Catamaran Sales: End of Year Market Report

What can be said about 2021?  Like so many people I’ve tried to make sense of what has been happening over the last 12 months and the more I try to make sense of things, the less clear things become.  I guess that is what the pundits like to call, “The New Norm.”

The catamaran market, similar to the RV, housing and even the semi-conductor market, have gone completely crazy during 2021.  According to Soldboats.com, the industry reporting mechanism for sales data, there were 726 catamarans, larger than 37ft and newer than 2005, which sold in 2021.  This represented a 35% increase in sales over the previous year, 2020.

With so many more catamarans transacting than the previous year what has that done with pricing?  For the 2021 calendar year, the average selling price for a sailing catamaran was $525,416, which was a 15% increase over 2020.

There are a few factors in my opinion that have contributed to rising prices.  To me the biggest factor is the basic principle of supply and demand.  To put things into perspective, catamaran manufacturers have steadily increased their production capacities over the last 5 years.  Even pre-supply chain interruption, there were roughly 1,000 catamarans being built globally.  With demand ever increasing, there are simply not enough new or pre-owned catamarans to keep up with the growing demand; I only see this becoming a bigger issue as interest in catamarans increase. I unfortunately don’t see manufactures increasing production levels to the point where demand will be met.

Here are my predictions for the catamaran market in 2022:

• We are going to continue to see a shortage of GOOD inventory through the half of the year.
• As people continue to return to work I think we are going to start seeing a steadier stream of inventory at the end of this cruising season.
• I think prices will begin to plateau/stabilize on the pre-owned side.  This is going to be driven by interest rates going up, which directly translates to reduced purchasing power for a lot of buyers.
• As the year goes on there are going to be a lot of buyers exiting the market over frustration.
• New boat sales will continue to set record highs with the cost differential between new and late model boats is minimal.

Whether you are in the market to buy your dream catamaran in 2022, or wrap up your sailing and sell your catamaran in 2022 please don’t hesitate to reach out. If you’d like to receive a copy of the the full market report, please drop me an email and I’ll happily share the data.