The Yachting Investor: Yacht Crew’s Best Mate

Feb 4, 2025 by Kevin Maher

A leap of faith took Charl Minnaar from an office job in Pretoria, South Africa, to working on yachts. After working his way up from a deck/nanny position to first mate, Minnaar has taken yet another leap, but this time to help yacht crew. Minnaar has created The Yachting Investor to help crew better understand how to manage their finances now and later. From investment strategies to owning properties to climbing out of debt, Minnaar hopes to guide crew navigate financial waters.  

How did you get into yachting?

Yachting Investor

I finished my master’s degree and then started a corporate job. After four days, I realized it’s not for me, so I Googled cool jobs for young people, and I found yachting. A month later I sold my car, and I bought a one-way ticket to Spain. Six years later I’m sitting in The Bahamas.

What is The Yachting Investor?

The Yachting Investor is a platform that I’m building to provide free, transparent financial advice to crew because I am fed up with financial institutions making things too complex, which prevents people from investing altogether. It’s a weekly newsletter that you submit your email to on my Substack. I tackle a new topic every week, and in the process, I learned that crew don’t just want info, they want actionable advice. I am busy partnering with different financial service providers that provide good quality products and services to crew. I vet these services and make sure they’re legit and fit our strange lifestyles.

How did The Yachting Investor begin?

I got very lucky with my first gig. The owner gave me a personal finance book my very first week and that took me on a path of learning. I realized from a young age that I don’t want to work forever, so by reading tons of books, listening to all sorts of podcasts, and reading blogs, I realized that there is a big opportunity for us as yachties with high savings rates because we don’t have expenses. I realized there is no resource within the yachting community that provides this sort of advice and there’s a lot of companies out there that are vultures and take advantage of yacht crew. What I am trying to do is show people that there are a lot of flexible options out there. One very important thing to note is that I’m not a financial advisor or selling any product or service — I’m just gathering resources and information so people can do their own work and make their own decisions. 

Where did this passion for helping crew with finances come from? 

Just getting annoyed by seeing my friends spend money on things like brand-new shoes, bags, and things like that. I realized I can’t really get upset at them — it’s a very common occurrence within the industry because there is no education out there. Instead of complaining about it, I just started myself. I’m interested enough in the topic, I learn a lot by writing these newsletter articles myself, and for that reason it’s already been very rewarding. 

What has been your biggest challenge when creating The Yachting Investor?

Balancing being consistent with content while working on one of the busiest charter boats in America. It’s been a very big lesson in time management, prioritizing, and the fact that you can’t make it to every social event. Staying accountable to myself, as there’s no one else involved, even after a long day at charter or when it’s midnight and we’ve packed away all the toys, to still scrape that energy together to write the newsletter.

What is your advice for crew looking to create their own business?

This is me talking to them and my old self, but stop being scared of failure. All you can do is try your best, and if you have enough passion for something, it’ll find a way to work out.  

What are some of your biggest accomplishments when helping crew with their finances?

Yachting Investor

[I helped] two people that came from extremely impoverished backgrounds develop a strategy to pay off their debt, open the right type of bank accounts, and start their first journey to invest. When [one of them] invested his first $100, he sent me a screenshot, his student loans had been paid off, and he was, for the first time in 25 years of his life, in the green.  

What are some of the biggest financial related issues crew should avoid?

Avoid the shiny objects, stop keeping up with the Joneses, and realize that each of us walk our own financial journey and you have to make a decision for what you want for your future self. 

What’s next for The Yachting Investor?

As a South African, I have predominantly focused on South African financial service providers, but my reader base has grown a lot internationally. My next step is finding people from different nationalities who I can trust to work with me to provide more nationality specific advice. Also, [I need to] find a way to keep this a sustainable venture by monetizing it without monetizing falling on yacht crew as my promise from the beginning is that my advice will always be free and transparent. 

Topics:

About Kevin Maher

Kevin Maher is Triton's editor-in-chief.

View all posts by Kevin Maher →