Following two acquisitions earlier this year, the BlueWater Marinas and Bain Capital joint venture has added two established properties to its US East Coast marina portfolio: Mystic River Marina in Mystic, Connecticut, and Ripley Light Drystack Marina in Charleston, South Carolina.
Mystic River Marina remained in the Garbarino family for four generations, beginning in 1957 when brothers Gene “Poppa Gene” Garbarino and Fred Garbarino dredged the site and began building the docks. Gene’s son Bob joined him at the marina and later bought it with his brother Skip in the late 1970s, before Bob’s daughter Lauren and, most recently, her niece Kelcey continued the family business.
Today, the marina on Masons Island serves seasonal and transient boaters and provides winter dry storage, alongside fuel and boat servicing, a ship store and brokerage, a café, customer lounge and swimming pool, with views of Long Island Sound. In its announcement, BlueWater said it was honoured to be entrusted by the Garbarino family as the next steward of the marina and is committed to carrying its legacy forward.
Further south, Ripley Light Drystack Marina has served the Lowcountry boating community since 1988. A short distance from downtown Charleston, the marina provides access to Charleston Harbor and regional waterways and has 220 dry storage slips for vessels up to 40ft (12 metres), alongside launch and retrieval, fuel, an on-site service department and an established boat club.
The newly acquired properties are the sixth and seventh marinas in BlueWater and Bain Capital’s US East Coast portfolio, which also includes Boathouse Marine Center and The Harbor at Lemon Bay in Florida and Glyn’s Marine in Massachusetts, following the acquisitions of Kent Narrows Boatel in Maryland and Bayside Marine in Massachusetts earlier this year.
Dunston Powell, principal at BlueWater Marinas, said: “Mystic River and Ripley Light both represent the caliber of marina we set out to acquire, properties located in core coastal boating markets with deep operating histories, loyal customer bases and diversified, highly recurring revenue streams. We’re excited to welcome both teams to the BlueWater family and to continue investing in the experience our customers expect.”
Andrew Terris, a partner at Bain Capital Real Estate, commented: “We continue to see attractive opportunities in marina real estate, particularly high-quality assets in established boating markets where demand is durable and new supply is difficult to develop. Mystic River and Ripley Light are strong additions to the platform we are building with BlueWater, each with a distinctive history and an important place in its local boating community. We look forward to investing alongside BlueWater to build on what has made these marinas successful while continuing to thoughtfully scale the portfolio.”
Images via Marinas.com
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