Boat Brokers: What Should a Buyer Actually Expect?

I’ve been wanting to ask this for a while because I’m genuinely curious about other boaters’ experiences.

How do you feel about boat brokers — positive, negative, or somewhere in between?

Over the past three years, we’ve bought and sold boats privately without issue. We negotiated price, terms and paperwork ourselves and had good experiences on both sides.

Now that we’re searching for our next “new-to-us” boat, we’ve been looking everywhere — private listings, broker listings, marinas and different provinces.

And this search has made me question what a buyer should reasonably expect from a broker.

To be fair, we’ve had two really positive broker experiences since May. One was representing the seller of a boat we were interested in and was quick to respond, knowledgeable and great to deal with. Another showed us a boat that ultimately wasn’t the right fit, but still offered to answer questions, provide comparisons and keep us in mind if anything came up that matched what we were looking for. That kind of service really stood out.

Unfortunately, several others have been difficult to reach, slow to follow up, or simply unresponsive.

One recent example really made me think about this from the seller’s side. We reached out on Marketplace about a boat and the owner replied saying his broker would contact us with the details. Two days later, after hearing nothing, we followed up with the seller. He was surprised and asked, “Didn’t my broker reach out?” Nope. The seller then had to contact his broker again to let him know we were still waiting.

And I couldn’t help but think — if I were paying a broker a significant commission to sell my boat, how would I feel knowing I had to chase them to respond to an interested buyer?

We eventually signed with a buyer’s broker because we wanted to dig deeper into the market — comparable boats, realistic pricing, recent sales and a better sense of what was actually happening.

Before signing, we had asked for some of that information, but were told that in order for him to really dig deeper, he would prefer that we sign with him because he was doing “all this work” on our behalf.

So we signed, assuming that meant a more active search, deeper market knowledge and access to information we couldn’t easily find ourselves.

Unfortunately, signing didn’t really change the experience.

At one point, listings I had sent over for price comparison were later sent back to me as possible boats for us — including one I had already explained was sold.

We also told our broker we were travelling out east and asked if he could identify a few boats along our route that fit our criteria so we could plan viewings.

Nothing was arranged.

When we later asked about it, he openly admitted he hadn’t put effort into that part of the search.

We were also told that our role was essentially to find the listings ourselves, send them over, and he would then make calls, gather details and write up an offer if we wanted to proceed.

And that’s where I started wondering:

If the buyer is doing most of the searching, what should the broker’s role actually be?

I absolutely see value in negotiation, contracts, paperwork and having someone who understands the transaction.

But I also assumed a buyer’s broker would be actively searching, networking, providing market insight and bringing opportunities forward — not simply waiting for us to find the boat first.

This isn’t meant to bash brokers. There are some excellent ones out there, and we’ve met a couple who have proven that.

What I’d really like is to open the conversation.

For boaters: what has your experience been, good or bad?

For brokers: what do you believe your role should be when representing a buyer or seller? What should clients reasonably expect from you?

And maybe it’s a worthwhile question for all of us in the industry to think about:

Are we delivering the level of service we would expect if we were the person on the other side of the transaction?