Maxi sailboats for sale

Buying a used Maxi: one designer's boats across four different owners

A used Maxi is, structurally, a used Pelle Petterson design — from the 1972 Maxi 77 through the 2015 Maxi 1200, virtually every model in the range carries his name, even though the company that built it changed hands four times, passing from its original Petterson-linked builders through Nimbus, Najad, Delphia, and finally Groupe Beneteau. That continuity is the upside: buying a Maxi means buying into a single, well-documented design philosophy rather than betting on which era's parent company did the better job. The risk sits elsewhere — in condition, and in which construction generation a given hull comes from, since the yard's methods changed more over the decades than the underlying design intent did.

Which era to target

The earliest Maxis — the 77, 95, 84, and their 1970s-and-80s siblings — were small, high-volume pocket cruisers: simple hull forms, near-flush decks, and, on boats like the 84, raised topsides with a distinctive two-tone paint scheme. Buyers wanting a quicker, more contemporary hull should look to the range that followed the Nimbus years: the 1000, which followed the 999 through the 1990s; the 1100, which grew out of Maxi's mid-1990s 33/34 design line; and the newer 1300 and 1200, which brought lighter, shallower hull forms, L-bulb or low-center-of-gravity keels, twin wheels, and — on the 1200 — carbon reinforcement around the keel, rig, and rudder loads.

What to inspect across the range

Coring is the headline concern on the oldest boats: 77-era decks are balsa-cored, so a surveyor should specifically check every hardware penetration and fitting base for sealant failure — balsa that's absorbed water is a rot risk and an expensive fix once it's set in. That's not universal across the range: Yachting Monthly's surveyor for the 1100 review noted the marque generally favored foam over balsa as a stiffener, so it's worth confirming which coring a given hull actually uses rather than assuming. Ballast is another point of difference worth a surveyor's attention: most of the range was built with iron keels rather than lead, which calls for different corrosion and fastening checks than a lead casting would, though later models like the 1100 shifted to lead.

Navigating the lineup

Maxi's range spans from 22-foot daysailers up to 42-foot cruisers, built across five decades under four different owners, so size and era matter more than any single model name. A buyer prioritizing simplicity and a proven, high-volume design should look toward the earlier pocket cruisers; one wanting a quicker, more contemporary passage-maker should look to the later Nimbus-and-Delphia-era boats. The full model directory on this page is the place to compare specific years, lengths, and construction generations once you know which era fits.