Looking for Feedback on Royal Cape Majestic 53

[sliceoflife]

Did a virtual tour of
https://www.yachtworld.com/yacht/200...ic-53-8408849/



Shopping for my first catamaran for my family of 5 to start sailing the Caribbean and beyond. Have owned a small mono before, so this will be a significant upgrade.



I like the spacious interior. I'm not so much a fan of the lines of the boat, and lack of fly bridge though.



My broker informed me that the boat last traded hands about a year ago, list was $549k and sold for $506k. The current owner said they put $100k into it, but fairly vague on what additional work was done.


Initially, I did not even want to give the boat a second look due to its age and possible cost associated with re-fit, but it seems as though most major things have been replaced within the past 5 years.



Looking for some feedback from more experienced catamaran owners and what questions/concerns you may have when looking at this vessel at current age and price.


thanks !

[smj]

Is sailing ability important?

[sliceoflife]

I’m not looking for a performance cat by any means. I would prioritize comfort over performance . From what I’ve read this boat is quite slow with a cruising speed around 6kn, which is pretty slow.

[tamicatana]

Very low bridgedeck. Will slam

[old pirate]

Certainly looks better than our Royal Cape 45 sailed in 1996. That one was very poorly built.
The idea came from using two Royal Cape One Design 30ft monohulls, stretched and made into a catamaran. Those yachts had great sailing ability and speed, but putting two together seemed to get the reverse effect.
The broker says it as a “motor sailer” !certainly no racehorse .you’d have to get used to4 to 6 knots.The accomodation is unbeatable for the size. Get yourself a very good surveyor. Tell him you are looking for a boat to last you 10 plus years. Good luck.

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by old pirate

Certainly looks better than our Royal Cape 45 sailed in 1996. That one was very poorly built.
The idea came from using two Royal Cape One Design 30ft monohulls, stretched and made into a catamaran. Those yachts had great sailing ability and speed, but putting two together seemed to get the reverse effect.
The broker says it as a “motor sailer” !certainly no racehorse .you’d have to get used to4 to 6 knots.The accomodation is unbeatable for the size. Get yourself a very good surveyor. Tell him you are looking for a boat to last you 10 plus years. Good luck.

This is one of the best posts ever!

I can't believe that's what they did. Fascinating

[sliceoflife]

Originally Posted by old pirate

Certainly looks better than our Royal Cape 45 sailed in 1996. That one was very poorly built.
The idea came from using two Royal Cape One Design 30ft monohulls, stretched and made into a catamaran. Those yachts had great sailing ability and speed, but putting two together seemed to get the reverse effect.
The broker says it as a “motor sailer” !certainly no racehorse .you’d have to get used to4 to 6 knots.The accomodation is unbeatable for the size. Get yourself a very good surveyor. Tell him you are looking for a boat to last you 10 plus years. Good luck.

Very interesting ! I agree 4 -6 is quite slow, granted I’m not looking for a high performance fast cat, but definitely not interested in motor sailing 24/7. Aside from ample interior space, the boat is lacking in many other areas, one being performance and sailability. Thanks for the tip on the survey , another concern of mine is resale value and maintenance cost of a 14 yr old boat.

[old pirate]

Resale and maintenance costs, both very difficult to predict ! Don’t know your time frame but who could have predicted the effects of covid on boat prices ? Here in Australia they all went up. In my memory boats were always a depreciating asset. So anyone telling you that x or y boat will be worth so much in a year or two needs to be treated with caution ? Generally a production catamaran of the larger builders will have/hold a better resale value because they are sought after by more buyers. Then again there are smaller companies who consistently build high quality boats (like St Francis) @ 12 boats per year and these also have good resale.
Never buy a boat thinking it that you are going to resell it for so much down the line. If you are to this line of thought stick to real estate or collector cars. Most of us (get to) love our boats and this has a value.
Some on this forum will tell you maintenance is 10% or 15% per year. Some boats are more maintenance than others. The quality of previous owners maintenance is very important. So when you are told everything has been done, question it ? From expierance one only really finds out or gets to know the boat after owning/using it for quite a period of time. To late to claim from a seller. “Buyer Beware”
I know all this doesn’t help much. But staying with mainstream catamarans might be a better bet as resale is more predictable and each has web sites where the followers help each other with manafacture problems and ideas.