While performance-oriented center consoles from Nor-Tech continue to dominate sales of new boats at Double R Performance, Peter Roberts, who co-owns the full-service dealership in Ontario, Canada, with his brother, Raymond, reported that sales of pre-owned go-fast catamarans and V-bottoms have been particularly brisk this year.

“It’s been on and off for the past few years, but this spring it went absolutely haywire,” he said. “I have not been able to keep up with used sportboat sales. Anything new we have built has a Verado (outboard engine) on the back of it. But the sportboat sales have all been used boats.”

For the first time since the dealership began carrying the Nor-Tech line, Double R Performance was briefly sold out of a pre-owned Nor-Tech 3600 catamarans.

Pre-owned models Double R Performance reportedly has moved this spring include a pair of Nor-Tech 40 Roadster catamarans (model years 2010 and 2014), five 36-foot Nor-Tech catamarans (with models years from 2007 to 2009) and a 28-foot Skater cat built in 1997. On the V-bottom side, the company sold a 43-foot Donzi built in 2006, a 46-foot Black Thunder built in 2003, a 35-foot Fountain, a 38 Powerquest, a 32 Baja, a 21 Checkmate and a 16-foot Donzi.

Finding late-model, used sportboats remains a huge challenge, Roberts, said. For the first time since the dealership took on the Nor-Tech line, he explained, the company sold out of every Nor-Tech 3600 catamaran it had in stock this spring. (That inventory has since been “replenished” as a 36-footer from Missouri is about to be listed by Double-R.)

“It’s the biggest problem a lot of dealers are dealing with—nobody has built a lot of sportboats in the past seven years,” said Roberts. “If you want a used 33-footer built in 1995, there’s a lot of that stuff out there. But that’s not what people are asking for.

“If a guy wants to go over 75 mph and doesn’t want to spend a half-million dollars on a new center console—if he wants to spend $150,000 to $200,000—he’s buying a used sportboat. He’s not buying a center console.”

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