Product Description

Boating Magazine's Insider's Guide to Buying a Powerboat features tips and traps for the smart boat buyer. If you don't have an uncle in the boat-dealership business, here's the next-best thing: a longtime boat dealer and salesman who lets you in on trade secrets so you can buy a new or used boat without getting burned. J. P. Lamy lays out a step-by-step approach to finding the right small powerboat (under 30 feet) and buying it at a fair price with favorable financing.

You will learn:

• How salesmen are trained
• What their margins and markups are
• The use of the Internet for boat shopping
• What to look for, good and bad, in a new or used boat
• Checklists
• How to negotiate honestly but toughly
• How to shave thousands of dollars from an asking price

Endorsed by Boating magazine, Lamy's guide helps you take control and win in the bargaining process. When it comes to buying a boat, knowledge is power.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #97926 in Books
• Published on: 1999-10-09
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 192 pages

From the Inside Flap
Get the Right Boat, at the Right Price

If saving several thousand dollars on the cost of a new or used small powerboat sounds good, you've definitely got the right book. This unique guide is the equivalent of a friend in the boat business. Consumer champion J. P. Lamy, a boat industry iconoclast, gives you tested advice on how to
Save $3,000 to $4,000 on the cost of a new $19,995 boat
Inspect and appraise new and used boats
Understand the psychology of the private sale to save thousands on a used boat
Choose the ideal make and model for you
Shop effectively in person, over the phone, and on the Internet
Reduce financing costs
Recognize and counter professional sales tactics

This book contains everything you need to know to buy a small powerboat (under than 30 feet) at a terrific savings.

From the Back Cover
Get the Right Boat at the Right Price.

If saving several thousand dollars on the cost of a new or used small powerboat sounds good, you've definitely got the right book. This unique guide is the equivalent of a friend in the boat business. Consumer champion J.P. Lamy, a boat industry iconoclast, gives you tested advice on how to

• Save $2,000 to $3,000 on the cost of a new $19,995 boat
• Inspect and appraise new and used boats
• Understand the psychology of the private sale to save thousands on a used boat
• Choose the ideal make and model for you
• Shop effectively in person, over the phone, and on the Internet
• Reduce financing costs
• Recognize and counter professional sales tactics

Insider's Guide to Buying a Powerboat contains everything you need to know to buy a small powerboat (32 feet and under) at a terrific savings.

About the Author
J. P. Lamy has bought, refurbished, and sold used powerboats and now sells new boats using a combination of good customer service and reasonable markup over the dealer's wholesale price. His win-win approach has propelled him to notable sales success in Florida's boating market. Distressed at some of the sales tactics he witnessed, he wrote this book as a consumer's aid.

Customer Reviews

An absolute must for anyone in the market for a powerboat!!
This book is extremely informative and well organized. Every step in the boat buying process is covered in terms easily understood by a first-time boat buyer (such as myself). After reading this book, I feel confident that I will be able to (1) find, negotiate, and purchase my first boat (at a great deal), and (2) be able to identify those boats/deals which are best left alone. I highly recommend this book!

Bingo!
This book delivers on its' promise to level the playing field for the new/used boat buyer. Ideas, tips, and traps presented in the book are all relevent and insightful. Good references and web sites are provided for further research. Especially useful are the "author's picks" section (for boat brands), the new and used boat checklists, negotiations, survey/inspections, and techniques for dealing with salepeople. At less than 200 pages it's a reference you can put in your pocket and take with you when shopping. Before you buy a boat, buy this book!

No meat to this book
While this book is a good overview of buying a boat, it contains no surprises - and I knew nothing about boats before buying it - save reading two magazines.

What did it tell me ?

- There is approx 30-35% markup on price of a new boat
- you get a good deal if you get 12-15% of that in negociating.

What else?
Nothing much but common sense, and repeated info.

An organised person could generate the checklists themselves with or without the help of this book or a couple of boating magazines.

Anyone who has purchased a new or used car would go through the same tactics with the dealer/seller.

What would I reccomend instead ?

I also purchased "The Complete Idiots Guide to Boating and Sailing" which gave me a better (but still reasonably high level) introduction to boats/buying.

What has really impressed me is my latest purchase (reccomended from Amazon Reviews) and that is the so called "Bible of Boating" Chapmans Piloting. It sounds a bit high-brow, but covers everything and anything a novice or experienced person could want to know. It is letter sized hardcover with 650 color pages - well worth thirty five bucks. Buy that and forget wasting thrity bucks on three empty paperbacks.