Renting out a boat

Nov 11, 2009
44
Pearson 365 Ketch Babylon, Long Island
BoatUS has a boat rental listing service for both boat owners and prospective renters. The service seems to address all the liabilitly issures. Details of the service can be found here: https://boatbound.co/boat-us?s=bus-nyc-intro-sail
I haven't used the service, but if I were considering renting out my personal boat, this might be a good start rather than open yourself up to all the legal and insurance issues.

Andy
 

capta

.
Jun 4, 2009
5,072
Pearson 530 Admiralty Bay, Bequia SVG
As a career captain, I have done this with several owners, and it has worked out well. But, this guy seems to be trying to take advantage of you. Obviously, your expenses are going to increase as well as wear and tear on the boat. Therefor, you are not in any position to "share" any expenses or costs. As a matter of fact even the captain's wages should be born by the chartering, when under charter, if he is pocketing anything beyond a commission for booking the charters.
If you want to try this, "rent" him the boat on charter days. Figure out what you will need to make to recoup the added insurance, maintenance and possible repairs; you will almost certainly not make a profit. That way he has all the legal responsibility with the CG and local LEO's. Have your lawyer draw up a bareboat charter contract (you can perhaps get one from a bb charter company?) Do not accept that this guy has any insurance coverage; that is YOUR responsibility. If you are paying him a monthly salary, then figure what the daily rate is and add that to the "rental" fee; no need to pay him twice.
You will have no way to check if he's being honest with you about the number of days he works, (especially if you do not live locally) but a record of engine hours may help. I would hope that this fellow is entirely trustworthy, but best to be cautious. Pm me if you'd like more info.
 
Feb 20, 2011
8,062
Island Packet 35 Tucson, AZ/San Carlos, MX
I think I'm spending waaaaay too much time thinking about this thread but here goes. This goes much further than liability and everything else that's been said. This sounds like a predator/prey relationship. Stay away, my friend. Stay away.
Sometimes, a little paranoia is a good thing.
 
Feb 11, 2006
141
Hunter 34 Galveston,Texas
Well, I'm going to take a different approach on this one. Not going to try to convince you. We have rented out our boat. We did it for about 2 years many many years ago. Believe it or not we only had a gentleman's agreement on a handshake. It worked out well for us. We were under commercial insurance through charter / sailing school. It was actually cheaper than buying insurance on our own. Even got agreed value. I always left the boat clean and when I got it back it was clean. I never had to share cleaning expenses. Nor would I ever share cleaning expenses. If anything was torn, broken or damaged. The captain always took care of it. Without question. But nothing ever really got broken except for the Y valve handle. The way we saw it, if something was broken, it was going to break anyway. Especially on a boat from the 80s. 90 percent of the time the captain was always on board when the boat was out. We kind of wanted it that way. That way if something was broken. There was no question about who was going to cover it. It actually was a really good deal for us for it. Allowed us to keep the upgrades /maintenance on the boat going. But no real profit. I would say just be very careful who you partner up with. I could go on and on about the benefits. No real negatives in our case.