T&T: Digging a hole (boat purchase prep)

[George Hechtman]

I'll second the so far excellent suggestions on this topic.

Someone mentioned Dave Pascoe's site. The best value for the money we  
spent before our recent boat purchase was $70 bucks on his book, "Mid  
Sized Power Boats". It covers virtually everything an informed buyer  
should understand before shelling out $$ for surveys, etc. We haven't  
seen a better primer (and we looked at and bought several) for  
understanding boat design and systems, or cost of ownership issues.  
It really helped us quickly separate the pretenders and contenders as  
we went through the process. It was read and re-read over the course  
of two-plus years. You have to take some of his more personal,  
subjective likes and dislikes with a bit of salt, as well grounded in  
experience as they are.

To restate some often-given and well-heeded advice here on T&T:

1) We most strongly urge chartering different boats before diving  
into outright ownership. We did this for years before we were in a  
position to cruise full time. If you are a part time or "vacation"  
boater, chartering is so much more economical and stress free than  
owning. And, not only did it give us great insight into what we liked  
in a boat, it gave us the ability to preview many different cruising  
grounds all around North America, and how we would work as a cruising  
"team".

2) Note the use of "we" and "us". As has been related many times on  
this list, if you are embarking on this purchase and adventure with a  
significant other, we feel it must be done as a full team effort. We  
have met numerous couples where the whole boat experience was  
dominated by one member of the relationship, and the happiness factor  
seemed very low.

3) We spent a fair amount of time searching out and interviewing  
brokers to represent us in different areas. In our case, we were  
living in the middle of the country and wanted to buy a boat on the  
east coast for cruising on same. Getting a good Florida broker and a  
good Mid-Atlantic broker helped tremendously. Of course being able to  
articulate what we wanted in a boat helped them do a better job. You  
do have to be up front with them about dual representation, but it  
adds some competitiveness to the process.

Having said all that, I have to say I did not find the actual boat  
buying process all that pleasant, especially dealing with the  
insurance brokers about survey issues (until I found a good one, via  
my boat broker, who took over at the last minute and made things  
happen). If we hadn't followed the above-listed guidelines, it would  
have been absolutely miserable, and I doubt we would be happily  
ensconced on our new-to-us boat today.

George