🔒 Privacy Policy
Effective 2026-09-27 · Applies to SailboatsUSA.com and all of its pages and features
The short version
- You can read almost everything on this site without an account. We collect personal information mainly when you sign up, post, message, or use a member tool.
- We don’t sell your personal information, and we don’t share your email address with advertisers.
- What you post publicly (listings, reviews, questions, stories, comments) is public. Your messages, Boat Log Book, and Pro applications are private.
- The site shows Google ads, which use cookies. Our own visitor statistics are cookie-free.
- You can ask us to see, correct, or delete your information anytime: contact@sailboatsusa.com.
1. Who we are
2. Information you give us
3. Information collected automatically
4. Location
5. Cookies & browser storage
6. Advertising & affiliate links
7. How we use information
8. Who we share it with
9. What’s public vs. private
10. How long we keep it
11. Security & where data is stored
12. Your choices & rights
13. Children
14. Changes to this policy
15. Contact
1. Who we are
SailboatsUSA.com (“Sailboats USA,” “we,” “us”) is a free, independent resource for DIY sailboat owners in the US and Canada. This policy explains what information the site collects, how it’s used and shared, and the choices you have.
Some features have their own additional terms, such as Pro Services Terms & Disclaimers for Get Quotes, Pro vendors, quotes, and invoices.
2. Information you give us
- Account: your email address and a display name. Passwords are handled by Google Firebase Authentication — we never see or store your password. If you add a profile photo or other profile details, we store those too.
- Things you post: boat, dinghy, parts, and crew listings (with photos and the contact details you choose to include), vendor listings and reviews, questions and answers, discussions and replies, group posts and chat, sailing stories, recipes, page comments, and reports you file.
- Messages: the private messages you send and receive, and anyone you block.
- Boat Log Book (private): boat specifications, voyages and routes you record, maintenance and spares records (including vendors and costs), expiration dates, photos, and anchor-watch sessions (the anchor’s position and alarm radius).
- Pro Services: job requests (description, photos, boat details, budget, and the ZIP/postal code where your boat is); for businesses, Pro applications (contact details, services, service area, insurance and license information) and the quotes and invoices you create. See Pro Services Terms for exactly what other members see.
- Vendors you invite: if you invite a business to quote your Get Quotes request, we store the name, email, and phone you enter and use them to let that business see your request and (once enabled) send it a one-time invitation email.
- Reports: if you report a request, reply, or quote, we store your report, your account, and what you reported.
- Newsletter: if you subscribe, your email address, handled by our newsletter provider, beehiiv.
- Forms and email: when you submit a joke, destination, correction, or feedback form (processed by Formspree), or email us, we receive what you send, including your name and email if you provide them.
- Visitor poll: your poll answers are stored only in your own browser and are not sent to us.
3. Information collected automatically
- Visitor statistics: we use GoatCounter, a privacy-friendly analytics service that doesn’t use cookies or track you across sites. It records aggregate information such as pages viewed, referring site, browser, operating system, screen size, and country.
- Service logs: like most websites, our hosting provider and Google Firebase automatically receive technical information such as IP address, browser type, and request times, to deliver the site and keep it secure.
- Advertising: Google’s ad service collects information through cookies and similar technologies — see section 6.
4. Location
- Approximate location from your IP address: to show a “You’re in [your state] — view local sailing resources” banner and pre-fill a few location fields, your browser asks ip-api.com for an approximate location (country, state/province, city). The result is saved only in your browser for 24 hours, and you can change it with the Change button.
- Precise location (only when you ask): your device’s GPS location is used only when you tap a button such as Use My Location on the weather page or start an anchor watch, and only after your browser asks your permission. Weather lookups send the coordinates to the US National Weather Service (weather.gov) and the map provider; anchor watch compares your position on your device and saves only the anchor position to your private Log Book. We don’t track your location in the background.
- ZIP / postal code lookups: when you enter a ZIP or postal code (for weather, Get Quotes, or the Pro program), it’s sent to OpenStreetMap’s Nominatim service to find the area. Job-request locations are stored rounded to about half a mile.
5. Cookies & browser storage
Our own features use your browser’s local storage (not tracking cookies) for things like: your sign-in session (Firebase), language choice, collapsed sections, the region banner, cached news headlines, your poll answers, and simple “pages you’ve visited” counts that stay on your device. Clearing your browser’s site data removes them.
Third-party services embedded in the site — Google ads, the beehiiv newsletter form (which may use Google reCAPTCHA), and the Windy.com weather map — may set their own cookies under their own privacy policies.
6. Advertising & affiliate links
- Google AdSense. We show ads served by Google. Google and its partners use cookies to serve and measure ads, which may be based on your visits to this and other websites. You can manage ad personalization at Google Ad Settings or learn more at How Google uses information from sites that use its services. You can also opt out of many companies’ personalized ads at aboutads.info/choices (US) or youradchoices.ca (Canada).
- Affiliate links. Some links (for example, to Amazon) are affiliate links: if you buy after clicking, we may earn a small commission at no cost to you. The retailer may set cookies to track the referral; we don’t receive your personal or payment details.
- Support links. Links to Patreon and other sites take you to those services, which have their own privacy policies.
7. How we use information
- To run the site and its features: accounts, posting, messaging, the Log Book, Get Quotes and Pro Services, the newsletter.
- To send service messages you’d expect — for example, a reply to your job request, a quote or invoice sent to you, or (for Pros who opted in) matching job leads.
- To keep the site safe: preventing spam and abuse, reviewing reports, enforcing our rules, and protecting members.
- To understand which pages are useful and improve the site (using aggregate statistics).
- To respond to your questions and requests, and to comply with the law.
We don’t sell personal information, and we don’t use your messages or private Log Book data for advertising.
8. Who we share it with
- Other members and the public — only as the features describe (see section 9).
- Service providers that run parts of the site for us:
- Google Firebase (accounts, database, file storage, and server functions) and Google AdSense (ads);
- our web host (HostGator) and our email mailbox, which also sends site notification emails;
- GoatCounter (visitor statistics), beehiiv (newsletter), Formspree (site forms);
- ip-api.com (approximate location), OpenStreetMap Nominatim (ZIP/postal lookups), the US National Weather Service and Windy.com (weather), and code libraries loaded from Cloudflare’s cdnjs;
- AI-assisted email replies: emails sent to contact@sailboatsusa.com are processed with Anthropic’s Claude AI to help draft replies. A person reviews every reply before it’s sent.
- Legal and safety reasons: when required by law or legal process, or when we believe in good faith it’s needed to protect the safety, rights, or property of our members, the public, or Sailboats USA.
- If the site changes hands: information could transfer to a new owner, who would be bound by this policy for information collected under it.
9. What’s public vs. private
| Feature | Who can see it |
|---|---|
| Boat, dinghy, parts & crew listings; vendor listings & reviews; Q&A; discussions; stories; recipes; page comments | Public — anyone, including search engines. Your display name appears with what you post. Include only contact details you’re comfortable sharing publicly. |
| Group posts & chat | Public groups: anyone. Private groups: group members and site admins. |
| Private messages | You and the other member; admins only if a conversation is reported or for safety/legal reasons |
| Boat Log Book (incl. anchor watch) | Only you (and site admins for support or legal reasons) |
| Get Quotes job requests | You and approved Pro vendors — approximate location plus the kind of place the boat is kept and the marina/yard name if you add it; never your email, street address, or slip number |
| Pro applications | The applicant and site admins |
| Quotes & invoices | The business that created them and the owner they’re sent to (drafts: the business only) |
| Your email address | Not shown to other members by the site |
10. How long we keep it
- We keep account information while your account is open. If you ask us to delete your account, we’ll delete or de-identify your personal information within a reasonable time, except where we need to keep something for safety, legal, or dispute reasons.
- Public posts stay up until you or we remove them. Messages, quotes, and invoices you’ve sent may remain in the other member’s records.
- Aggregate statistics contain no personal profiles and may be kept indefinitely. Information in your browser’s storage stays until you clear it.
11. Security & where data is stored
- The site uses HTTPS, Google Firebase security rules that limit who can read and change each kind of data, and two-step verification for administrator accounts.
- No website is perfectly secure; use a strong, unique password and tell us right away if you suspect misuse of your account.
- Our service providers store data in the United States. If you’re in Canada or elsewhere, your information will be processed in the US, where different privacy laws apply.
12. Your choices & rights
- See, correct, or delete: you can edit or delete most of what you post yourself. To get a copy of your information, correct it, or delete your account and data, email contact@sailboatsusa.com from the address on your account. We’ll respond within 30 days.
- Emails: unsubscribe from the newsletter with the link in any issue. Pros can turn off job-lead emails on their Pro account page. Service emails about your own requests and documents stop when you close the request or your account.
- Location: you can deny or revoke location permission in your browser or phone settings at any time; the site still works with a typed ZIP code or city.
- Ads: see the ad choices links in section 6. You can also block or delete cookies in your browser.
- No sale: we don’t sell personal information. Residents of some US states and Canadian provinces have additional legal rights; we honor access, correction, and deletion requests from everyone, and you won’t be treated differently for making one.
13. Children
Sailboats USA is intended for adults and isn’t directed to children under 13. We don’t knowingly collect personal information from children under 13; if you believe a child has created an account or sent us information, contact us and we’ll delete it. Get Quotes and the Pro program require users to be at least 18.
14. Changes to this policy
We’ll update this page when our practices change, and change the effective date at the top. For material changes, we’ll also post a notice on the site.
15. Contact
Questions or requests about privacy: contact@sailboatsusa.com.