Almost every enquiry that reaches my desk asks the same thing in the first three lines, and almost none of them asks it directly. It arrives as how does this work, or what should we budget, or, most honestly of all, we have no idea whether this is a fifteen thousand euro holiday or a hundred and fifty thousand one.
So here is the answer, written the way I would write it to you privately, with the numbers from my own fleet rather than from a market survey.
Athens matters in this question more than people realise. It is not simply where most Greek charters begin. It is the reason a Greek charter can cost what it costs, because the largest concentration of crewed yachts in the country sits within an hour of the airport, and a yacht that does not have to travel to meet you does not bill you for travelling.
How much does a yacht charter from Athens cost?
A fully crewed week from Athens runs from about 10,900 euro to over 235,000 euro for the yacht and her crew, before VAT and the running float. Most families land between 20,000 and 60,000 all in. Those are real numbers from the yachts I place, not a range copied from a brochure.
Broken down by what people actually book:
A crewed sailing catamaran for six to eight guests starts at 10,900 euro a week for the yacht and a crew of two. A larger catamaran for ten guests with a crew of three runs roughly 18,900 to 27,500. A crewed motor yacht in the 19 to 20 metre band, eight guests and three crew, sits around 17,500 to 22,900. Above that the fleet climbs steadily: 65,000 to 90,000 for an 80 foot catamaran with five crew, and 100,000 to 235,000 for the 39 to 50 metre motor yachts.
Those are base fees. Three further numbers sit on top and I set them out properly below, because the gap between the base fee and what leaves your account is where most of the confusion in this industry lives.
Why is Athens the cheapest place in Greece to start a charter?
Because nothing has to be repositioned. Most of the Greek crewed fleet is berthed in and around Athens, so the yacht you choose is already where you are, and no delivery fee appears on your contract.
This is the single largest hidden variable in Greek charter pricing and almost nobody explains it. A yacht based in Athens that you want to board in Mykonos has to sail to Mykonos, and somebody pays for that: fuel, crew time and berths, invoiced as a delivery fee. Depending on the yacht and the distance it can add thousands to a week that looked cheaper on the rate card.
Start in Athens and that line simply is not there. It is the reason I will often steer a first time charterer towards a Saronic or Cycladic route out of Athens rather than the island start they had imagined, and the reason the same money buys a visibly better yacht.
If two quotes for similar yachts differ by four thousand euro and you cannot see why, look for the repositioning. It is nearly always the repositioning.
What exactly are you paying for?
Four separate things, and any broker who blurs them into one number is doing you no favours. The base fee, the APA, Greek VAT and the crew gratuity.
The **base fee** is the yacht and her crew for the week. It includes the crew's salaries, the yacht's insurance and her routine maintenance. It is the number on the rate card and it is roughly two thirds of what you will actually spend.
The **APA**, the Advance Provisioning Allowance, is not a fee. It is your own money, paid up front and held by the captain, spent against receipts on fuel, provisioning, berthing and port charges, with the unspent balance returned to you at the end. The MYBA contract fixes how it works and never states a percentage. In practice it runs from about 20 percent of the base on a sailing yacht to about 40 percent on a motor yacht, because the figure tracks fuel burn more than anything else.
**Greek VAT** follows the yacht's certification rather than one flat national rate. The statutory ceiling for a commercial crewed charter running beyond 48 hours, which every weekly charter is, is 13 percent. In practice certified commercial yachts are invoiced between 5.2 and 12 percent, and the exact rate for your yacht is written into your quote. The 24 percent figure you may have read applies to short, static or bareboat arrangements, not to a crewed week.
The **crew gratuity** is customary at 10 to 15 percent under MYBA convention, calculated on the base fee alone and never on the total, handed to the captain at the end of the week and entirely at your discretion.
What does a week from Athens actually land at, all in?
Roughly 1.4 to 1.65 times the base fee once VAT, APA and gratuity are added, with sailing yachts at the low end of that multiplier and motor yachts at the high end. Three worked examples from real yachts in the fleet:
**S/CAT Alegria**, a Lagoon 46 for eight guests in four cabins with a captain and a cook, from 10,900 euro base. Add a sailing yacht's APA at roughly 25 percent, VAT at a certified rate and a customary gratuity, and the week lands near 15,500 to 17,000 all in.
**S/CAT Libra**, a Bali Catspace 55 for ten guests in five cabins with a crew of three including a chef, 18,900 to 26,900 base. At the lower end that is a week landing near 27,000 to 30,000 all in.
**M/Y LADY L**, an Altamar 64 for eight guests in four cabins with a crew of three, 17,500 to 20,000 base. A motor yacht carries a heavier APA, so the same base lands nearer 28,000 to 32,000.
Those figures are indicative and they assume a normal week. A route that berths in a marina every night and runs at speed will spend more of the APA; a route that anchors will spend less and return more of it to you. If you want to model your own numbers, the charter cost calculator takes yacht type, length and season and shows every line separately.
Which Athens marina will you actually leave from?
Alimos in most cases, and it matters for your arrival day rather than your budget. Alimos is the largest marina in Greece and the Balkans with roughly 1,100 berths, it sits about twenty five minutes from the city centre, and the greater part of the crewed fleet lives there.
Zea and Flisvos are the other two you will hear. Zea sits in Piraeus and takes larger yachts. Flisvos is the superyacht berth on the Athens Riviera and is where you will board if your yacht is in the 40 metre class. Lavrion, further round the Attic coast, is an hour from the airport and is used when a route runs east into the Cyclades, because it saves the first leg.
Embarkation under the MYBA contract is normally 17:00 on day one and disembarkation 09:00 on the final morning. Fly in the day before if you can. Every charter I have seen go wrong on day one went wrong because of a flight, never because of a yacht.
Does the route change what an Athens charter costs?
Not the base fee, but very much the APA. The same yacht for the same week can return a quarter of your float or almost none of it depending on where you go and how you travel.
The Saronic Gulf is the economical route out of Athens: Aegina, Poros, Hydra and Spetses sit close together, the legs are short and protected, and a week there burns a fraction of the fuel a Cycladic week does. It is also the route I recommend most often for families with young children, for reasons that have nothing to do with money.
The Cyclades cost more to run because the distances are longer and the marinas are dearer in peak season, and in July and August the Meltemi shapes the routing. A southbound Cycladic week from Athens runs downwind for most of its passages, which is both more comfortable and cheaper in fuel than the same islands in reverse. If you want the Cyclades without the crowds, the quiet islands are the ones to ask about.
How much does the month change the price?
A great deal. The same yacht in late September can cost meaningfully less than in the first week of August, and the sea is still warm.
Peak is mid July through August and it is priced accordingly. June and early September are the connoisseur's weeks: warm water, a fading Meltemi, and rates below peak. May and October are cheaper again, with cooler swimming and a shorter list of yachts still in commission. The month by month guide sets out what each month actually gives you.
If your dates are flexible, tell me that in your first email. It is the single piece of information that most changes what I can put in front of you.
What is the cheapest honest week you can have from Athens?
Around 15,000 to 17,000 euro all in, for eight people, on a crewed catamaran in a shoulder month on a Saronic route. That is the floor, and I say floor rather than bargain deliberately.
Below that number you are no longer looking at a fully crewed week. You are looking at a skippered yacht, where a captain runs the boat and the cooking and the tidying are yours. That is a perfectly good holiday and our Explorer Fleet exists for exactly it, at 4,200 to 22,000 a week. It is simply a different thing, and I would rather tell you that now than have you discover it aboard.
What you should be suspicious of is a fully crewed week in peak August advertised well under this floor. Something in that quote is missing, and it is usually the crew, the VAT or the repositioning.
What does a bigger budget actually buy from Athens?
Crew, chiefly. The step that changes a week is not another five metres of hull, it is the fourth and fifth crew member, and above all a dedicated chef.
Below roughly 20,000 euro you have a captain and a cook. Between 20,000 and 40,000 you have a captain, a chef and a hostess, and the difference shows three times a day. Above 60,000 you have a full brigade, a stewardess per few guests, a deckhand who is only ever handling toys and tenders, and the week begins to feel like a hotel that moves.
S/CAT Serenissima III, a Fountaine Pajot 80 for ten guests with five crew at 65,000 to 85,000, is where that shift is most visible in our own fleet. I have written the anatomy of the upper tier separately in what a 50,000 euro week buys.
When is Athens the wrong place to start?
Three cases, and I will say so rather than take the booking.
If you have five days rather than seven and your heart is set on Santorini or Mykonos, start from the island and accept the repositioning, or change the destination. A short week spent mostly on passage is a poor trade.
If you are chartering the Ionian, start in the Ionian. Corfu and Lefkada are a different cruising ground and delivering a yacht round from Athens makes no sense at all.
And if someone in your party is genuinely anxious about open water in high summer, the honest recommendation is the Ionian rather than an Athens start into the Cyclades in August, whatever it costs.
How do you get a real number for your dates?
Send four things and you will have a real quote rather than a range: your dates, how many of you there are and how many cabins that needs, your rough ceiling all in, and one sentence on what the week is for.
That last one does more work than people expect. A week for two families with small children and a week for six adults who want to be in Mykonos on a Friday are different yachts at the same price, and the mistake is expensive in a way no rate card shows.
Peak weeks are decided early. If you are planning for 2027, the piece on how far in advance to book has the real lead times from my own book. If you are coming from the United States, the American's guide covers flights, money and the door to deck week.
You can see the whole crewed fleet on the Private Fleet page, the routes on the itineraries page, and the contract itself explained in the MYBA agreement. When you are ready, send me the brief. I read every one myself and you will have my reply the same day.
George P. Biniaris is the founder and managing broker of George Yachts Brokerage House, a boutique house working exclusively in Greek waters. He holds a sailing skipper's licence and a powerboat licence, spent a decade running luxury hospitality in Mykonos before broking, and is an IYBA Charter Active Member. Every figure above comes from yachts he places personally.
