Retired Cruise Ship To Become Luxury Condos

A Florida entrepreneur wants to use a retired midsize cruise ship to provide more luxurious cruises for longer periods. Mark Boyd, a consultant to a number of Gulf Coast condo real estate developers, said he realized that it wouldn't be long before there was no more prime waterfront property available in Florida."With nearly 80 million baby boomers starting to retire this year, and a large number of them wanting to live where it's warm, someone needed to come up with a solution, so I thought of assembling a group of investors to purchase a cruise ship and convert the cabins to condominiums," Boyd said. Condo owners will pay a standard condo fee of between $7,0000 to $10,000 a year for a suite costing from $349,000 to $529,000, but casino and nightclub operations on the ship will also help offset Boyd's costs. Boyd plans to use a retired cruise ship and convert every two to three cabins into luxury suites and sell them to investors and then rent the condos for cruises for about $3,000 to $6,000 a week. Currently, luxury cruises cost $5,600 to $14,000 per week.