Superyachts get even more super

As the rich get richer and more numerous, the yachting industry is enjoying a frenzied race for bigger and ever more ostentatious vessels.

"The market is on fire right now," said yacht broker Jim McConville of International Yacht Collection in Fort Lauderdale. He usually does two or three deals a month, but is working on five.

Three hours after the annual Yacht and Brokerage Show opened in Miami Beach this week, he got an offer for Full Bloom, a four-deck, 37m Trident with glossy mahogany fittings and a Jacuzzi on the fly deck. The owner is asking US$9.9 million ($13.6 million) and has had it only four years.

"He's moving up to a 180-footer [55m]," McConville said.

Industry publication ShowBoats says there are 592 superyachts 24m and longer on order at shipyards around the world, up from 445 last year. German yacht builder Lurssen is making 10 of them and they average 71m.

"There's been an explosion in the last 10 years in the size and dollar value of these boats," yacht show organiser Kaye Pearson said.

The superyachts start at a few million dollars and rise to more than US$200 million. Owners generally spend up to 10 per cent of the vessel's cost each year to run them - including maintenance, fuel, dockage, provisions and crew salaries.

They rival the best mansions in furnishings as well as size. Some have helipads, wine cabinets, swimming pools, gyms, crystal chandeliers and onyx countertops.

"They want elegant, 99 per cent of the time, on any size boat," said Zak Kadosh, who designs interiors for IK Yacht Design in Dania Beach, Florida.

This year's hot accessory is a US$50,000 satellite system that provides wireless high-speed internet access and voice-over-internet phone service far out at sea.

For the buyer with more money than time, Millennium Super Yachts is asking US$28 million for its 42m The World Is Not Enough, billed as the world's fastest yacht.

It sleeps 10 passengers and a crew of eight, has burled walnut walls, marble and alabaster bathrooms, two Jacuzzis and several 105cm plasma televisions.

It travels at 70 knots, making a three-hour or four-hour tour out of a 300km voyage that would take most yachts 15 to 20 hours.

"A lot of yachts have to travel all night. Half the crew is up all night long and the next day they're not ready to take care of the owner," Millennium's John Schmiemann said.

The megayacht phenomenon is mainly driven by the general rise in wealth. The Merrill Lynch/Capgemini wealth report says worldwide 7.7 million people had assets of more than US$1 million at the end of 2003.

Forbes magazine lists 587 billionaires on its latest ranking of the world's richest people, 64 more than a year earlier.

Their combined net worth soared to US$2.47 trillion in 2004, up from US$1.82 trillion a year earlier.

Russia's transition to free enterprise has created so much new wealth that Yachts International magazine has launched a Russian edition. The US dollar's weakness has made American luxury yachts a bargain for well-heeled Europeans.

"All the Europeans are coming here to buy boats at 30 per cent off," McConville said.

Some US buyers who felt uneasy about frivolous luxury during the sombre aftermath of the September 11, 2001, attacks were embracing ostentation again, brokers said.

Baby-boomers who sold their companies and made their fortunes were getting on in years and felt entitled to a reward.

- REUTERS