BoatBanter.com - need help with foreign purchase

"John Murfet" wrote:

"Rosalie B." wrote in message
.. .
"John Murfet" wrote:

I'm planning on finding a used 38' boat in the USA east coast,
outfitting,
then sailing on to Europe. My questions are : how much visa time would I
be

You are eligible for the Visa Waiver Program but I don't think this is
a help to you. It looks like your limit is 90 days which cannot be
extended, and you have to have a round trip ticket.

http://travel.state.gov/visa/questions.html
snip
I'm not sure whether you could get a Cruising Permit after you get the
boat - that allows foreign boats to cruise in the U.S. for a year,
after which you must leave U.S. coastal waters and enter another
country. An alternative is to pay the U.S. duty (about 1.5%) so the
boat can stay in the U.S. as long as you want.

allowed (I'm an Australian citizen), and if I spend 30 - 40k on a boat
would
that time be enough to ready the boat for cruising? I'm a single male,
how
difficult is it to find crew willing to share expenses?
Any help is very welcome.

I'm sure you can re-register the boat. That part will be easy
(relatively speaking). You have a certain amount of time to get her
out of Florida after the purchase before you have to register in
Florida and pay Florida tax, and I'm not sure how that would apply in
this situation as a foreign national. I've not seen that addressed
anywhere..

For US and probably Canadians also, if you buy in Florida and don't
pay the tax,, you aren't allowed to return her to Florida for a year
after you leave in order to avoid paying the tax (see note), but again
I'm not sure how that would apply to you, nor do I think it will be
easy to get any guidance from officialdom as they probably don't know
either. But FL tax isn't the worst thing in the world to have to pay.
At least it is better than being deported without the boat.

[Note: I think the rule is that you have a month or two after you buy
to leave before you pay the tax. Leaving demonstrates that you don't
intend to use the boat in Florida and that's why you don't pay. But
the second part of that is that you can't come back into FL for a
year. Also note that these time frames both for the time to leave FL
and for a US cruising permit (I think) don't apply if the boat is up
in a yard]

But the visa situation is that you have to have your return ticket in
order to get in, and the permit is non-renewable. The reason to go
out and come in again (other than that things are more accessible and
cheaper in the US than in the Bahamas) is that when you do that you
get a cruising permit for yourself and the boat for a year (I think)
and are no longer on the Visa Waiver program and thus not limited to
90 days.

I think the people to ask about this are the SSCA. Someone who is an
Australian member might know.

The time required will vary depending on the type of boat. I'd
suggest buying a boat that's pretty much ready to go SOMEWHERE, going
to the Bahamas or someplace like that, and then returning to the
Florida and putting the boat up in a yard to do the work (if the boat
is in the yard the Florida 90 day restriction doesn't go into effect).

As far as finding crew - I've never been able to do that.

Hi Rosalie
Thanks for your help. I believe I can register my newly aquired boat as an
Australian vesel from the Australian embassy when I relinquish the American
registration. Perhaps that then allows me to cruise American waters. I'll
have to check.

I'm sure you have to get a cruising permit, and I do not think (based
on another account I read on the internet) that you can do that if the
boat STARTS OUT in the US. It has to be outside the US and then come
into the US. If the boat is small enough, you might be able to truck
it up to Canada and work on it there. I know people who've done that
even with our size boat. Then you can sail back down. The coast of
the US makes a good shakedown cruise.

Have you been unable to find any crew, or do you mean 'suitable crew'

After Bob (my husband) had a heart attack, I wanted someone to help us
bring the boat back from Nassau, and no one that I knew or in my
internet family could afford to leave their jobs and help us out for
no pay, although we would have fed them and paid all the boat expenses
and we have a very comfortable seaworthy boat (IMHO).

If I understand correctly, you are asking for someone who has enough
money to be able to support themselves for an indefinite period of
time on a small boat with long periods of boredom interspersed with
terror just for the pleasure of your company and visiting foreign
countries.

If someone had that amount of money and free time and the desire to do
that, why wouldn't they just buy their own boat?

I have heard of folks who do gather crew together. Sometimes there
are a group of folks who are already friends and they take turns being
crew. I've also heard of a LOT of cases where crew has been lined up
and has jumped ship and left the owner in the lurch.

Sometimes people PAY crew, and sometimes people who want to sail but
are too afraid and/or too old to want to do it by themselves will pay
another person to take them along on their boat, but generally that is
rare and I don't know how you go about doing that.

For a small boat like that, single handing isn't so bad, especially in
the ICW if you are just going across to the Bahamas.

grandma Rosalie

S/V RosalieAnn, Leonardtown, MD
CSY 44 WO #156
http://home.mindspring.com/~gmbeasley/id2.html