Increasing cost of new boats?

[Mike Clark]

So I have 2015 SX 240 that I pretty much customized to my liking, but like everybody else, always looking to upgrade.
Been reading comments about a new 25Ft model to replace the 24Ft models. Awesome I say until I realize they will probably start at 62k for the SX Model and go vertical from there. Current 24Ft 242 X is about $78k, which when looking at the new 27 Ft base model at 99k sounds like a deal and then right up to $129k for the top version. If you were interested what would “you” be willing to spend on new 25 Ft if it had allot of the new design cues of the 27 Ft boats, Which I personally like, but most hate. I always hear members comment, that the Yamahas are great deals compared to competing brands, but after physically looking at the Regals, Chapparelle,s Crownlines it is obvious that those boats are A higher quality boat all around. All boats have quality issues, but it appears that there are allot of electrial issues with the new boats that have the latest connect system, and drive by wire. It seams as though Yamaha is so hell bent on upgrading so often that they never really get all the issues worked out on the last update, design change. As luck would have it, not had a single issue with mine, although I am a maintenance fanatic. I am on it every weekend May through early September, so it is used. Biggest worry is I get new boat and end up With tons of issues. Yes I am rambling, just looking for others thoughts, comments

 

[mwalker4]

Seems like you have a really nice boat that you like. I wonder what they could do that would make it worth upgrading, twin SVHO's? As a fellow Ohioan, I wish the season was longer so I would wear out my boats more often. Dang, sales tax alone is crazy.

 

[Noko]

I wonder if Yamaha will price itself out of a market? I guess they are selling enough boats now that they figure they can get the higher prices. I paid $42K new for my 2013 which seemed like a lot. I don't think I'd be interested in a new 24-25' Yamaha now if they are going upwards of $65K or more.

 

[HangOutdoors]

Larger Gas Tank- 80-100 gallons, Twin SVHO's, Larger Head Area, walk through in back between engines, Larger 2 stage Bimini, couple more degrees on the Deadrise, more fluent Ballast System, improved hull design for better handling rough water. Not sure what else they may throw in there. Obviously I personally would consider Larger Gas Tank with Twin SVHO's to get a lot more range would be something that would make me look twice.

@Noko you are probably close with an SX/AR style starting in the mid 60's.

 

[Mike Clark]

I agree, a lower walk though and a larger head area would be a big plus, also the twin SVHO's would be awesome. Would definitely need the larger gas tank then.

I do not ski or wake board, but would like all the options of the best stereo, bright colors on the interior, etc, offered on a non wake boat.

I had a custom bimini cover made for my existing frame, made 4 inches longer in the middle and had it done in red to match boat, cover comes down farther in front and back and due to the wider spread of the frame , it also lowered the center section by 4 inches so looks much better and allot more coverage. I'm 5'8" so I still have about 5 inches above my head. Not good if you 6.0 foot.

 

[ripler]

I wonder if Yamaha will price itself out of a market? I guess they are selling enough boats now that they figure they can get the higher prices. I paid $42K new for my 2013 which seemed like a lot. I don't think I'd be interested in a new 24-25' Yamaha now if they are going upwards of $65K or more.

Yamaha is definitely pricing themselves out of the market, I've been saying this for a while. When I bought my Yamaha what attracted me to it was the swim deck, price, and jetdrive in that order. I paid right around 32K for my boat in 2010 and it has been bulletproof. For the price of their larger boats they now put themselves into a market with way better options, especially in what they call their wake series.

 

[HangOutdoors]

A $1 in 2010 is not a $1 in 2020. With that said, I will agree that the prices seem a bit out of control. Perhaps "if" and when sales slow it will be evident. Typically what happens is that the MSRP's will stay and continue to climb but the incentives for slow sales will get bigger. That way when they release new models and years they can peel off the people who will just pay top dollar, not knowing better or really caring, and then as the winter and early spring comes around they can just increase discounts, add-ins, etc. A manufacturer also doesn't want to drive the price of used down because then people would buy nice used boats instead. There is a balancing act.

When I had this great Idea that we should buy a boat this year I told the Admiral that we could get something decent new for around 30k in the 21' range probably. She said "That's sounds Fantastic". Boy was I wrong and quickly corrected once I started looking. Upgraded to from the 19' to the 21' at the last minute.

 

[biffdotorg]

All boats have quality issues, but it appears that there are allot of electrial issues with the new boats that have the latest connect system, and drive by wire. It seams as though Yamaha is so hell bent on upgrading so often that they never really get all the issues worked out on the last update, design change.

I think forum and facebook group readers are blinded by the few that have issues. Yup, that's where we hear about it, and they bark loud as they paid so much for their boat, or their dealer sucks. But if a person actually looked at the big picture and the quantity of boats actually sold. And the even larger amount of owners that have never looked at a boat forum, they may realize it's only a small fraction of boats shipped and sold each year.

In fact, I bet if we polled just the group here, you could bet that a very large percentage of us, started searching through threads and forums when we had our first real problem, and were too bullheaded to go to the dealer to get it taken care of. So many trouble free boaters may have saved themselves the heartache of reading through everyone elses problems by just avoiding facebook.

Hand raised?

 

[Bluewater272]

I'm not sure of anything that a 25' boat could offer that would offer a compelling reason to upgrade from a 2015+ 24' boat. SVHOs are at the bottom of the list for me personally, my boat is already plenty fast and pretty inefficient compared to other boats in class. Don't need more speed, and don't need to burn more (and more expensive) fuel).

 

[ourlee]

Larger Gas Tank- 80-100 gallons, Twin SVHO's, Larger Head Area, walk through in back between engines, Larger 2 stage Bimini, couple more degrees on the Deadrise, more fluent Ballast System, improved hull design for better handling rough water. Not sure what else they may throw in there. Obviously I personally would consider Larger Gas Tank with Twin SVHO's to get a lot more range would be something that would make me look twice.

@Noko you are probably close with an SX/AR style starting in the mid 60's.

Don’t know about the gas tank but the 2021 25X is getting SVHO 500hp.

 

[biffdotorg]

Don’t know about the gas tank but the 2021 25X is getting SVHO 500hp.

Proof or pics, otherwise this is pure speculation/rumors

 

[HangOutdoors]

@biffdotorg C'Mon man have hope.... I want to be able to put 14 people on my boat, do 51 mph and go around the lake a few times before I need to refuel

 

[biffdotorg]

@biffdotorg C'Mon man have hope.... I want to be able to put 14 people on my boat, do 51 mph and go around the lake a few times before I need to refuel

I'm with hope. I am just amazed how many folks were piping up that they are coming, but nobody has seen anything yet. And the leaks are minimal.

So has anyone played in photoshop and brightened the leak photo on the yamaha facebook thread? They always leak a little, and it's too dark to see any detail. (they do this with sleds every year too)

And as far as fast and 15 people, that's what the tritoon on the other side of the dock is for.

 

[HangOutdoors]

@biffdotorg I would look pretty ridiculous with both a Yamaha and a Tritoon on trailers in my drive. I don't have the luxury of a lake house or a dock.

 

[scokill]

Don’t know about the gas tank but the 2021 25X is getting SVHO 500hp.

500HP didn't help seadoo.

 

[HangOutdoors]

Here is the image lightened as much as I can take it in Photoshop. Unless you are talking about another image I didn't see.

 

[HangOutdoors]

Maybe i should get off the forums for a bit and do some work today.......

 

[Quad]

A $1 in 2010 is not a $1 in 2020. With that said, I will agree that the prices seem a bit out of control. Perhaps "if" and when sales slow it will be evident. Typically what happens is that the MSRP's will stay and continue to climb but the incentives for slow sales will get bigger. That way when they release new models and years they can peel off the people who will just pay top dollar, not knowing better or really caring, and then as the winter and early spring comes around they can just increase discounts, add-ins, etc. A manufacturer also doesn't want to drive the price of used down because then people would buy nice used boats instead. There is a balancing act.

When I had this great Idea that we should buy a boat this year I told the Admiral that we could get something decent new for around 30k in the 21' range probably. She said "That's sounds Fantastic". Boy was I wrong and quickly corrected once I started looking. Upgraded to from the 19' to the 21' at the last minute.

The Admiral and I had been looking at used boats for the last 3 years, and finally came to the realization that with what we were looking for (a 2016+ 24' boat) we were in a better situation going new than dealing with someone's discarded 3 year old toy, especially since we plan to keep it for a good while. I started getting antsy seeing some of the new theorized features coming out in the next couple weeks, but also have some level of comfort that we ended up with the most mature iteration of a 5 year old design. Like buying a car, I avoid the first year of a new model update like the plague. Usually they're pretty good by year 2-4

 

[brian86992]

I can't speak to the cruiser market but as far as center consoles go, Yamaha still has some room to run on price. The FSH 210 out the door under $50k is untouchable. Especially when considering that the usability of the boat is at least a 23' maybe a 25' outboard CC equivalent. You're looking at the $90s and above. The only lacking feature of the FSH imo is power.

Here's a good watch if you want to wrap your head around what else is out there right now in the small CC market.

I would love to see a 24' or 25' FSH. Any price around the $65K mark I would bite immediately.

 

[ripler]

A $1 in 2010 is not a $1 in 2020. With that said, I will agree that the prices seem a bit out of control. Perhaps "if" and when sales slow it will be evident. Typically what happens is that the MSRP's will stay and continue to climb but the incentives for slow sales will get bigger. That way when they release new models and years they can peel off the people who will just pay top dollar, not knowing better or really caring, and then as the winter and early spring comes around they can just increase discounts, add-ins, etc. A manufacturer also doesn't want to drive the price of used down because then people would buy nice used boats instead. There is a balancing act.

When I had this great Idea that we should buy a boat this year I told the Admiral that we could get something decent new for around 30k in the 21' range probably. She said "That's sounds Fantastic". Boy was I wrong and quickly corrected once I started looking. Upgraded to from the 19' to the 21' at the last minute.

I understand, but the point I'm trying to make is that price used to be what drew people to Yamaha including me. Now the only advantage Yamaha is over both Vortex and Scarab is the clean out ports and nothing else. Their warranty used to be a complete joke and now to be able to compete they had to extend their warranty and they didn't do it for free. I've had my boat for 10 years and have been on this and another forum since day one and have seen the changes to the boats over the years. The worse thing that happened to the Yamaha customer was the introduction of Vortex and Scarab jet boats. You would think competition would be good for a jet boat buyer, but the only thing that happened was Yamaha increased their pricing to be in line with Vortex and Scarab. Yamaha is now playing catch up to both Vortex and Scarab as far as quality and features. Both Vortex and Scarab allows you to customize your boat, with Yamaha you get what you get.