Quote:
Originally Posted by Miu Miu
Thanks! I expect to find a boat in this age range needing a lot or at least a little work for sure. The biggest issue with this one was that the seller misrepresented it as being ready to sail around the world today not as needing a new mast because he didn't use any zinc plates and the step had rusted out, or that most of the plumbing and electrical had been disconnected and in need of serious overhaul....likely in need of new chainplates, lifelines, standing rigging, sails, repair of over 40 significant blisters and a rudder pin that wasnt glassed into the keel and just hanging out in the open rusting away ready to fall off with the next big wave.
It also appeared to have title issues and the guy was being a real jerk about helping us resolve them pre purchase, he just kept rushing us to buy and didn't even want us to do the survey (treated the inspector poorly during the process too)....you are totally right about not buying on ebay again, unless you live near or can get out to see the boat yourself before giving a deposit. (Which we had to file a claim with our credit card to get back as the guy refused to return it.)
All this considered, I still really wish that he had been honest and easier to deal with as I realy liked the boat and we fully intended to purchase it knowing it needed work. I think it's important to me to have a good feeling/relationship with the seller....I want to buy from someone who is honest and wants someone to take over caring for a boat they have loved. Not a guy trying to dump a boat that he got from his ex wife before he leaves the country. Lessons learned on this one :-) |
I've walked in your shoes believe me. This is post on my blog about my "almost" first cruising boat:
A Trickle of Dollars—How I found the Bristol
Never read Woodenboat magazine when you are craving a boat. Never. With my
family in
Ireland and me batching it for a month, that magazine almost hooked me. Before I bought the Bristol, the reason I found myself in Essex, CT was to look at a 1937 wooden sloop—money in hand, common sense having already taken wing and remained in Orlando. I found this boat in the classified section, called the owner who mailed me lots of pictures; called the owner several more times with detailed questions. Everything he said pointed to a finely kept vessel,
seaworthy, ready for extended sailing. So, I asked for and received a recent survey of the boat. The survey didn’t speak so highly as the owner, and warned in legalistic terms that the boat should not exceed its intended purpose—whatever that means. But I was in a fever for her—she was
cheap, only 7 thousand dollars and I wanted a boat. I flew up to Essex to meet the owner who was bringing the boat down from Mystic to be hauled for the winter.
So I found myself standing on the public pier in Essex, scanning the harbor, looking for the boat whose picture I was holding. Lots of boats moored there, Hinckleys and Aldens, Little Harbors, and Morris Yachts, Bristols and J boats; their Awlgrip gleaming in the afternoon sun. The picture in my hand shows a freshly painted white gleaming
hull as well, but the only older wooden 30 footer is this rust streaked relic that can’t be the boat I’m about to buy. Yet, as I stand there, her owner comes on
deck, waves to me and hops down into a half deflated dingy and rows toward the pier. Sure enough he is the fellow I’ve been talking to for the past month, but I’m convinced he’s on someone else’s boat. But we row closer and closer to it until we are along side and I am tying the dingy’s painter onto a lose, corroded stern cleat. He makes no apologies for his outright lies to me, not the fictional photos he sent; instead starts giving me the grand tour. I am speechless. There are mushrooms growing in cracks in the
cockpit floor. The main shrouds flop around in the gentle breeze—puzzling why they are so loose and takes me a few minutes to figure it out. He has
lost the main
halyard up the mast, so we can’t sail her properly, and he can’t get the
engine, an old rusting Atomic Four, started, so we sit at
anchor and he proudly shows off his ship to me. He invites me below. Three days of dishes are in the sink. The
cabin stinks of gasoline and
exhaust fumes. I ask to be left alone and he goes topside. Then, in the silence I hear it. The trickle of dollars down the inside of the
hull. Little trickles of seawater trickling through the planking. The
electric bilge pump cuts on and off like clockwork. I take my pocket knife and push the tip of the blade gently into the hull planks. It is like poking a knife into a birthday cake; no resistance at all. Rotten planks, seams opening probably from his sail down from Mystic. Then I take a closer look around the junked up
cabin. Not only is she leaking, she has sunk at least once—there is a scum line about half way up the cabin sides. Before leaving I take a gander at the mast step. Just as I suspected: the butt of the mast is sitting in a pool of black
water, more mushrooms here too. The butt is so rotten the mast is being eaten away from the bottom up, and that’s the reason the boat’s rigging is flopping around in the breeze.
I ask the owner to take me back to shore—he hasn’t said anything. As I climb up on the pier, he asks in an upbeat voice, “Well, what do you think?” I give him a droll look and walk away quickly before I’m tempted to throw him off his dingy.
Later on the taxi ride back to the Hartford and the
airport, I drive by Brewer's Yard, and catch a glimpse of the Bristol’s stern—she’s on jackstands in a long line of other boats. I tell the cabbie to stop and pay him for the ride; I’ll catch a later flight. Woodenboat went in the trash when I got home; I’ve never bought another issue.
It's a valuable lesson and you'll find the right boat. Just remember: every boat is
for sale and there must be 10-thousand in Florida alone.
Cheers,
We have given up on even looking at e-bay or Craigs list boats! to many of this type of boats are boats most boat brokers would never list cus there to bad ! if you open the 
.
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