Smart Buyer’s Guide to Residential Cruises

Residential boats are a way to share the expenses instead of owning your own private yacht. The concept seems reasonable, but there is some price gouging going on in the business.

The ship that started the current wave of luxury residential homes aboard cruise ships was “The World”, operated and managed by ResidenSea. All of the residences aboard “The World” are already sold out, but occasionally an owner puts one up for sale. If you have to ask the price, you probably can’t afford it.

Residential Cruise Line, LTD. Offers 1 bedroom, 1 bath, 624 sf. apartments at “The Magellan” for only $2,160,000. 4 bedrooms, 4.5 baths, 4,334 square feet. unit will cost you $15,460,000 to purchase and an annual maintenance fee of $542,000.

Not to be outdone, The Four Seasons Ocean Residences has units ranging from $3.75 million to $39 million, and sizes range from 797 square feet for a 1-bedroom unit to 7,860 square feet for a 4-bedroom unit.

The “Orphalese” plans to launch in 2008. They are offering 200 permanent residences ranging from the 1,000-square-foot, 2-bedroom Pegasus Estate to the 3,700-square-foot, 5-bedroom Penthouse, which are available for full ownership. 2-bedroom apartments start at $1.8 million with $30,000 in annual fees, while penthouses start at $10 million with $78,000 in annual fees.

Voyage Partners has a ship under construction but has not yet announced prices. When they do, prices will likely fall in the range of the others on this short list of new residential cruisers.

Another ship of this caliber is in the planning stages, it will be called “Everest” and will be 656 feet long if or when built. It is having 17 apartments and a private penthouse for owners on the upper deck.

“The Orphalese” is the best bargain of the bunch, and I think the highest quality ship as well. “The Orphalese” is being built at Aker Shipyards in Finland by the same builders who recently built the world’s biggest and best mega cruise ships, including the largest of all cruise ships “The Freedom of the Seas” operated by Royal Caribbean. . Also the management of “The Orphalese” seems to be practical. There will also be 265 guest suites available on the ship for cruise passengers who do not have residences of their own.

Using the best of “The Orphalese” bunch as a benchmark, let’s see how it stacks up against real-world prices.

New cruise ships can be built for around $200 million. The construction of the most expensive new mega cruise ships cost around 500 million dollars.

All current prices for residences aboard cruise ships are exorbitant. Apparently, the rich enjoy wasting their money. It must be a matter of status to waste more money than the Joneses. For those who’d rather not waste money trying to outspend the Joneses, there’s a better way.

Occasionally a cruise line may have a new ship under construction and be in financial difficulty. They may be forced to abandon the construction project, and an unfinished ship may lie idle in a shipyard. There are such boats available now. One in particular is the following:

725′ 725ft./221m UNFINISHED 12 DECK PASSENGER VESSEL

Year: 1990

Current Price: US$15,000,000

Located in the Mediterranean

Hull Material: Steel

Engine/Fuel Type: Twin Diesel

Unfinished 12-story 725 ft/221 m passenger vessel

Steel hull and superstructure built in Poland in 1990, with an extended length of 50m/164ft. in 1995 in Greece for the original owner who went bankrupt. The new owner is not interested in completing the 13,000 ton cruiser (lightship) and is now at the stage where our proficient boatbuilders can complete it in record time according to the Buyer. specific requirements. Also ideal as a floating or ro-pax condominium project. Priced “as is, where is” with motors, generators and other equipment on board (see list below) is $15 million, or turnkey completion in 20 months for $130,000,000. Located in the eastern Mediterranean.

The aforementioned “turnkey” price of $130 million is based on the completion of the ship at the Elefsina Shipyard in Greece. It wouldn’t be wise to do that with this ship. Greek shipyards receive very few new construction projects these days, and for good reason. Trade unionists in Greece are doing a very good job improving the wages, benefits and working conditions of shipyard workers in Greece. Unfortunately, they also slow down work and increase costs.

The sale price of this boat is less than the price of a large apartment in “The Magellan”. Selling price and selling price are two different prices. This ship could probably be bought for about 11 million dollars. It would be foolish to end this ship in a Greek union shipyard. She can be cheaply towed to nearby shipyards in Tuzla, Türkiye. The ship can be finished there faster, for about half the price, and with better craftsmanship. This ship could be purchased and finished to a high standard equal to “The Orphalese” for a total cost of much less than $100 million (perhaps even as low as $60 million). It can be finished to order, with each residential unit customized to suit its owner(s). The finished product would be a completely new, modern ship with luxury homes on board that would be at least as good or better than anything on the market.

That still seems like a big part of the change. But this is a large ship and would easily accommodate 200 luxury residential units and about 200 conventional cruise cabins or so like “The Orphalese”. The average cost of the residential units would be less than $500,000. That would mean that the smallest residential units would cost much less than the median price. Also, with an additional two hundred (plus) conventional cruising cabins, cabin owners could recoup much of the operating costs and thus virtually eliminate “maintenance fees” for themselves. The expense for the owners can be less than 10% of the going rates if the buyers did not need to pay some skillful promoters and sellers, but bought the boat directly themselves sharing the actual costs by dividing the ownership of the boat among the buyers. Why would anyone want to pay ten times as much money to purchase and much higher maintenance fees for a similar onboard residential unit? The only reason I can think of is to impress others with the amount of money they can spend.

Used cruisers are an even bigger bargain. Look at the specifications of the following unfinished conversion boat for sale:

UNFINISHED YACHT FOR SALE

PRICE OF OWNERS USD 1 MILLION

FULL SPECIFICATIONS, GA AND LIST OF AVAILABLE EQUIPMENT

GREEK FLAG

ROMANIA BUILT / 1988

LAST IN DRY DOCK 1997

DIMENSIONS 116.40 X 14.20 X 5.20 DRAFT METERS

TSO/NTR 3430/2000

23 EXPECTED KNOTS

PLANNED HELIPORT

PLANNED ACCOMMODATION FOR 81 PEOPLE

CREW FACILITIES PLANNED FOR 93 MEMBERS

Once again, the sale price is subject to negotiation. Used boats can be refitted to look like new and can be brought up to International Safety Standards (SOLAS). There are shipyards all over the world that can do good quality work at even less cost than the shipyards in Tuzla, Turkey. If a ship is currently in Greece (as many are), then Tuzla is the best place to tow it for major shipyard work. The “SE” shipyards in the Black Sea port of Nikolaev, Ukraine, offer the best value for money in that part of the world. The bottom line is that savvy shoppers can score great deals, even on high-end purchases like a luxury residential home aboard a cruise ship. I keep a list of those who have expressed interest. The list is confidential and will not be shared for marketing purposes. The purpose of maintaining the list is to facilitate co-ownership directly between buyers without the involvement of intermediaries or promoters.