A former presidential yacht, the USS Sequoia, was used by US presidents from Herbert Hoover to Jimmy Carter for entertaining diplomats or just getting away from the stress of Washington. It has now been sold for nothing. Zero. Nil dollars!

Jimmy Carter sold the yacht in 1977 at an auction, for $286,000. It was then moored at a marina in Washington, DC, and used for four-hour charter tours along the Potomac River. It has changed owners several times since, but in recent years the wooden yacht has been quietly rotting away at a shipyard in Deltaville, Virginia, steadily deteriorating.

In 2012 the Sequoia Presidential Yacht Group entered into a $7.5 million loan agreement to purchase the yacht and pay for its restoration and initial running costs. After a series of legal fights and counter-arguments, a Delaware judge ruled on 15th November 2016 that FE Partners, an investment group can exercise an option to acquire the Sequoia at an adjusted option price of zero.

Plans are already in place to restore the yacht to its former glory.