Quote:
Originally Posted by spartacus
Cant see it effect prices at all.
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Not sure how. Prices are affected by supply and demand. I can't see anything that suggests demand currently outstrips supply in the used rib market, and without a sudden economic boom that will change.
We are looking at 50 "1 yr old" ribs on the market with a roughly 40% discount on the retail price (along with the 20 odd protectors for those with tighter budget constraints).
If you were looking for a reasonably new ribcraft, you would need to give them some serious consideration. Would you rather buy an ex Olympics boat that might be less than a year old and have had a month of heavy use but being "reconditioned" by ribcraft and sold with full manufacturers warranty or a 3 or 4 yr old leisure boat. The inevitable consequence is that sellers of 3-4 yr old boats will need to reduce their price to be more affordable than the ex olympics boats; so then the 5 and 6 yr old boats suffer the same problem and so on...
If these all get bought by sailing/dive clubs etc looking to upgrade their existing fleets then there will suddenly be 50 extra ex-club boats on the lower end of the market. At some point they would have upgraded anyway (probably with a new boat) but probably not all at the same time. Likewise if it is private individuals or charter companies who are trading up to an ex-Olympic boat.
The only way I can see it not affecting used prices at all is if most of the buyers are new to ribs and would have bought a new boat. Realistically they are a bit "function" rather than "form" for most newbies with a big chequebook. That may mean it will not affect all rib prices though - e.g. someone looking for a "pretty boat" isn't going to see much extra choice. I can certainly see it spreading beyond the ribcraft marque though - especially into "lesser" respected brands. "Why buy a new CheapRIB when you can get a near enough new RIBcraft for the same money?".