Securing a slip

My wife and I are in the process of purchasing our first "big" boat (47ft). I must say that one of the most vexing aspects of this entire transaction is figuring out the strategy for securing a place to keep it. Our plan is to cruise fairly extensively during winter and spring and to do just short trips in summer and fall.

We have to be north of Florida for hurricane season so that rules out keeping it any place close to our home in the keys. We have tentatively settled on somewhere in South Carolina. For those of you in similar situations of being gone from your home marina for extended periods of time, how to you make sure you have a spot when you return 5 months later? Do you just pay for the entire year? Does your marina allow you to make seasonal reservations? Or do you find there to be adequate enough space that you can always find a space somewhere?

An ancillary question is for those of you who lease on an annual basis; if your boat is registered out of state how do you avoid triggering personal property tax in places like Georgia or South Carolina. It seems as though an annual lease would be waving a huge red flag.

Depends. We kept a boat in North Florida. We’d cruise each winter and wanted to keep the slip we had. The marina charged us 1/2 price for the slip while we were gone and they would rent it out for full price. We did need to give them 30 day notice on when we were returning.

We had friends in South Florida and slips were hard to come by. There, they payed for the year whether they were there or not.

A while back I remember reading about the cost of slips in south Florida and thinking "Hey, that's not as bad as I though; we are nearly paying that much here on Lake Erie." I had to sit down when I realized the south Florida cost was monthly compared to what we pay for the entire season. Still gives me pause.

I live in San Fransisco and am looking at keeping a boat in the Pacific Northwest. The Insurrance company is going to require a caretaker since I don’t live where I would be keeping the boat. Just another thing to think about.

bes1020 said:

My wife and I are in the process of purchasing our first "big" boat (47ft). I must say that one of the most vexing aspects of this entire transaction is figuring out the strategy for securing a place to keep it. Our plan is to cruise fairly extensively during winter and spring and to do just short trips in summer and fall.

We have to be north of Florida for hurricane season so that rules out keeping it any place close to our home in the keys. We have tentatively settled on somewhere in South Carolina. For those of you in similar situations of being gone from your home marina for extended periods of time, how to you make sure you have a spot when you return 5 months later? Do you just pay for the entire year? Does your marina allow you to make seasonal reservations? Or do you find there to be adequate enough space that you can always find a space somewhere?

An ancillary question is for those of you who lease on an annual basis; if your boat is registered out of state how do you avoid triggering personal property tax in places like Georgia or South Carolina. It seems as though an annual lease would be waving a huge red flag.

Click to expand...

We spent 18 months in Charleston SC. We are a resident of another state. We were charged a substantial SC property tax on our boat for renting a slip. We were told by the tax office that if in Charleston SC waters for six months in a calendar year, does not have to be contiguous we are charged. Won’t return. Our boat is federally documented.

for sc:
1) if the tax office representatives even suspects your boat has been in state for greater than 179 days, they will try to locate you and send you a tax bill. It is up to you to prove them wrong, and then they will dismiss it promptly. Yes, you are guilty until you prove yourself innocent. I have been through this personally.
2) if your primary residence is in Charleston county, you owe the 10.5% annual assessment on all your personal property including cars and boats. The location of them is irrelevant. this of course depends on them identifying you as an owner of a boat they have seen in their waters. my Coast Guard documented Boat, with a port of call out of state, we’re still subjected to the county personal property tax, once they discovered I was the owner. I am a resident of the county. yes my next cruising boat will be handled differently.

This is what I would do. I would determine where you want to keep the boat when not using it considering insurance requirements and taxes. Then I would look to see if there is a Safe Harbor marina in that location. If you have an annual contract with them, you can get up to 3 nights at another Safe Harbor for free. That would be handy when you're cruising. The slip rate for annual contracts is much less than monthly or daily rates, so it will likely to get the annual contract even though you will only be there for part of the year.

There is a train that goes up the coast from FL that is reasonably priced. You can leave a car by your boat slip to local transport.

Yes, it is a bit complicated.

bes1020 said:

My wife and I are in the process of purchasing our first "big" boat (47ft). I must say that one of the most vexing aspects of this entire transaction is figuring out the strategy for securing a place to keep it. Our plan is to cruise fairly extensively during winter and spring and to do just short trips in summer and fall.

We have to be north of Florida for hurricane season so that rules out keeping it any place close to our home in the keys. We have tentatively settled on somewhere in South Carolina. For those of you in similar situations of being gone from your home marina for extended periods of time, how to you make sure you have a spot when you return 5 months later? Do you just pay for the entire year? Does your marina allow you to make seasonal reservations? Or do you find there to be adequate enough space that you can always find a space somewhere?

An ancillary question is for those of you who lease on an annual basis; if your boat is registered out of state how do you avoid triggering personal property tax in places like Georgia or South Carolina. It seems as though an annual lease would be waving a huge red flag.

Click to expand...

Just an fyi, NC tax burden is considerably less than SC. We are at Wrightsville Beach, still far enough south to have minimal cold weather(no ice or snow).

bes1020 said:

We have tentatively settled on somewhere in South Carolina. For those of you in similar situations of being gone from your home marina for extended periods of time, how to you make sure you have a spot when you return 5 months later? Do you just pay for the entire year? Does your marina allow you to make seasonal reservations? Or do you find there to be adequate enough space that you can always find a space somewhere?

An ancillary question is for those of you who lease on an annual basis; if your boat is registered out of state how do you avoid triggering personal property tax in places like Georgia or South Carolina. It seems as though an annual lease would be waving a huge red flag.

Click to expand...

We own a slip in Windmill Harbor, Hilton Head, SC.
Several boats come here for Hurricane season. One can lease/sublease privately from slip owners but our marina will also broker slip rentals to transients & short term rentals while we are away.
We live in SC so the higher personal property tax is offset by the low state and county taxes. That said, the PPT is county driven, for us a Beaufort County employee walks the docks every 2-3 weeks and tracks which boats are present. In some jurisdictions marinas are required to submit a list of vessels - usually Jan 1. I have no knowledge of PPT being assessed based on a lease if your vessel is out of state for >6 mos, but each local jurisdiction can set their own rules

Greetings,
We kept our 46' trawler in Camden county NC. Personal tax was 3%. One of the lowest in NC. We rented for the season but were there most of the time. Lambs Marina

Another tax to be aware of is sales tax. Washington state charges sales tax on the full value of a boat that was in Washington waters for 6 months if sales tax has not been paid in another state....no limit on how long the boat has been owned. They also have dock watchers, I'm told they pay a bounty when an out of state boat is turned in. This is enforced by requiring a registration sticker after 6 months. Seems like many states have a tax trick waiting for the unaware boater.

The South Carolina personal property tax which applies to boats is very steep, and county authorities are ruthless. An earlier post on another thread said the personal property tax can be eliminated by stating the boat is a home. That works for federal and state tax deductions for mortgages, but I would certainly look into it before moving a boat to SC. And it would still be no bargain. The home tax is 4% if it is your primary residence, and 6% if it is a second or vacation house.

I live in SC and keep my boat on the Chesapeake Bay. South Carlina gets a copy of the USCG docmentation database, and if you have a mailing address (not hailing port) that has SC in it, you will get a tax bill annually from the county where you reside, and as an earlier post said, it is up to you to prove that the boat is kept elsewhere. I would always scan and send a copy of my slip agreement in VA, but it was a battle. After sending the agreement one year, the tax lady came back with a copy of the law on what constitues pesonal property. It was amusing, written when the state was primarily agricutlural so, "assess and donkeys" counted in that category. Boats were not mentioned. I was going to let my wife have the pleasure of handling that, as I know she was dying to know the tax assessment for one ass, but I lost patience and told the tax lady she was quoting from an 1869 law, and would she take a peek at the opening page of the state department of revenue's website which quoted the governor plainly stating that boats were generally taxed in the location where they spent most of the time. I did not hear from her for two months, so I know she was trying to figure a way around that one. She could not get around the governor, so she relented.

This thread makes me appreciate my slip at home even more.

Stickman said:

for sc:
1) if the tax office representatives even suspects your boat has been in state for greater than 179 days, they will try to locate you and send you a tax bill. It is up to you to prove them wrong, and then they will dismiss it promptly. Yes, you are guilty until you prove yourself innocent. I have been through this personally.
2) if your primary residence is in Charleston county, you owe the 10.5% annual assessment on all your personal property including cars and boats. The location of them is irrelevant. this of course depends on them identifying you as an owner of a boat they have seen in their waters. my Coast Guard documented Boat, with a port of call out of state, we’re still subjected to the county personal property tax, once they discovered I was the owner. I am a resident of the county. yes my next cruising boat will be handled differently.

Click to expand...

Hello, I am in Upstate SC, Oconee County, looking to buy a boat and keep on the coast also. How would you handle differently for tax purposes. I thought my taxes were based on my home residence county?

Recommend you do a search in this forum of the word Tax. You will find many long discussions on the subject.

Remember each county in SC seat their own personal property tax for property (boats) within their county borders

Does not matter where you live in SC, boats are generally taxed where they are anchored. IF you keep the boat on the coast, you will pay tax to a coastal county, not Anderson County or wherever you actually live. If you have a marina slip you will have an agreement showing the months/day you rent the slip; same with a year-round mooring ball. IF the agreement is for longer than six months (185 days to be safe) you can legally escape the SC county tax. I live in Berkeley County, SC, but I keep my boat on the Chesapeake Bay in VA. When the SC authorities come knocking, I show them a copy of my slip agreement proving I keep the boat in Virginia. Sometimes it takes twice, but it suffices. And this steep personal propperty tax in SC is an annual one.

IF you are going to keep a boat on the coast in SC, you should check each county. I think each sets its rates, so you might find one that is less. I don't know. Charleston and Berkeley are the same. I would certainly look into Georgia--might not even have a boat tax.

Glad we're in Washington; boat value +/- $130,000, annual registration $424. That's about 3.25%. And we own our slip, monthly HOA dues +power +/- $245.00. No income tax, sales tax and sin taxes (liquor/tobacco) high. I guess that the tax man always wins in the end!
Regards,
Scott

It's like gambling and politics: the house always wins, and you can't fight city hall.