.
Annual, monthly or transient?
An annual contract is materially cheaper per foot than a monthly, and a monthly is cheaper than a transient night. The prime stretches run a waiting list, so the slip is often decided before the boat is. If you are buying in the fall, start the marina conversation at the same time as the survey.
What does the rate actually include?
Per-foot is the headline. Electricity is usually metered on top, and a big boat on 100A three-phase is not a rounding error. Ask about liveaboard rules, guest policy, whether contractors can work on the boat in the slip, and what happens to the rate at renewal.
What does your insurer need?
Above a certain size most policies want a named hurricane plan, and the marina is half of it. Either she moves out of the box before a storm or there is an agreed plan for her where she sits. Settle that with the marina and the underwriter before June, not during a warning.
Where will she live?
Dockage is the largest line in most owners' budgets and the hardest to sort out from a website, because availability moves and the published rate is rarely the whole story. Tell us her length and beam and roughly where you want to be, and we will tell you who to call and what to expect to pay.
Or call (954) 560-2811.