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Popularity in boats is usually a proxy for one thing: how many days a year the boat actually gets used. Bowriders top the sales charts because they remove the excuses.
Bowriders outsell every other trailerable boat type. Here is the honest breakdown of why buyers keep choosing them, and where the popularity is deserved.
The bowriders that come up most often when readers ask us where to start.
The world's best-selling bowrider size, in its most accessible form: light, simple and easy to tow.
US$38,000 - US$52,000 new
The refined mainstream benchmark: quiet, dry, and beautifully finished for the money.
US$72,000 - US$95,000 new
The previous-generation classic. Millions of families learned to boat in one of these.
US$8,000 - US$22,000 used
Buyers rarely want a single-purpose boat. They want to take the kids out, tow a tube, throw a line in occasionally and anchor somewhere pretty for lunch. A bowrider covers all of it competently.
Specialist boats create friction. If your boat only fishes, the family stops coming. If it only cruises, you stop fishing. Bowriders keep everyone interested.
Because bowriders are built in enormous volumes by brands like Bayliner, Sea Ray, Chaparral, Quintrex and Quicksilver, the used market is deep. Deep markets mean fair prices, easy comparisons and available parts.
You can buy a serviceable used bowrider for the price of a second-hand car, and you can sell it again without waiting six months for a buyer.
A bowrider is a sociable shape. Everyone faces inward, conversation works, and the bow lounges put two people in the best seats on the boat rather than staring at the back of a cabin.
Add a good stereo, a chiller box full of drinks and a swim platform, and the boat becomes the destination rather than the transport.
