Marina asset management · Australia
We manage marinas and marina hotels as investment assets, and we manage them for one outcome: maximum occupancy and maximum profit. Berth revenue strategy, marina marketing, capital works, compliance and owner reporting — waterfront assets only. No generic facilities management, no labour hire.
Scope of service
Marina assets fail differently to commercial property. Piles corrode below the waterline, pontoons fatigue, electrical pedestals degrade in salt air, and berth revenue leaks through casual bookings that never make it to an invoice. Our asset management practice is built entirely around waterfront facilities and the hotels attached to them.
Berth rate benchmarking against comparable Australian marinas, tariff restructures, casual versus annual mix, temporary sublet programs, storage, hardstand and fuel margin review — modelled to NOI and yield, not guesswork.
Ten-year capital plans for pontoons, piles, gangways, seawalls, hardstand, electrical and fire services. Remaining-life assessment, staged renewal budgets and tender scopes so owners spend ahead of failure, not after it.
Full physical audit of every berth, arm, service pedestal, mooring and structure, delivered as a photographed asset register with condition ratings, defect priorities and costed remediation.
Safety management plans, risk registers, emergency and spill response, contractor induction and permit systems, and audit-ready documentation aligned to the WHS Acts, marine safety legislation and EPA obligations in each state.
Where a hotel, resort or serviced apartments sit on the marina, we manage the whole precinct: guest berthing packages, shared amenities, tenancy and licence structures, service charges and combined emergency planning.
Independent representation of the owner: operator scorecards, service-level reviews, occupancy and arrears reporting, complaint and incident trend analysis, and quarterly asset performance reporting to the board or trustee.
Pre-acquisition and pre-sale due diligence on marinas and marina hotels: lease and licence review, berth title and tenure, condition and capex exposure, compliance liabilities and revenue verification.
Crown and Maritime lease obligations, berth licence documentation, sublet and casual berthing frameworks, and marina berth licence agreements that stand up when a dispute lands.
Owner representation
We audit the physical asset, rate its condition, and give owners a staged capital plan they can budget and tender against.
Occupancy & profit mandate
Marinas are not run for tidiness. They are run for return on a very expensive piece of water. Every mandate we accept is written around two numbers — how full the marina is, and what the owner keeps after costs. If we are not moving both, we are not doing our job.
In a typical Australian marina, contracted berths sit empty a meaningful part of the year while owners cruise, refit or travel. That water is already paid for and already staffed. Releasing it as temporary sublet nights through BerthPoint turns idle berths into high-margin revenue with no capital spend — and the licence holder shares in it, so retention rises at the same time.
Most tariffs are last year's tariff plus CPI. We rebuild the rate card by LOA band, beam, monohull versus multihull, power draw and berth quality, then benchmark it against comparable facilities in the same catchment. Under-priced premium berths and over-priced hard-to-let berths are the two most common leaks we find.
Uninvoiced casual nights, unmetered power, unbilled hardstand days, lapsed insurance, forgotten annual increases and arrears that quietly age past 90 days. Every one of these is recoverable. We instrument them in BerthPoint so nothing leaves the marina without an invoice attached to it.
Fuel, pump-out, hardstand and travelift, storage cages, trailer and tender parking, contractor access fees, laundry and amenities, visitor packages tied to the marina hotel. Ancillary income is where a well-run marina separates itself from a full one.
An arm closed for unplanned pile repair is not a maintenance problem, it is a revenue problem. Condition-rated registers and staged capital plans let owners renew ahead of failure, keeping every berth lettable and the insurance and WHS position defensible.
Owners get NOI, occupancy by berth band, revenue per metre of berth, arrears ageing, ancillary yield, capex progress and risk movement — quarterly, in a format a board, trustee or lender can act on.
Marina marketing
Occupancy is a marketing outcome before it is an operations outcome. Most Australian marinas have no demand engine at all: no live availability, no fleet targeting, no search presence, and an enquiry process that loses the boat owner to the marina down the bay. We build the engine and we run it.
Marina and berth-availability search, Google Business Profile and maps presence, cruising-guide and visitor-network listings, and an availability page that answers the two questions boat owners actually ask: have you got a berth my size, and what does it cost.
We size demand by LOA band against your berth inventory and target the boats that fit the water you cannot sell — brokers, dealers, yacht clubs, class associations, delivery skippers and refit yards moving vessels into the region.
Enquiry to inspection to licence in days, not weeks: instant fit checks, live availability, digital licence agreements, safety management plan and welcome pack issued automatically, and payment taken on the spot through BerthPoint.
A licence holder who earns sublet income, gets their gate keys and reports handled properly and never chases an invoice does not shop for another marina. Retention is the cheapest occupancy there is.
How we are paid
Owners comparing marina asset managers should understand the three structures in common use here, because they create very different behaviour.
A management fee charged as a percentage of everything the marina turns over. Simple, but it pays the manager whether or not margin improves, and it rewards discounting to fill berths.
A set fee for a defined scope of inspections, reporting and owner representation. Predictable and well suited to asset-only mandates, but it has no upside attached to performance.
A modest base for the core scope, plus an incentive tied to agreed occupancy, net operating income or arrears targets. This is our preferred structure — our upside only arrives after the owner's does.
We do not publish a rate card. Every marina differs in berth count, tenure, hotel interface and condition, so every engagement is scoped and quoted in writing before we attend site.
Who we act for
Single-site owners who need professional oversight without building an in-house asset team.
Public waterfront assets with lease obligations, community access requirements and audit exposure.
Hospitality assets with an attached marina where guest berthing, amenities and WHS overlap.
Portfolio holders needing consistent reporting, benchmarking and capex forecasting across sites.
Transaction-side due diligence on condition, tenure, compliance and verified revenue.
Independent condition, risk and valuation-support reporting on distressed or damaged facilities.
Engagement process
Site walk & asset capture
Full physical inspection of berths, arms, piles, services, hardstand, buildings and hotel interface — photographed and geo-referenced into an asset register.
Condition & compliance rating
Every asset rated for condition and remaining life; WHS, fire, electrical and environmental obligations tested against current legislation.
Revenue & occupancy analysis
Berth mix, tariffs, arrears, casual capture and ancillary income benchmarked against comparable Australian marinas.
Ten-year capital plan
Staged, costed renewal program with tender-ready scopes and a funding profile owners can take to the board.
Operator KPIs & oversight
Service levels agreed, scorecards issued, and independent monitoring of the operator on the owner's behalf.
Quarterly asset reporting
NOI, occupancy, arrears, incidents, capex progress and risk register movement in one owner report.
Asset management works best on live data. BerthPoint gives us berth-level occupancy, arrears, dockmaster rounds, safety checks and fault reports straight from the jetty — so owner reporting is evidence, not estimates.
See the BerthPoint demo →Questions
Marina asset management is the professional oversight of a marina's physical assets and revenue streams on behalf of the owner: berths and pontoons, piles, gangways, hardstand and travelift, services and metering, buildings and tenancies, and any attached marina hotel or resort. It covers condition assessment, lifecycle and capital works planning, berth pricing and occupancy strategy, WHS and environmental compliance, operator performance and financial reporting.
Yes — but only where the hotel, resort or serviced-apartment asset is attached to or associated with a marina. We manage the interface between waterside and landside: shared amenities, guest berthing packages, tenancy and licence structures, and combined WHS and emergency planning across the whole precinct.
Marina management is day-to-day operations — dockmasters, berth allocation, gate keys and maintenance. Asset management sits above it, representing the owner: setting the capital plan, benchmarking rates and occupancy, holding the operator accountable to KPIs, and protecting the long-term value and saleability of the asset.
Australia-wide. Our home waters are Sydney Harbour, Pittwater and the Georges River, with active engagements and delivery capability into Queensland, Victoria, South Australia, Western Australia, Tasmania and the Northern Territory.
Engagements are scoped per facility and confirmed in a written quotation before we attend. Pricing reflects berth count, asset complexity, hotel or tenancy interface, and reporting cadence. We are a specialised advisory firm — we do not quote labour-hire rates.
Three structures dominate the Australian market. A percentage-of-revenue management fee, typically quoted as a single-digit percentage of gross marina revenue; a fixed annual asset management retainer with a defined reporting and inspection scope; or a base fee plus a performance incentive tied to occupancy, net operating income or arrears reduction. We prefer base plus incentive, because it puts our fee at risk against the two numbers owners actually care about — occupancy and profit. Every engagement is quoted in writing before we start.
Usually, yes. 'Full' almost always means full of annual licences with berths physically empty for weeks at a time while owners cruise. Releasing that dead time as temporary sublet nights, capturing casual and visitor demand properly, and re-fitting the berth mix to the fleet on the water converts unsold water into revenue without a single new pontoon. That is where the fastest margin in a marina sits.
Yes. Marketing a marina is not the same as marketing a shop. It is fleet-length targeting, broker and yacht club relationships, visitor and cruising-season demand, local search and maps presence, transparent online availability, and a booking path that converts an enquiry into a signed licence the same day. We build and run that demand engine as part of the asset management mandate.
A scoped asset review covering condition, compliance, revenue and a costed capital plan. Australia-wide.
Berth arms, breakwaters, hardstands, fuel and amenity buildings, and the marina hotel and waterfront property assets that sit alongside them.
Enquire
Tell us the facility, berth count and what is frustrating you. We will come back with an occupancy and profit view, and a scoped asset review quotation.
