Denis:

What you describe is the "custom of the industry" and there are very good
reasons for it as others have noted. I sold yachts for about a year in
Annapolis for a very respected dealer/broker and not once did I have a
customer who just wanted to take a test sail to see what suited him. It just
isn't the way business is done. Even $100 paid to the seller isn't likely to
get you a test sail. As a yacht broker I would drop such a customer like a
hot potato as a "tire kicker".

And as someone noted, how can a broker make a living selling boats at
$50,000. Well, just barely. Our brokerage had a $25,000 cut off to accept a
listing. It just didn't make sense to spend your time driving all over the
northern Chesapeake showing boats to earn a total (split 50/50 between the
person and the firm) commision of less than $2,500.

There are brokerages that sell low value boats. There is one in the south
county area, that we referred our low end listings to. But all of his boats
were either on the hard or right there in a slip at the marina. He never had
to drive anywhere to show his listings. He did have a $1000 minimum
commision.

If you just want a test sail to determine if one type of boat is better than
another (as opposed to checking out a specific boat before closing the deal)
then there are other ways of doing this. Chartering is one way. Bumming
rides from OPBs (other peoples boats) is another. You can sometimes wangle a
test sail from a new boat dealer if he has one that you like in stock. But
new boat dealers are pretty good at smoking these frauds out.

Also let me suggest that a short test sail is not going to really tell you
whether one type is better suited for you or not. Unless you are a very
experienced sailor, all sailboats sail well on a nice day. Once you know
boats, you can tell more from the design, layout, construction as to how it
will work for you than after you sail it for a short while. My first
cruising boat was a new XXX. I was in love with it for the first several
months. Then I began to notice its vicious roundup tendencies in a strong
gust. I sailed other boats of similar size that didn't do this. I sold the
boat after less than a year and later learned that this was the
manufacturer's first design of this type and it was a fundamentally bad
design.

David