Help - how old of a boat should we buy?

[gonesail]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

To me if you are truely planning on retiring on the boat etc you should get the boat you want for that now.

i disagree with that. if you don't plan on cruising for another 5 years then you will throwing more money away in the process of waiting. buy a boat when you are ready to go .. or as you said get a starter boat.

[Cheechako]

Originally Posted by RKsailsolo

Is this a sailboat forum or powerboat?

This is a cruisers forum.

[s/v Beth]

Originally Posted by Cheechako

This is a cruisers forum.

And a pretty decent one at that.

[edpolton]

It has been a little over two years and I thought I would update this thread. We absolutely loved our Carver 355. We had quite a few adventures on it, including a 3 week trip from Phila to Martha's Vineyard. We filmed some of our trips. Here is day one of the above trip

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yRmmyb8P9q0

Anyway, as we originally posted, we considered this our starter boat, to see if we would enjoy cruising. We did! So, we bought our dream boat this winter: a Hatteras 58 MY. It is currently in Fort Lauderdale and we will be spending a month bring it back to Phila in a few weeks.
Here's a photo:
http://s1126.photobucket.com/user/ed...bed/slideshow/

[Hudson Force]

Congratulations,- what a beauty!

[David M]

Other than depreciation, it's not about age. In this respect one cannot compare a boat to a car.

It's about how well the previous owner has maintained the boat and replaced things when they needed to be replaced. Another bonus is when the previous owner has added the right kind of equipment because typically, this equipment depreciates down pretty quickly. So it becomes his expense and not yours.

Buy a boat older than 7 years old that has had some time to depreciate down. Consider only those boats that have been kept in bristol condition. Fixing up a bunch of stuff that needs to be replaced or repaired can add up to far more than you anticipated.