One of the basic things you need to think about when you want to buy a boat is what time of the year to buy. If you pick the right time of year, you can sometimes save literally hundreds of dollars, which will help to pay your boat insurance after you do buy the boat.

The best time to buy a boat is during boat show season. The vast majority of boat shows take place during the winter months. These are the times that sellers want to get their boats moving through the pipeline. It’s the slowest season in the boat sales industry, and retailers especially are interested in getting product out the door.

Another good time to buy your boat is during the late fall. During the late fall, boat dealers are trying to get rid of their old inventory so that they can bring in the next year’s model boats. In this regard, the retail boat market isn’t much different from the automobile sales market.

There’s another way in which buying a boat can be like buying a car, in terms of timing. It depends, of course, on the dealership’s structure. If the boat dealership is a larger one that has commissioned salespeople, you can take advantage of that. Shopping for your boat toward the end of the month, for example, can really motivate your salesperson to give you the best possible deal because she’s trying to hit her sales goals for the month.

Shopping for a boat during the week instead of the weekend can be helpful too. You’ll have more of your salesperson’s time and attention, as he isn’t chomping at the bit to complete your sale and move on to the next customer. Daytime is ideal, and if you have personal or vacation time from work it might even be worth thinking about taking a day off work to boat shop.

Finally, try to avoid an impulse buy if you can help it. Waiting a few days, weeks or even months can help you to get a much better deal. Everyone thinks about buying a boat in the spring, but that’s the time when sellers are least motivated to offer discounts or deals. If you can put your boat off one more season, you could be talking about saving a large chunk of change.

Photo via robert_hornung