The Secondhand Ocean: America Stopped Buying New Boats. It Did Not Stop Going Out.

MARINA NO. 14 · MARITIME JOURNALISM · THE BLUE ECONOMY

New powerboat sales fell in 2025. Four of every five boats that changed hands were already used. The data says Americans have not stopped going out on the water. They have stopped wanting to carry the whole cost of getting there.

In short: New US powerboat sales fell an estimated 8 to 10 percent in 2025, yet 79.7 percent of the boats sold were pre-owned and recreational marine spending still reached $54 billion. Americans have not stopped going out on the water. They have stopped wanting to carry the whole cost of getting there.

Picture the guy who bought a 22-foot center console in the spring of 2021, when dealers were selling anything that floated and the deposit felt like a formality. He still has it. He still likes it. And every October, when the cover goes on, he sets slip, insurance, fuel and storage against the number of times the engine actually turned over, and he does not love the result.

He is not an outlier. He is the median customer of an industry that has quietly changed what it sells.

What did the 2025 boat sales data actually show?

The headline was a decline. The National Marine Manufacturers Association (NMMA) estimated that new powerboat retail unit sales, personal watercraft included, fell 8 to 10 percent in 2025, to between 215,000 and 225,000 boats. Its sales-trends report put the count at 220,397 new powerboats, led by fishing boats at 77,434 units and watersports boats, including PWC, at 71,461. Total recreational marine retail spending still reached $54 billion.

The number that reorders the story sits one line lower. New boats were 20.3 percent of all boats sold in 2025. Pre-owned boats were 79.7 percent.

The part of the market that gets the headlines, the dealer lot and the January boat show, is one boat in five.

NMMA estimates that boat shows alone, concentrated between January and March, account for 30 to 60 percent of annual retail sales. The industry’s shop window is narrow, seasonal and brightly lit. The Fort Lauderdale show we covered in No. 13 is the extreme version of it. Most of the market happens in driveways, classified listings and brokers’ back offices.

How big is the American boat fleet, and how often does it leave the dock?

The installed base is enormous. NMMA’s registration report counts 11.8 million registered and documented boats in 2024, plus an estimated 3.6 million that are neither registered nor documented. That is roughly 15.4 million vessels.

What nobody publishes is how often those boats leave the dock. I looked for a clean national figure and did not find one I would stand behind. The numbers that circulate come from surveys of different years and different definitions, so I am not repeating them. The gap is itself a finding: an industry that tracks every unit sold has no routine measure of how much of its capital sits idle.

Why are buyers buying down?

Sales in 2025 concentrated in entry-level categories: personal watercraft, aluminium fishing boats and smaller boats that can be trailered to a local ramp, according to NMMA’s market outlook. Chief executive Frank Hugelmeyer described a “wait-and-see mindset” among some consumers after an uncertain economic year. The same outlook called the market stable, supported by steady boating activity and by the increased use of shared-access models: boat clubs, peer-to-peer rentals and charter.

Put those facts side by side and something unexpected comes into view. The slump in new boats is not a slump in the desire to be on the water. NMMA itself describes activity as steady. It is a slump in the willingness to carry the full fixed cost of a boat in order to get there. That is our reading of the data, not NMMA’s. But the association’s own list of what is holding the market up points the same way.

What does this mean for owners and guests?

For the owner of that 22-footer, the useful number is not the purchase price. It is the number of hours the boat earns or enjoys per year. Shared access is the first serious answer the market has produced to that arithmetic. We looked at the fee side of it in The Middleman Tax.

For the guest, the implication is simpler. The supply is already out there: a fleet in the millions, most of it second-hand, most of it unused on most days. The missing piece has been a way to find it and talk to the person who owns it.

Full disclosure: this magazine is published by Marina Boat App, a booking app for boats, water taxis, fishing and diving trips, crew and berths. It is built on exactly that premise. Operators pay zero commission and guests message the captain directly. The platform is new and in its founding-partner phase, and we would rather say so than imply otherwise.

The boating industry has always counted the boats it sells. The more interesting number is the one it has never counted: the days a boat stays tied up.