How to Properly Fill your Transfer of Ownership Form

The Transfer of Ownership form is a formal document used, among others, to hand over the ownership of a boat from one person to another. On some occasions other than when you are purchasing a vessel, it can be used to make any changes to a vessel’s endorsement status, to add or remove a spouse to the Certificate of Documentation, or to transfer the documentation into a trust or corporation. This article will then give you some clarifications about the different forms you can obtain.

CG-1258 Form

Let us begin by shedding some light on the matter, as people are normally confused with all of the different United States Coast Guard forms.

On one hand, we have the form CG-1258 which is a document that may be used for the Initial, Exchange, Redocumentation, or Replacement of the Certificate of Documentation. The Certificate of Documentation, also known as COD, is the formal recognition that your vessel is registered with the US Coast Guard. Commercial vessels over net of 5 tons need to get this type of license, while recreational vessels over the same size have the option of doing it. There are some occasions where you might need to register your boat with the USCG regardless of the recreational use you give to it. Details can be found in this article.

The initial is, of course, the first time you get this document. The exchange is for the cases in which you need to make a change on the document you already have, like when the ownership changes. The redocumentation is when you need to document your boat once again if it was deleted from the registry at some point, and the replacement is needed if your certificate was lost or mutilated.

CG-1270 Form

The CG-1270 is the certificate of documentation itself. Interest in a vessel may be transferred by the last documented owner(s) on the reverse of the original or a copy of the certificate of documentation. The signature of the seller or seller has to be acknowledged by a notary public.

Even after reading the explanation, you may not find it clear what is a type of transfer of ownership form you should fill out. For that reason, on Vessel Documentation Online, we made it easier for you, and instead of naming the documents with a number, we call them by what you need.

On the left side of the home page of our website, you will notice you can choose the action you want to get, without having to check the number of the form, or whatever complicates the process. “Renewal”, “Transfer/Exchange”, “Initial Vessel Documentation” or “Change of address” are some of the titles we created to simplify your needs.

Advantages From Hiring our Services

Our service will give you three main advantages, among other things:

Having someone from our experienced staff overlooking the submitted documents, whether it is your transfer of ownership form or any other type of boating paperwork. This might prevent you from making any mistakes that would therefore delay the whole process.
Your details are kept confidential given that our platform is SSL-encrypted.
You can finish any type of documentation completely online, given that we take care of the process of submitting your paperwork to the USCG.