Covid caused a ‘massive spike’ in yacht sales — now some of those boats are back on the market

Some pandemic-era yacht owners are headed back for dry land.

The pandemic spurred a "massive spike" in yacht sales, said Richard Allen, chief operating officer of the Hong Kong-based yachting company Simpson Marine.

"We've seen a lot of those people, that had their boats for two years, sort of now wanting to travel," he told CNBC. "In the last probably few months, talking with other people in the industry, we've seen an increase in brokerage activity of … boats being sold."

That was expected, said Paolo Casani, CEO of the Monaco-based yachting company Camper & Nicholsons.

"We sold, as an industry worldwide, more than the double the yachts [in 2021] than 2019," he told CNBC. When this happens, "they go to the market starting from a couple of years later."

Enthusiasm for yachting remains high, even if sales have fallen since 2021, said Casani.

"The industry is going back to 2019," he said. "And we have to distinguish between brokerage and new builds, because the demand for new builds is still quite high."

With more yachts hitting the brokerage market, prices are down, albeit slightly, from pandemic-era highs, he said.

"Prices are still quite high," he said. "There is still a gap between the demand and the offer ... but we do believe that there will be still a reduction in the course of 2024."

Some yachts buyers in Asia aren't selling, though, said Allen — in fact, they're trading up for larger vessels.

"Some have actually really enjoyed the boating lifestyle, and are already upgrading … to bigger boats," he said.

Asia — a continent of rising wealth and numerous island nations, many bathed in year-round warmth — has long been viewed as the next frontier for global yacht growth.

Casani and Allen, who spoke to CNBC on April 26 while