Marine broker Geoff Lovett reveals 30-year career with a beautiful yacht
Marine broker Geoff Lovett has had a career-long relationship with a beautiful yacht, Dreamtime, which he has sold five times in 30 years
You could say it’s been a dream run for Geoff Lovett. The veteran Gold Coastbased yacht broker with 56 years in the industry has recently sold 115-foot (35m) luxury yacht Dreamtime for the fifth time.
He first sold it in 1986 on behalf of a finance company – and has sold it on every occasion since.
The long association fist began thanks to his connection to a finance company, Nat West. Nat West had taken possession of it from a syndicate failing to follow through with the purchase of the vessel.
At the time, Nat West was being used by Mr Lovett in his own business, he said.
“They had financed the vessel but the syndicate weren’t able to go through with buying it and the finance company took the boat over. They asked us to help out,” he recalled this week.
Since then he has been the broker for Dreamtime every time it has been sold.
While he can’t remember the sale dates he believed he’d sold it at least once every decade since the 1980s.
Mr Lovett, 77, said he had done the deals on other smaller vessels up to six or seven times but the Dreamtime was the biggest boat he had repeatedly sold that many times.
“You gain knowledge of a vessel and the vendors are comfortable and so are the purchasers,” he said.
“I have been in the boating industry since 1960 and I’ve been in the business for 56 years.
“We have always tried to give people the right sort of service.”
Mr Lovett wouldn’t disclose how much he has earned in commissions from his five sales of Dreamtime but told Coast Weekend with a smile: “It has been very good to me.”
The founder of Marina Miragebased Geoff Lovett International motor yacht specialists, which he has since onsold but continues to work for, said he believed it might be the final time he brokers a
Dreamtime deal. “It is cruising around north Queensland at the moment. The new owners couldn’t wait to get it up there and get it working,” Mr Lovett.
“I think it will probably stay with them for a long time. They are very comfortable with the purchase. It will be very hard to prise it off them.”
Built by Lloyds Ships and most recently refitted in 2015, Dreamtime is available for charter year round for $70,000 a week.
It comes with four rooms including a master suite.
As for Mr Lovett, whose Geoff Lovett International was among the first Marina Mirage tenants, he has no plans to stop globetrotting and doing yacht deals.