Death of a boat business.....
 

This is a very sad situation but a common one in the United States today.

Any small business that is making it today has to have something special
going for it. Cheap rent or just the right location or old money.

I don't recommend anyone open or buy a small business in the US unless it is
out of their home with no employees.

It is all big business now or it is no business.

Don't get emotional about it, just believe it and make adjustments. Times
change.

--
Bill Kiene

Kiene's Fly Shop
Sacramento, CA, USA

Web site: www.kiene.com


"Chuck Gould" wrote in message
oups.com...
Ran into a situation today that I am sure we will be witnessing more
frequently.

I know a young couple who operate a very decent little sales and
service shop in a middle sized city north of Seattle on Puget Sound.
It's a family business that has supported them and their kids for the
last several years, but when I ran into them today they
mentioned they had decided to close up shop.

Interesting, and sad, is the reason why:

The local marina is expanding at their location. That should be good
news, except for the fact that as part of the expansion a "public/
private partnership" is building a fancy new condominium complex. A
huge new mooring basin has been dredged and developed, but guess what?
Those slips aren't available long term to the general public (i.e. the
taxpayers who funded the development of this public land), they are
being given to the condo development company as a reward for
developing the condo village at the site, and any time that a condo
resident wants to purchase one of the slips (from the development
company, of course), any tenant that is merely renting the slip will
be subject to eviction.

How this concerns my friends and their boat shop: They are currently
occupying a fairly old building that fronts a road running along the
perimeter of the marina. They have a small office and retail area, and
several service bays.

"Our lease is up pretty soon, and the Port is going to tear down this
building," they said. "We've been offered the same square footage in
one of the new commercial buildings that will be part of the
condominium complex, but there's going to be a difference in rent.
Right now, we pay about $25,000 per year to rent this space, but after
they force us to move next year the rent would go up to $14,000 a
month. That's a total of $168,000 per year in rent, or $143,000 more
than we're paying now. We can't see any reason to keep the doors open
with that sort of increase in overhead."

Obviously my friends did what anybody else would do in the same
situation- took a careful look at how much they're able to put in
their pockets each year with the current overhead, subtracted $143,000
from that number to reflect the future overhead, and looked at the
amount left over and asked, "why bother"?

Congrats to the greedy arse port authorities and the high dollar condo
developers. They have completely overlooked that fact that most of the
infrastructure for boating consists of small and medium size family
businesses. Those software millionaires living the fat life in the
waterfront condo McMansions have a rude awakening in store......even
if they buy the slips out from under the public and moor their gold
plated boats, their very presence will have raised real estate values
to the point where nobody will be able to remain in business to
service or maintain them.

Coming before all that very long to the waterfront near you...
Pretty sad.

Death of a boat business.....
 

This has been happening in Southwest Florida for the past 10 years...and in
Southeast Florida for longer than that.

It just started happening in the Keys a couple of years ago, but fortunately
the real estate market took a hit and slowed things down.

I had a boat stored at a marina that leased the land, and the landlord
decided not to re-lease the property *at any price*. They sold it for $20
million to Eco-Group...a large developer out of Tampa.

Same thing happened to two other marinas in Naples in the past 3 years.




"Chuck Gould" wrote in message
oups.com...
Ran into a situation today that I am sure we will be witnessing more
frequently.

I know a young couple who operate a very decent little sales and
service shop in a middle sized city north of Seattle on Puget Sound.
It's a family business that has supported them and their kids for the
last several years, but when I ran into them today they
mentioned they had decided to close up shop.

Interesting, and sad, is the reason why:

The local marina is expanding at their location. That should be good
news, except for the fact that as part of the expansion a "public/
private partnership" is building a fancy new condominium complex. A
huge new mooring basin has been dredged and developed, but guess what?
Those slips aren't available long term to the general public (i.e. the
taxpayers who funded the development of this public land), they are
being given to the condo development company as a reward for
developing the condo village at the site, and any time that a condo
resident wants to purchase one of the slips (from the development
company, of course), any tenant that is merely renting the slip will
be subject to eviction.

How this concerns my friends and their boat shop: They are currently
occupying a fairly old building that fronts a road running along the
perimeter of the marina. They have a small office and retail area, and
several service bays.

"Our lease is up pretty soon, and the Port is going to tear down this
building," they said. "We've been offered the same square footage in
one of the new commercial buildings that will be part of the
condominium complex, but there's going to be a difference in rent.
Right now, we pay about $25,000 per year to rent this space, but after
they force us to move next year the rent would go up to $14,000 a
month. That's a total of $168,000 per year in rent, or $143,000 more
than we're paying now. We can't see any reason to keep the doors open
with that sort of increase in overhead."

Obviously my friends did what anybody else would do in the same
situation- took a careful look at how much they're able to put in
their pockets each year with the current overhead, subtracted $143,000
from that number to reflect the future overhead, and looked at the
amount left over and asked, "why bother"?

Congrats to the greedy arse port authorities and the high dollar condo
developers. They have completely overlooked that fact that most of the
infrastructure for boating consists of small and medium size family
businesses. Those software millionaires living the fat life in the
waterfront condo McMansions have a rude awakening in store......even
if they buy the slips out from under the public and moor their gold
plated boats, their very presence will have raised real estate values
to the point where nobody will be able to remain in business to
service or maintain them.

Coming before all that very long to the waterfront near you...
Pretty sad.

Death of a boat business.....
 

On Fri, 20 Jul 2007 20:37:05 GMT, "NOYB" wrote:

This has been happening in Southwest Florida for the past 10 years...and in
Southeast Florida for longer than that.

It just started happening in the Keys a couple of years ago, but fortunately
the real estate market took a hit and slowed things down.

I had a boat stored at a marina that leased the land, and the landlord
decided not to re-lease the property *at any price*. They sold it for $20
million to Eco-Group...a large developer out of Tampa.

Same thing happened to two other marinas in Naples in the past 3 years.

Don't most of those waterfront condo developments build marinas?
Maybe not boatyards, but at least berths?
I didn't look close, but it seemed that in Punta Gorda dockage
increased when they put up condos. They may not be renting
out the berths yet, but I suspect they will eventually, as it's money
in the bank. From what I've seen in Florida, most canal homes with
docks have empty docks. It was the same in Cape Coral, but I haven't
been there for years.

--Vic

Death of a boat business.....
 

Don't most of those waterfront condo developments build marinas?
Maybe not boatyards, but at least berths?
I didn't look close, but it seemed that in Punta Gorda dockage
increased when they put up condos. They may not be renting
out the berths yet, but I suspect they will eventually, as it's money
in the bank. From what I've seen in Florida, most canal homes with
docks have empty docks. It was the same in Cape Coral, but I haven't
been there for years.

--Vic

Maybe the Japanese are buying it all up like Hawaii.... it's probably the
Chinese this time around. hooray for NAFTA!

Death of a boat business.....
 

I don't see why the Biz has to "die". There are several marine
sales/service shops in Seattle and Kent who aren't located directly on
the water or next to a marina. So they have to move...big deal. I have
moved my Biz twice in the last 10 years due to skyrocketing rent and
swinging wrecking balls. It's a risk when you rent, and, just part of
business if you need to move.
JR

Chuck Gould wrote:
Ran into a situation today that I am sure we will be witnessing more
frequently.

I know a young couple who operate a very decent little sales and
service shop in a middle sized city north of Seattle on Puget Sound.
It's a family business that has supported them and their kids for the
last several years, but when I ran into them today they
mentioned they had decided to close up shop.

Interesting, and sad, is the reason why:

The local marina is expanding at their location. That should be good
news, except for the fact that as part of the expansion a "public/
private partnership" is building a fancy new condominium complex. A
huge new mooring basin has been dredged and developed, but guess what?
Those slips aren't available long term to the general public (i.e. the
taxpayers who funded the development of this public land), they are
being given to the condo development company as a reward for
developing the condo village at the site, and any time that a condo
resident wants to purchase one of the slips (from the development
company, of course), any tenant that is merely renting the slip will
be subject to eviction.

How this concerns my friends and their boat shop: They are currently
occupying a fairly old building that fronts a road running along the
perimeter of the marina. They have a small office and retail area, and
several service bays.

"Our lease is up pretty soon, and the Port is going to tear down this
building," they said. "We've been offered the same square footage in
one of the new commercial buildings that will be part of the
condominium complex, but there's going to be a difference in rent.
Right now, we pay about $25,000 per year to rent this space, but after
they force us to move next year the rent would go up to $14,000 a
month. That's a total of $168,000 per year in rent, or $143,000 more
than we're paying now. We can't see any reason to keep the doors open
with that sort of increase in overhead."

Obviously my friends did what anybody else would do in the same
situation- took a careful look at how much they're able to put in
their pockets each year with the current overhead, subtracted $143,000
from that number to reflect the future overhead, and looked at the
amount left over and asked, "why bother"?

Congrats to the greedy arse port authorities and the high dollar condo
developers. They have completely overlooked that fact that most of the
infrastructure for boating consists of small and medium size family
businesses. Those software millionaires living the fat life in the
waterfront condo McMansions have a rude awakening in store......even
if they buy the slips out from under the public and moor their gold
plated boats, their very presence will have raised real estate values
to the point where nobody will be able to remain in business to
service or maintain them.

Coming before all that very long to the waterfront near you...
Pretty sad.



--
--------------------------------------------------------------
Home Page: http://www.seanet.com/~jasonrnorth

Death of a boat business.....
 

On Fri, 20 Jul 2007 08:53:03 -0700, Chuck Gould
wrote:

Port Commissions are under a lot of pressure to produce the highest
possible economic return to their communities. In doing so, some of
them lose sight of thier basic mission- to operate a maritime port.

If the only consideration in every community is "what is the highest
and best use of every single square inch of property and how do we
move from here to there?" any industry that requires any amount of
space to operate or must by nature compete with intensive condo
development for "desirable" locations (i.e waterfront) is in the
crosshairs.

I was just pointing out that one poster's assumption in incorrect.
Notice that poster hasn't rebutted that comment, thus it's a dead end
on this thread.

All city governments are pushing for more revenue and they will get it
anyway they can.

The question is how can they take maximum benefit from their
situation. I'm pretty sure that high dollar boats mean high dollar
repairs and it would seem that they are positioned to take advantage
of that.

For example, the largest small boat repair center in CT that is an all
around repair shop is located smack in the middle of CT as far from
any water as you can possibly get.

Just a thought.

Death of a boat business.....
 

"Short Wave Sportfishing" wrote in message
...

I was just pointing out that one poster's assumption in incorrect.
Notice that poster hasn't rebutted that comment, thus it's a dead end
on this thread.

All city governments are pushing for more revenue and they will get it
anyway they can.

The question is how can they take maximum benefit from their
situation. I'm pretty sure that high dollar boats mean high dollar
repairs and it would seem that they are positioned to take advantage
of that.

For example, the largest small boat repair center in CT that is an all
around repair shop is located smack in the middle of CT as far from
any water as you can possibly get.

Just a thought.


Yup... the Rosborough boat company has been doing it's finishing work in one
of our Industrial Parks, a couple miles from the ocean.
http://www.rosboroughboats.com/about.html

Death of a boat business.....
 

Yes, they put in slips. And the slips sell for $400,000+.

But the ones at those two sites are for residents of the condos only.



"Vic Smith" wrote in message
...
On Fri, 20 Jul 2007 20:37:05 GMT, "NOYB" wrote:

This has been happening in Southwest Florida for the past 10 years...and
in
Southeast Florida for longer than that.

It just started happening in the Keys a couple of years ago, but
fortunately
the real estate market took a hit and slowed things down.

I had a boat stored at a marina that leased the land, and the landlord
decided not to re-lease the property *at any price*. They sold it for $20
million to Eco-Group...a large developer out of Tampa.

Same thing happened to two other marinas in Naples in the past 3 years.

Don't most of those waterfront condo developments build marinas?
Maybe not boatyards, but at least berths?
I didn't look close, but it seemed that in Punta Gorda dockage
increased when they put up condos. They may not be renting
out the berths yet, but I suspect they will eventually, as it's money
in the bank. From what I've seen in Florida, most canal homes with
docks have empty docks. It was the same in Cape Coral, but I haven't
been there for years.

--Vic

Death of a boat business.....
 

Short Wave Sportfishing wrote:
On Fri, 20 Jul 2007 10:23:06 GMT, "longshot" wrote:

Coming before all that very long to the waterfront near you...
Pretty sad.
money makes the world go round. The Republican way of life. Fatten up the
rich. Draw the line fatter between the rich & everyone else. Watch the
peasants squirm.

And exactly how many members of that city council are Republicans?
I'll bet dollars to donuts that the majority of the city council, and
the state legislative committee who over saw the development, if any,
are Democrats.

Wanna take that bet?

I'd be more interested to know how many of those key decision makers
either got deals on units, or options to buy at less than market prices.
That or the decision makers, regardless of party affiliation are also
real estate types profiting from the other side of the transaction.

Death of a boat business.....
 

On Fri, 20 Jul 2007 20:37:05 GMT, "NOYB" wrote:

Same thing happened to two other marinas in Naples in the past 3 years.

And to a large full service ship yard in Ft Myers, recently replaced
by high rise condos.