About BoatSharp
An independent buyer-information publication for people about to spend real money on a used boat.
What BoatSharp is for
BoatSharp exists to answer one question: is this particular boat worth buying, and what should I check before I hand over the money?
Classifieds sites help you find a boat. Forums help you feel better about one. Neither helps you decide. We cover the four checks that actually determine whether a purchase goes well — value, research, verification and inspection — in the order they make sense.
What we publish
- Boat values and how to build a defensible number
- Hull identification numbers, history reports and what records can and cannot show
- Registration, titling and ownership research, state by state
- Buying checklists, red flags, negotiation and inspection guidance
- Ownership costs, and later, financing, insurance and transport
How we decide what goes live
A page publishes when it says something specific enough to act on and every factual claim in it has a source. That is why several hubs on this site list pages as researching rather than shipping thin ones, and why the state registration section has a working template and a research queue instead of fifty generated pages.
Where we have not verified a fact, we mark it — in public, on the page, rather than dropping the field and hoping nobody notices.
How we make money
Some links on BoatSharp are affiliate links, and we may earn a commission when you buy through one at no additional cost to you. Our first commercial relationship is with Boat-Alert, which sells paid boat history reports. We do not own or operate any service we write about.
That relationship does not decide our conclusions. We publish the limits of the products we earn from, we link to free official routes on the same pages, and every affiliate link is marked. The full disclosure and the editorial policy spell out how that separation works.
Corrections
Rules change, agencies reorganise and prices move. If something here is wrong or out of date, tell us and we will check it: corrections@boatsharp.com.
BoatSharp provides informational content. It is not legal, surveying, mechanical or financial advice, and nothing on this site replaces a marine survey.