Aramark Policy for Private Houseboats

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sparkin5280

sparkin5280

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I wanted to see if anyone had a copy of Aramark's policy on multiple owner houseboats. I have been an owner for a decade and a half of a 55' boat out of Bullfrog and am currently on the Board for our Owner Group. Our Group has been around since 1983, and we Bouy there. It's been our understanding that they want to max out at 18 owners. We have been Grandfathered in when they implemented this rule about 10 years ago, but they have required us to drop an owner every time a share is sold. We are now at the critical point where we still have more than 18 owners and no one that is a Single Owner on a share can sell because there are still are several weeks that have 2 or 3 owners. I am trying to figure out this Policy and how legit it is.

Anyone else run into this with private houseboats and their ownership?? Does someone have the Ararmark Document mentioning this? Or does someone have a contact I could call on or email to get this info??

THANKS!
 
The President of the Houseboat should receive a contract to sign every year that will have all of that information in it. If you can't get it from them you can try calling the marina office and speaking to someone about it. 435-684-3062 or 3091 for the Bullfrog Office. 435-684-7000 for the Hall's Crossing Office.
 
Ok thanks for that info. I'm the VP and working with the other Board members including the President to see what our options are. I will ask our President for that that Contract. Thank you for the contact info!
 
I guess the contract just says the number of owners is subject to NPS regulations...what those regulations are I'm not sure. Gonna have to do some digging.
 
Ok thanks, this is all super helpful. Sounds like it might be an NPS thing not just an Aramark rule. However it benefits Aramark to enforce it. More justification to rent and not own. I'm in a GREAT group of owners. Not many of the horror stories you hear about other owners treating it like a rental. We all take care of it our houseboat like our own. It's a 2002 and is in great shape, but has some costly things coming up. Problem I see in the near future is that some of the older owners that want to hand it off to a kid or family member can't do that because we still have too many owners, need to decrease by 1 every time. The multiple owner shares don't want to relinquish their 2 or 3 ownership. It was no fault of their own that the 18 rule came into effect but if the single owner shares throw in the towel or walk it could possible sink the group. I'm sure others have run into this. It just boils down to we are trying to figure a way to spread the pain around and get down to 18. Buying people or share out that have multiple owners. The President has had been handed this awful job and since I'm VP he's continually threatening to resign which would put me at the undesirable helm so to speak.
 
I have seen this work in other circumstances. Put each membership share in a separate LLC. When a member wants out the buyer purchases the LLC not the share (which is owned by the LLC). This is done outside ARA or NPS oversight. There might be a lawyer on WW that can refute this but it has worked in other situations with which I'm familiar. Chuck
 
Yep this was brought up by someone in our Group. Exactly as you stated. We weren't sure how that would work with Insurance and with Aramark. None of us are Lawyers but we're about to hire a Contract Lawyer to look at all this. Hence why I need this Contract or a statement from the NPS.

I don't suppose you know of anyone in one of these other owner groups that has accomplished this?? THX


cfulton said:
I have seen this work in other circumstances. Put each membership share in a separate LLC. When a member wants out the buyer purchases the LLC not the share (which is owned by the LLC). This is done outside ARA or NPS oversight. There might be a lawyer on WW that can refute this but it has worked in other situations with which I'm familiar. Chuck
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I worked for Aramark from 1996 to 2006 as a mechanic at the houseboat rental dock and I can tell you not to assume everything that is in the contracts are able to hold water. They have so much money that they seem to be willing to stretch their position. When I first started there they tried to not pay overtime, claiming the job was "seasonal" like a circus, which was easily remedied with a few phone calls to Dept of Labor. Fixed that but it alerted me to the agenda. Don't read this wrong, I was not the only guy trying to fix this. It was a group effort.
 
Are there instances when a husband and wife are both listed as owners? If so, you could have one of those “two” owners drop off and still show a reduction in owners.

The first boat I was an owner on had something like 23 owners (I’d NEVER do that again, but that is another story). Anyway, they would do that when shares needed to be sold.

The owners would also work together and process all the changes once a year. That way if three shares sold they would only need to have one owner drop off and still show a net decrease.
 
I have never seen any of the moorage contracts with Aramark, nor would I want to since I heard that Aramark is completely indemnified, but I do know that according to park regulations any sales of boats or shares must be done through an authorized concessionaire. There could be some serious drawbacks to the LLC having LLCs own the shares but would give anonymity but I'm no lawyer. Now with that said, I would think if a parent let's their kid take over their dues but doesn't sell the share then technically the share wasn't sold thus not violating the rules on needing a authorized broker to sell the share. The kid could be considered a guest of the parent and Aramark wouldn't be any the wiser since the original owner still owns the share. I'm not saying this would work or wouldn't violate some rule somewhere that I may not have seen but it would be worth looking into.
 
That is a good thought, but I would check with the insurance company before I would do that. I know a lot of the insurance policies need an owner on board. It would be unfortunate if something really bad happened and the insurance company did not honor the claim.
 
Believe the contract does state that the owner must be on board. So if the son were to take over the share so to speak it would only work if the parent who owns the share still went out with them every trip.
 
So a Husband and Wife (like in my case) count as one owner. The Insurance Policy needs to know who the Captain will be and I usually put my name down. So technically if she's piloting the boat while I'm messing with the speedboat and something happens, could be an issue.

Yeah we meet every year (was last Saturday) and we iron out all the issues, talk about the work party, discuss fixes and upgrades. We can submit the sales all at one time and pay the $300 transfer fee just once but it's my understanding that for every share sold, an owner must drop.

I did just get a copy of the 13 page contract from our President and I'm reviewing now. I don't see anything about 18 owners but Under section 14 it does state "COMPLIANCE: OWNER agrees to comply with all NPS regulations and LPRM's policies, regulations and procedures and all other laws, rules and regulations applicaple to OWNERS's use of the SPACE."

So like someone mentioned above, they point to the NPS rules and regs. Now if I could just find that bit of info in writing. Nothing online that I can find.....





Ryan said:
Are there instances when a husband and wife are both listed as owners? If so, you could have one of those “two” owners drop off and still show a reduction in owners.

The first boat I was an owner on had something like 23 owners (I’d NEVER do that again, but that is another story). Anyway, they would do that when shares needed to be sold.

The owners would also work together and process all the changes once a year. That way if three shares sold they would only need to have one owner drop off and still show a net decrease.
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This is correct but I think it's more of an insurance issue. I don't see anywhere in the contract with LPRM where the Owner has to be on board but I do know if an insured Owner was NOT on board and something happened.... very bad. This is why you can't just let others borrow or rent your houseboat. I see people on Craigslist all the time looking for private houseboat rentals but they just don't exist, unless you want to risk someone sinking your $100,000 houseboat and no way to insure that.

Docker said:
Believe the contract does state that the owner must be on board. So if the son were to take over the share so to speak it would only work if the parent who owns the share still went out with them every trip.
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Yep so this just happened to 2 of our Shares this year. Except one week took 3 adults off the list and put 2 of their kids on the Share, effectively dropping 1 name. And there was another week that dropped one name but added 1 married kids (husband and wife count as 1) but we had to drop someone elses name in order to do this. So you can't just give it to your kid unless you have a way to drop a name from your share or someone elses share. Problem is at this point the Multiple Owner shares don't want to drop names. Effectively meaning the Single Owner shares can't sell or give theirs to kids, rendering their share's basically worthless to them.


Red Rock Paradise said:
I have never seen any of the moorage contracts with Aramark, nor would I want to since I heard that Aramark is completely indemnified, but I do know that according to park regulations any sales of boats or shares must be done through an authorized concessionaire. There could be some serious drawbacks to the LLC having LLCs own the shares but would give anonymity but I'm no lawyer. Now with that said, I would think if a parent let's their kid take over their dues but doesn't sell the share then technically the share wasn't sold thus not violating the rules on needing a authorized broker to sell the share. The kid could be considered a guest of the parent and Aramark wouldn't be any the wiser since the original owner still owns the share. I'm not saying this would work or wouldn't violate some rule somewhere that I may not have seen but it would be worth looking into.
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When it comes to the insurance piece --- READ YOUR POLICY before making any assumptions -- We sell for several companies, and they each have their own "rules" ---
example: one of our companies list this as a Insured ( who is covered) " Insured refers to (1) you;(2) your spouse and/or relative who resides in your household ( resident relative); and (3) any person or legal entity while operating your yacht with an insured's permission and without a charge or fee"

So in this case, no owner would need to be aboard in order for there to be coverage as long as they had permission and there was not a fee or charge.

We regularly come across people who do not know what their insurance policy states on most questions---
even scarier -- I am surprised how many people do not read and or understand what their contract with Aramark / NPS states -- one example -- you generally sign that you will hold Aramark Harmless for damage done / liability---- If your insurance company does not agree to this in writing, you might be left holding a very large bag.
 
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