where to buy a boat

Is it true that you can only buy a boat from a local dealer? The only reason I ask is because I called on a boat in so cal and the guy that worked at the place told me that he couldn't sell me a boat. Then he told me to go to my local dealer. What kind of crap is that?

You are not supposed to, but some dealers will anyway.

Why would you not want to buy locally? Service near you is sooo important!

I traveled 4.5 hours to trade in and buy my new boat because it was the best deal and I shopped it hard locally and far away. I would never take my boat back to the dealer. I have a very good independant shop to go to for Mercruiser warranty if need be here in Santa Rosa. However I realize that for some the only choice is the dealer. Not all but most dealers are great until after the deal. Once the check clears everything changes.

Look I just think that its funny that this guy told me this. So whats it really matter if I buy the boat out of town. It doesnt mean that I wont take it there for service. If i dont buy the boat locally they wont work on my boat. Is that how it works. Just wondering.

A lot of the boat manufacturers try to protect dealer territory. Since far fewer boats sell than say cars...I suppose they feel this protects those that want to "invest" in a dealership.

Screw dealer territory. That it why we hear all these stories about dealers putting the screws to our nuts with service related issues. Give me a place that offers top notch customer care and ill pay a few extra bucks out the door..

Just remember, if you do buy a boat out of territory, you might save a few bucks, but if you take your new boat to your local dealer that you did not purchase it from, the SN will tell where it came from. More than likely on a new boat, the local dealer will do the work on it, but you wont get any favors from them. Just remember that when its 90 outside and the middle of summer and you need warranty work done, it might be November before you get your boat back because they will put their customers in front of you...

How is that so. Why do they have so much power. There must be some law that states how long you can keep someones boat or car for service. This boat game sounds as hard core as the oil game. Like dennis said they can get you by the nuts. Thats sad. What the hell happend to customer service. Just because some other painter painted the exterior of a home doesnt mean that I wont paint the interior of it. Just another load of crap from the big business men with money. We are free to choose where they tell us where we can buy stuff. If not they can give us hell. Big business is going to turn us into robots. Just work for the man and shut up. Thats why business owners love to hire thoes people that are "just doing the jobs americans dont want". Its because they cant bitch about how much they get paid or the rights they have. They cant speek english. They just tell the guy that can speek english to tell them what to do. Then pay him 50 cents more an hour and label him a "crew manager". Look. I work hard to try to make my life better but what ive learned is you cant get ahead without making a honest buck. Thats sad. The only way to get ahead is to make "FREE" money. Free money means stab your brother in the back in order to get ahead. Whats wrong with people. Greed is the worst.

I do not see anything wrong with what Byrd said. He was stating they most likely will do the work but remember like every business their will be a priority list. It is no different with car dealerships. If you buy from them they will often work harder to make sure your needs are taken care of ASAP and possibly bump your car, truck or boat ahead of others. I have learned that lesson and look for a fair price that ensures that my needs will be addressed. As Byrd said if it is the middle of summer I do not want my boating waiting for a slot to be fixed I want it near the top of the list.

This has nothing to do with greed or "The Man"! It is reality!

yo bazel read what i said. i didt blame him i just said that it was a joke what the dealers do. yes it does have to do with greed. greed is reality. let me spell it out for you slow. they want you to buy a boat from them. if you dont there might be a good chance your boat can sit for a long time to get it fixed. how does that not have anything to do with greed. if they didnt care where you got the boat,they would take care of your problems. Not put you at the end of the line. read what i said completely before you start typing. dude you got it all twisted.

We have kind of gone this circle before... In the end, if a dealer did not take care of me in a professional way, I would contact the manufacturer. I don't care where I bought the boat. It would also reinforce the decision to purchase elsewhere.

The "You didn't buy from us, so I will screw you" is EXACTLY why you wouldn't want to purchase from a dealer. I think the better route would be, let me wow you with my service. Keep coming back to me......and we will work with you on your next X number of boats you purchase.

That is not to say that the dealer cannot bump your boat a day for a 3 time repeat customer to save them a day.... But Summer to November is a joke and cannot even be taken seriously.

Remember, this stuff goes both ways. Treat me poorly and I will do everything I can to sway people away from your business. "Yea, I have this boat, but I will NEVER GET ANOTHER because the dealer can never satisfy my needs. Go with something else." A few comments like that on the dock stick in other potential customers minds. People without brand goggles are few and far between.....so when someone is bashing their own brand at the dock.....people tend to listen.

P.S. I have purchased 2 boats from my local dealer. They are as good as it gets as far as dealers go(BIG THANKS TO TAYLOR'S BOATS). I send people there all the time.... But I just think the argument above is crap.

when i said how is that so is just me saying that its a joke that they do that, not what he said.

all eyes, I am speaking from experience when I use to sell heavy equipment. Although different product, the business models are similar. Here is the reason why this happens. Contrary to popular belief, it costs a dealer more than what the manufacturer reimburses them for warranty work. Parts are covered, but they usually have a max time allowed per warranty repair. Also, the manufacturer determines their own discount when it comes to labor, regardless of what rate the shop actually charges for service work.

A dealer is inclined to support his customers that support his business, not someone that gets a small profit deal from a competitor because he knows he will never have to work on the boat. It has nothing to do with "the man"...

look i have a o6 x2. it only has 20 hrs on it so its not been worked on yet. the thing is that i got the boat at a real good price so im going to sell it in order to pay off some credit dept. i want to buy another boat but what i got my 06 for i cant get another one. i love my boat but its better to my wife and i to sell this one to get rid of our credit cards. im lookin to spend between 50-55 grand on a boat. the ones that i like in that rang are 06 wakesetters but at that price they are from private sellers. so im just wondering if the local dealer will punk me because i didnt buy the boat from them.

If you and I brought our boats into a dealer for repair at the same time and I bought the boat there I would fully expect to take priority over your boat. While you were waiting another customer brought their boat in and it needed attention then I would expect it to go in front of you as well. It is about relationships. If you are only going in when you need something there is no relationship you are simply an unkown customer. Explain how this is greed. My last 2 big purchases where from local dealers where I got a fair price and I am confident I will get great service. Could I have saved a bit of money by looking elsewhere in other territories? Possibly but I highly doubtt it.

How would you not expect them to bump you, and address a loyal customers need? If you are that upset about it get a written statement on when they will have it done or take it somewhere else. Build relationships with the places you want to get service from and you will have an easier time. You don't always save money when you look for the lowest pice. Value and Cost are long term components to a purchase of any kind.

i see your point. but to me a customer is a customer. if i have to eat a little money on a job in order to get more business then thats whats its about. if you take care of that guy who got his boat from out of town he will come back to you. maybe not to buy a boat but maybe a wakeboard or tower lights ect. they set it up so the only you will get taken care of is if you buy the boat from them. it has to do with the man because the man has dealers in areas where only that dealer can sell them that boat. wheres the comp in that. if there were two mastercraft dealerships in my town that were owned by two different people im sure you could get a better deal at one than the other. deal meaning better price or service. which ever one that is more important to you.

what just because you go to disneyland more than me means you dont have to wait in line. man what happend to wait your turn. well what happend was now he can buy a pass that lets him cut in line. its a lot of money but if you want to buy it you can. well the guy buying that pass is now the man. thats how it works. but the man always has something to do with it. if your a loyal boat owner why cant you understand that they might be busy.

I want to add that I find this whole way of thinking amusing.... Those who assume you need to be screwed at the first or at the end....but you are going to get screwed.

QUALITY DEALERS will take care of you at purchase and in the shop....that is a fact. They do not have to overcharge you when selling OR screw you on service if you purchased your boat elsewhere. They can choose to do either, but then they wouldn't be a top notch dealer IMO.

AGAIN, I am not talking about getting bumped a day....I am talking about the "I'll show you attitude." If a dealership cannot keep up with their workload, they better hire more techs.

buy the way its stupid of me to bring this up because my friend works at a dealership that fixes both mastercraft and malibu. its just the game they play with people i dont care for.

Byrd has it right. It cost the dealer money to do warranty work. The manufacturer tell you how much you are going to get paid for doing the work and how long it should of took you. The dealer doesn't get paid for the time it took to find out what was wrong with it in the 1st place. If you buy your boat from you local dealer it will be good for you. Tell them you want to buy from them and just ask for the best price they can give you and be nice about it. It should work out for you.

The dealership is in business to sell boats. When they sell boats to "thier" customers, they have an obligation to service thier customers boats first and foremost.
Someone above said, "when it's 90 degrees outside..."etc....
That is exactly spot on, IMO. They have a looooong list of customers that they sold a boat to waiting for thier boat to be worked on, but yet for some reason if you buy a boat from a dealer out of territory, you feel they owe you the same service that the dealer you bought the boat from does....
Malibu is very territorial, and dealers do get thier hand slapped for selling outside of thier own.
Buying a used boat is a different story. There are ways to find out who originally sold the boat, and who the original warraty is registered to. The dealer ultimately has the obligation to service the boat being that they are the warranty center for the brand. But it is to thier discretion how they want to handle the work load.

Back to the original question, as to why the dealer said he wouldn't sell a boat out of territory is fear of possible reprocussions. Worst case scenario for the dealer you wished to buy from is that Mastercraft (or whoever) may yank their product from the dealership. Selling out of territory is one reason you may lose your dealership.

i posted a topic on boat service awhile back. we bought our boat in petaluma at hammers ski and marine and needed some routine service done. we tried to take our boat to the local centurion dealership in san ramon (San Ramon Boat Center....aka: "Sucks Ass") since it's only ten minutes from our house. they told me they would not help us as we did not buy our boat there. i called "bs" and was pretty upset as their service dept was slow at that time. i will never go into san ramon boat center since the guy i spoke to was a complete di*k. my point is that the local service dealer has no real obligation to help you out if you bought your boat elsewhere. just something to be aware of. good luck in whatever you decide.
tim

thanks tim. so if i find boat x in Wash for 50 grand and then my dealer has the same boat for 55 grand shouldn't they sell me the boat at the price of boat x? if their a good dealer? now i know that you have to compare apples to apples. do dealer ships match price?

Great customer service is expensive. If you want to save a little money not buying from your local dealer you can't expect them to make your boat a priority. They will still service your boat, but expect the customer who spent 65K on a brand new X-2 to be more of a priority. It's not greed it's taking care of the people who support the local dealer.

Why should they sell at the lower price if they are moving boats at the higher price. You do not know what their overhead is. They may have a far superior service center that requires the higher purchase prices. The cheaper dealer may be losing the line and does not care because they won't service it anyways.

I do understand what you are saying and your frustration is noted but you are over simplifing things by saying bc this dealer charges X so should another dealer.

As I said price does not equal cost. Good luck with it and I hope you get the boat you want at a fair price for you and the dealership.

thanks bazel.your right. to save a couple grand may not be worth it if the service i get is crappy. thanks to all who had input. in the long run its just better to buy from the local dealer.

The new boats in my region, at one particular dealer, are fixed priced . . . non-negotiable. You either take it or leave it. One boat in particular was worth 43 to 44k and was listed for 52k, non-negotiable. That is a lot of negative equity donated to the dealer, for the sake of getting good future service. I think it's a bunch of cr*p, myself.

It has been mentioned on this board many times that the brand choice should be driven by the quality of the dealer. I agree. The one thing I noticed is the dealers that focused on inboards were much better to work with than the ones that sold OBs and IOs too. Passion for the sport and genre is important in attracting the right staff.

When I was shopping for my boat I researched the brands and narrowed it down to MC and CC based on the fact that I have excellent dealers for both within 15 minutes of my house. After I decided to purchase a used CC from the dealer primarily because it was a solid deal on boat that was still nearly new. I told the MC dealer that I chose to go the used route and found the right deal on a CC he was very cool and encouraged me to use them for service as they are PCM certified as well.

I have not felt the need to use them for service but have still spent a plenty in his shop on boards and other equipment. I feel comfortable that I could get service in a timely manner from either.

I noticed you said you were looking used which I think changes everything about this argument. If you buy it private party the dealer shouldn't care as much as if you bought a new boat outside of the territory. Someone has to keep the old boats floating and that seller is probably buying a new boat contingent on the sale of his old boat. Maybe see if the dealer wants to sell it via consignment to get them involved.

Yea thats what I was thinking. I looked at the new 20 foot malibu. They are asking between 52-55 grand. im the type of guy that would rather buy a 05 or 06 vlx for that price. I know people never tell the truth about how much they really paid. so what id buy will prob be used. what price sould a 06 vlx go for. ive seen used for 49-56 and i got a price on a 06 brand new for 52 grand but its far away. my dealer is out of the 06 vlx

If you can buy new for 52 or used for 49-56....I just don't know how you don't go new..... Assuming they are =.....

If the dealer does not do right by you after purchase, be in the ear of the manufacturer.....BE A PAIN IN THE ASS.... Make life Hell for everyone, sell your boat in a few years for 3-5 K less than you paid and buy from someone else. Send the paperwork to(X manufacturer) and the promise that you will do everything you can to badmouth their boats not only locally, but online for the rest of your boating days.

That sounds harsh.....but like they may tell you, this is business....not personal......

P.S. AGAIN, I am not talking about 2K(difference on a new boat equally equipped) or a day or two here or there on service……

im going to put money down on the new 06 vlx tomm. ej someone else also told me that he doesnt trust anyone to work on his boat. when he has a problem he takes it to the boat builder. so its worth it to me to try and save some doe. thanks ej