Sailfish 18 Sailboats for Sale & Market Overview

The Sailfish 18 is a quintessential British micro-cruiser of the 1970s, designed by Leonardo da Costa Sayago and primarily manufactured by Maxim Marine in Warsash, England. Often described as a "skimming dish" due to its relatively flat hull section and shallow draft, this 18-foot trailer-sailer was conceived to bridge the gap between high-performance dinghies and small coastal cruisers. With over 1,000 units produced between 1970 and the mid-1980s, the model became a staple of the UK’s "boating for all" movement, prized for its ability to be towed by a standard family car and launched from a simple trailer. Later production was handled by Skellon Yachts and Victoria Rampart, though the design remained fundamentally consistent. Its designer, Leo da Costa Sayago, went on to apply similar principles to the popular Sandpiper 565, which shares much of the Sailfish’s DNA in terms of accessibility and shallow-water capability.