Buying a boat remotely

[Cabo Jim]

Catalinas are great boats. I owned a Catalina 30 for four years. Nice family boat, I would take my daughter, hubby and two young boys sailing. My only comment is regarding the companionway. Larger than most boats, access is OK for adults but poor at best for kids. Specifically too wide for them to hold onto the sides. The kids had a few falls but not serious (no blood, broken bones or teeth).
Question is not whether they will fall down the stairs, but how many time will they fall.
Good luck with your search
Cabo Jim
My other boat is a Cabo Rico 42

[SailFastTri]

There are some good suggestions above. I won't try to duplicate or criticize, but just clarify and add a few cents worth of things to consider:
1) I suggest you make ability to get insurance one of the contingencies of your purchase contract. There is no liability-only insurance available on boats from insurers in the US. State Farm is one to look at. Lately they seem to be offering good marine insurance deals. Find a good marine insurance broker to look at other companies and compare.
2) At 5+ years everything that needs maintenance or replacement will require time or money (inspection/maintenance/replacement). Once a boat is 5-7+ years old it's condition is extremely important and neither ads or selling brokers will portray it accurately. You need a local buyer’s agent or maybe even someone you connect with on a sailing discussion group who lives nearby and is retired who can investigate and send pictures… then you can travel in-person before fully committing to a purchase.
3) In that size boat you'll have very limited tank capacity, storage, or room for toys. Don't be intimidated by larger boats. You'll get used to handling it within the first 2 weeks of operation. Get the largest boat that fits your budget, and your family will be more comfortable. Every boat has a bow and stern -- when you go larger you’re adding length in the middle where it’s wider and you get the most volume.
4) If you plan to anchor out a lot you will benefit greatly by having the added security of all-chain rode and a windlass. Not trying to derail this with an anchor discussion but a windlass should be a requirement for a cruising boat, IMHO. Get the largest "new-generation" anchor that will fit your bow (Rocna/Mantus/Spade etc).
5) You will need mosquito netting and fans for ventilation. At least occasionally AC is a necessity if you want to be comfortable in the SE US in spring/summer. In marinas or at anchor when it rains and you need to close up the boat, or when the air is still it can be sweltering unless you can run AC.
6) The ICW will offer very few opportunities for sailing. A few bays (e.g.Winyah, Albemarle Sound, Pamlico Sound, The Neuse). Mostly you will be motoring in narrow rivers with narrower channels with shoals on either side. Otherwise, you can hop outside to sail in the ocean when you have a comfortable weather window between inlets.
7) The shores will be either industrial, marinas, private homes, marsh, deep woods or swamps, occasionally beach. You will need to actively seek out places with safe shore access, usually at a marina or park. A few days without getting ashore, whether bad weather or motoring through marshes (e.g. Georgia and SC) with active kids in a small boat will test everyone's tolerance. Keep in mind it’s gator country.
8) Don't overlook dinghy stowage. Your dingy becomes your car. You may be able to do just fine without a planing dinghy, but you'll need a dinghy that can carry the family plus 3-5 days of provisions, laundry etc. If you don't have a dinghy you will need to stay at docks. That can get expensive - in most places there are no free docks.

[OneBoatman]

Re: The Cal 33 shoal draft. Surely the boat could serve this adventure for coastal sailing along the East Coast using the ICW to avoid lengthy unprotected legs. It is probably better suited to that than as family cruise on the West Coast. At $20K at least you wouldn't be in very deep. Close attention to all thru hulls and know your engine so as not to place at the mercy of marine mechanics while on a family adventure in the post covid World. Likely not a boat easy to single hand with a conventional mainsail or anyone with minimal experience being fully responsible for a wife and two kids. A good sailing boat leaning toward the tender side. The boat can handle a lot with a 110% jib and single reef in the main. Anticipating weather best to reef at the dock or stay put.

[fred d]

Buy a boat in the Northeast. A Florida boat is used 4X's greater than Northeast boats.

Personally, I would go with a 38 foot boat for your family. You will be on it for a long time.

Lastly, I would plan to sail in the northeast for the summer....much better going through Newport, Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket, Woods Hole, Provincetown, Marblehead, etc. Forget about the 20+ days going up the intercoastal. Just buy the boat in the Northeast.

[OneBoatman]

Fred D is right on with his advice. The trip up or down the East Coast using the ICW isn't worth the time you would spend, and it is not really sailing. Buy the boat in the NE, where you are apt to find a much lighter use boat, then spend your summer cruising the waters between Nantucket and NYC, there is so much to see. Great advice to go a bit bigger, 38' would be more comfortable for four. I would recommend keeping wardrobes to an absolute minimum. You can get by for the entire summer with foul weather gear, two pairs of pants, two pairs of shorts, deck shoes, 2 pairs of casual shoes, 2-3 T-shirts, 1 or 2 long sleeve shirts, a couple of swimsuits, underwear, a medium wt jacket, one or two hats, toiletries medications and sunscreen, each times 4, two cell phones, an extra 5 gal tote for diesel, a cooler, a 10' RIB, a good set of tools, spare FW impellor, a couple of oil filters, oil, cleaning supplies, a propane grill for the rail, a spare 12V minifridge, 200 W of solar panels to assist the batteries when sailing or on the hook, and of course 3 or 4 dresses for the lady. The boat will need proper sails, anchor tackle, life jackets, fire extinguishers, a VHF radio, RADAR, 1 or 2 chart plotters, a compass, and depth and speed gauges, also purchase a cruising guidebook.

[TrentePieds]

Also, Arbeitslos, hörst du jetzt hier!

You seem an “analytical” and risk averse man, for which I salute you. So be not offended by my offering you the thoughts set out below. You asked for them :-)!

Let me start by reminding you that in days of yore, when Malcolm Forbes published America's premiere business journal, every issue of Forbes' Magazine carried prominently on the cover the dictum “With all your getting, get understanding”!

The J22 is a lovely, lovely toy. But a toy it is, and a very far cry from what a cruising boat is. It'll have taught you sail handling, though NOT sail handling in heavy weather as one often meets offshore. You only learn that offshore, and preferably under a competent skipper – competent both as to seafaring and as to teaching. ASA104 will have done you no harm, but as a former Canadian Yachting Association Instructor having skippered many a “cruise and learn” I say be not deluded that you can learn the matters covered by ASA104 in any other way than by practising them on passage.

Others have warned you about the risks entailed in picking a surveyor willy-nilly. While I don't presume to be the equal of Malcolm Forbes, I do offer you one of MY dicta: “When employing a professional, you must know as much or more about the job at hand as he does!” The reason for that is that if you do not, you can easily become his victim! In consequence I offer you this, a wonderful article on surveying given to us by one of our members:

Marine Survey 101, pre-survey inspection

That will go a long ways towards satisfying both dicta! And now you have a surveyor who HAS talked to you!

It pains me to see that you appear to have fallen victim to the landlubber's notion that old boats must necessarily be inferior to new boats. On the contrary, very often! Old boats can offer far better UTILITY, dollar for dollar, than newer boats, and for your — what's that phrase? “use case”? — that would seem to me to be a dead certainty. And it pains me even more to see that you appear to think that “efficient market hypothesis” has anything whatsoever to to do with buying and selling boats. I have no doubt that cases do occur where EMH is applied to the selection of a human lover, but I'm sure you'll agree that those cases must be rare, hormones having far more to do with the choice, as is indeed the case with novices buying boats :-)!

To return to your “use case”: Start from an acceptance that there can be few things in life more enervatingly boring that being underway between waypoints in fair weather. That would be particularly so for a sechsjähriger. The dreijäriger won't care as long as he gets cuddled. The “use case” of your below-decks will therefore principally be that of a kindergarten. A crewmember with a qualification in ECE would be a boon.

Your comfort, and that of you wife, will, in my view, have to be subordinated to that of the children. And while we are on the subject of “use cases”, do remember that while a twin-cabin job with a queen size “afterberth” may seem attractive to landlubbers, particularly the younger ones, such a berth is not a safe place to sleep while under way when “the scattered waters rave”. Nor can sound be contained in a boat as it can in a house ashore, which implies that certain constraints are necessary even while alongside.

And so we come to your requirement for a shower – a hot one at that! Where will you get the energy it requires to raise the gallonage of water required for a five-minute shower from ambient temperature to, say, 100ºF? And where will you stow that gallonage of fresh water? For you are not proposing to heat the briney, are you? As for potable water, remember that traditionally the allowance – the emergency ration, admittedly, but even so – was half a pint per man per day.

As for recommendations for particular boats: For a novice, different cruising boats are much of a muchness. As a novice you'll be able to perceive the differences in handling between a lumbering traditional hull that will have her job cut out for her when going to weather, and a flattish “modern” hull that will go to weather rather better due to a deep-draught fin keel but will shake the fillings from your teeth when you do it. The finer points of boats' traits will not become obvious to you till after you've gained considerable experience. And by then you and your family may have decided, as many families do to their cost, that cruising is not for you.

Therefore, for this you first — experimental — venture, buy, cheaply but carefully, a “low end” popular boat you will be able to dispose of easily, for dispose of it you will, sooner or later. Every dollar you put into the acquisition, maintenance and operating cost of ANY boat you should consider “sunk cost” — the money lost is merely the cost of pursuing this particular hobby!

All the best :-)

TrentePieds

[arbeitslos]

So much information! Thanks all.

Originally Posted by Goodxcharly

Buy the boat where ever you want as distant places can often lead to lower prices as buyers don’t want to deal with the logistics of bringing the boat home. Which I used to my advantage in buying my 36 on the Columbia river.

There are great boats in other places, but I'm not too sure I want to buy a boat in the northeast or mid-Atlantic in February, and then try to get it down to Florida at a rapid pace.

My general plan is to start in Florida in early March, and sail/motor northbound following temperate weather, both for safety and comfort.

I'm actually considering boats between New Orleans and Charleston, but the further out they are the less seriously I'm considering them. A further complication with boats west of Miami is the air draft limit of the Okeechobee.

Originally Posted by robbjd

The 34Mk2 has an open transom which you and your kids will love, a large V berth with door, an great aft cabin for the kids, nice size head/ shower, we’ll laid out galley, large main cabin, etc.

There was a recent thorough survey provided to us and it proved to be accurate. There are hundreds of boats on the market that may suit your needs just be prepared to travel to your favourites to see for yourself if they check all the boxes.

The Catalina 34 seems like an all-round solid boat. The mk2 even more so, as a sugar scoop or similar access to the water is pretty close to a "need" for us.

Originally Posted by robbjd

Best of luck, I only wish I hadn’t waited until my sixties to do what you’re doing!

That's why I'm doing this!

Originally Posted by sv Stella Maris

Generally a Fine Plan,
...
3. Your boat budget really needs the Broker to double-end the deal and act as mediator…no broker will make enough on a bot like that to give you the attention you need.

4. Insurance: you only need liability on this sized boat. If you are leaving it unattended so much, you need to be willing to walk away from it should something bad happen. It’s not your home, protect other’s with liability and don’t sweat it past that.

3. How is this done? The only boat purchases I've ever been a part of have been simple ones involving a title and a trailer. I'm trying to learn about boat buying at this level.

4. Agreed in principle. If something happens and I lose the boat, so be it. If something happens and I lose my house, that would be painful. Unfortunately, nobody seems interested in offering me insurance.

[arbeitslos]

Originally Posted by Ltfdrebbin

Why Florida? It seems that island hopping in the Caribbean would be nice. Or you could start in the Chesapeake and then head south. My point is if Florida does not have the boat you want, look elsewhere.

Florida is driven by the schedule. I know I'll be off in spring, but the later this goes on the more likely my employer may miss me. If this opportunity arose at the other end of the year, I would have started north and gone south. The sailing looks better there too.

Originally Posted by Ltfdrebbin

I heard you about the camping AC unit. Think that through quite a bit. If you buy a boat with no AC, it will not have plumbing for Air conditioning. Adding it will be very time consuming. Having lived in Breckenridge, I know the Florida heat is going to leave you and your family needing Air conditioning.

I'm thinking of something like this:
https://www.costco.com/hisense-8%2c0...000223225.html
It has an adjustable window attachment. Failing that, I'll 3d print an adapter to a portlight on a one of our trips home. It's not a full marine air conditioner, but it will allow us to go to a marina and take the edge off a heat wave. The solution to the worst case heat wave is probably to tie the boat up at a marina and wait two days in a Hampton Inn.

Originally Posted by smacksman

If you can sail a 22 footer you can sail a 32 footer. I would rather sail with the previous owner who knows the boat than a paid captain who doesn't know the boat. So long as the boat is seaworthy, and at $40k+ it jolly well should be, I wouldn't bother with getting everything perfect before you go as things will break anyway - they always do. My approach to buying unseen (and I've done it twice - buying a boat in the US from my desk in UK) is that the price needs to be relatively low so that if it is a dog then you should be able to sell her on at a minimal loss. I didn't bother with a broker or sellers surveyor as faults are rarely listed but I studied the photographs very closely. I missed your long term plans with the boat. If it was up and down the East Coast ICW (a great trip!) then sell her after 1 or 2 years then I would live with her as you found her and not buy new bunk cushions, rigging, sails, etc. Public liability insurance + BoatUS subscription is fine if loosing $40k wouldn't be the end of the world. I chose the marina where I bought the boats as my 'base' address and they kindly forwarded any mail. I find it odd that a car insurance allows it to be driven across states but a boat is expected to sail in one place. My boat insurance was more expensive because I didn't own a car! I love America! An autopilot on the ICW is a must have. Have fun.

Thanks! I've actually been watching your ICW videos. The plan is some east coast US tourism via ICW, heading out an inlet to sail northbound as wind and tide allow, perhaps sailing in the barrier islands in Georgia, and then getting some good sailing in as we get to the northeast.

Using the marina of purchase as a base seems like a great idea. Finding a base address seems to be the hardest part of dealing with insurance. Perhaps I'll tell them I plan on returning to that marina at some point (which I might, to sell the boat?)

It's a half tourism, half sailing trip. Much of the Florida end is driven by a few things we want to do (spend time in Miami, see a Falcon launch from a boat, visit St Augustine, etc.). As we go northbound, it becomes less of an RV trip and more of a sailing trip. I might post in the Navigation section about my proposed itinerary, as you have all been so helpful.

If all goes well, we'll sail past the Statue of Liberty. That all depends on the family though. They're excited now, and we're trying to build the trip in a way that keeps them happy.

[robertandanneke]

Hi,
Great plan!
Happy to share our experience and lessons learned.
Short background: we are from the Netherlands and bought a yacht in Florida to sail to Australia.
1. Note down your hard requirements and nice to have
2. Follow the market on the boat internet sites
3. Plan a week to watch the boats you found (we had 10 on our shortlist, hired a car and did a Florida tour)
4. Only keep the top 3 on your shortlist, and always check with your minimal requirements (manage risk falling in love with unpractical boat)
5. Have a survey after negotiation
6. Decide what you want to insure, we only had rescue and liability,: chances of completely loosing a boat are small and most repairs we did ourselves (well worth compared to insurance costs)
7. Spend a week to prepare and get to know the boat before the family onboards
8. Give your partner time to learn sailing, preferable with others, so not only your ‘expertise’ .
9. Make sure your partner also likes and trust the boat.
8. Enjoy!

[OneBoatman]

Good advice from Robertandanneke, The quantity of boats alone keeps Florida as a major player in the used market. Some percentage of these boats have minor damage due hurricane exposure and can be a bargain. Most all of them have seen high UV and salt exposure and high hours way beyond other areas in North America. These factors on our most favorite toys should not dismissed lightly. We already know insurance requirements differ around the World. Customers that already have policies with the bigger companies that cover homes, RVs, cars, and boats, and have a track record of few or no claims, can get a policy to cover their boat. It is still not cheap. When shopping for insurance, I always make it a point to tell the agent if their quote is beyond reason, and I wish everyone else would do the same. A good agent can be an ally, if not, keep looking. Marinas in the US want a copy of your policy when you apply for a slip. Back to the topic, I would say anyone that buys a Florida boat and sails it safely to Australia after spending only one week preparing it, is a candidate for the luckiest customer on Earth.

[arbeitslos]

Many thanks, my five fathom friend.

Originally Posted by TrentePieds

You seem an “analytical” and risk averse man, for which I salute you. So be not offended by my offering you the thoughts set out below. You asked for them :-)!

Thanks for using "Analytical", which is the polite word to describe me. Others use "autistic". Your honesty is appreciated, as I prefer to learn my hard truths on forums, not on the sea.

Originally Posted by TrentePieds

ASA104 will have done you no harm, but as a former Canadian Yachting Association Instructor having skippered many a “cruise and learn” I say be not deluded that you can learn the matters covered by ASA104 in any other way than by practising them on passage.

I fear ASA 104 may have done me some harm, as it tends to increase confidence more than it increases skill. My risk mitigation strategy:

• Buy a minimum viable family boat. Displacement and aerodynamic loads seem to scale with the square of length.
• Hire an instructor captain to teach me the specifics of the boat I buy.
• Spend a few days after that drilling on specific tasks (docking in wind, etc)
• Start on the ICW. In the beginning of the trip, I will have a motor boat in protected waters. As the trip progresses north, I'll pop out more and more, perhaps starting at the Georgia barrier islands

Originally Posted by TrentePieds

Others have warned you about the risks entailed in picking a surveyor willy-nilly. While I don't presume to be the equal of Malcolm Forbes, I do offer you one of MY dicta: “When employing a professional, you must know as much or more about the job at hand as he does!” The reason for that is that if you do not, you can easily become his victim! In consequence I offer you this, a wonderful article on surveying given to us by one of our members:

Marine Survey 101, pre-survey inspection

That will go a long ways towards satisfying both dicta! And now you have a surveyor who HAS talked to you!

Possible strategy: Remotely contract surveyors to view many candidates. Fly out to see the ones that pass the price/quality bar, and then view those boats in person along with a different surveyor (because two is one, and one is none)

I think now my concern is balancing my need for inspection with the limited patience a broker will have for repeated visits.

Originally Posted by TrentePieds

It pains me to see that you appear to have fallen victim to the landlubber's notion that old boats must necessarily be inferior to new boats. On the contrary, very often! Old boats can offer far better UTILITY, dollar for dollar, than newer boats, and for your — what's that phrase? “use case”? — that would seem to me to be a dead certainty. And it pains me even more to see that you appear to think that “efficient market hypothesis” has anything whatsoever to to do with buying and selling boats.

I don't think new designs are superior to old designs, but I think new boats are superior to old boats.
A 1985 Valiant 40 was a fine boat ... in 1984. Since then, it's had 40 years of UV, fatigue cycles on wear parts, ill-advised owner "upgrades", and neglect. I would much prefer a 2011 Valiant 42.

I think my max age at this point is 30 years, with a preference to under 20 years. It looks like the Great Recession wiped out sailboat manufacturing, and there's little selection past 2008.

That's also why I'm trying to buy with an eye to what will sell, not just what drives my primal urges. Otherwise, I'll just buy a boat because it felt right when I went inside, which would merely be repeating a mistake I made many times when I was a single man.

A Pacific Seacraft 34 or a J/Boat would get the juices flowing, but may not be appropriate for my purposes.

Originally Posted by TrentePieds

And so we come to your requirement for a shower – a hot one at that! Where will you get the energy it requires to raise the gallonage of water required for a five-minute shower from ambient temperature to, say, 100ºF? And where will you stow that gallonage of fresh water? For you are not proposing to heat the briney, are you? As for potable water, remember that traditionally the allowance – the emergency ration, admittedly, but even so – was half a pint per man per day.

I think a full-duration hot shower is out of the question, but enough warm water to rinse, soap, and wash children when they inevitably get too dirty is likely a necessity. If they associate the boat with being washed in cold water, they will resent it.

A minute or two of lukewarm water is probably enough. Our water consumption boondocking in the camper is slightly under ten gallons per day, and a six gallon hot water heater is enough. For safety reasons, I think I prefer 120V. I could heat it up at the marina, and it will stay warm enough to be tolerable for a day or so afterwards. I'm sure I will have a battery generator, I might have an actual generator, which would allow for a little extra heating.

Originally Posted by TrentePieds

Therefore, for this you first — experimental — venture, buy, cheaply but carefully, a “low end” popular boat you will be able to dispose of easily, for dispose of it you will, sooner or later. Every dollar you put into the acquisition, maintenance and operating cost of ANY boat you should consider “sunk cost” — the money lost is merely the cost of pursuing this particular hobby!

I fear this is a case of "Good, Fast, Cheap, pick two". This is all happening a year earlier than I was planning (I was planning to buy a lake boat this year, just to get used to boat ownership and maintenance). Outside factors have accelerated my plan, leaving me feeling a little behind the power curve.