On Tue, 16 Aug 2005 07:52:43 -0400, DSK wrote:


Not so. The "equivalent of a $150,000 vessel" would be one that was
fully found and ready to put to sea. What you're getting is a potential
vessel, which needs an undetermined amount of future expense & labor.

OK, fair enough. Let's say "equivalent of a $150,000 vessel should I
finish it in the same manner it was started by paying pros $50,000 and
having bought it for $30,000, thus saving $70,000 on a like-new boat".

If the potential boat is exactly the design you've always wanted, and
the previous builder was a meticulous perfectionist who spared no amount
of money on tools & materials and no amount of his own time, and is so
sick of the potential boat and/or desperate for cash he'll hand it over
for a song (or better yet, pay you to haul it off), then it can be a
good deal.

Exactly.



I have looked at several such boats, ranging from "hopelessly rusting
empty hulls" to "just add teak", and it is very surprising just how
finished an unfinished and "hard to sell" boat can be.


Not surprising at all, at least not to my cynical eye. They're trying to
sell a very personal dream. Only a person who shares the dream will be
at all interested, and most won't have much money.

The idea is that I have the money to buy a new production boat, but I
find in many cases the ideas of somewhat conservative perfectionist
obsessives suit me better. Ask a Beneteau sales dude "but where do I
put the tap set and the bench vise?" and you'll see why I don't like a
lot of today's boats for offshore work. There ARE decent, functional,
non-dock-jewellery-oriented production cruisers out there, but they
tend to be European and frighteningly expensive. If I do buy used,
instead of 90% finished, it's likely to be in Europe or South Africa
due to the seamanlike mentality.

Obviously, competant and focussed surveying is essential in such
cases

IMHO what would be most essential would be a complete and honest
estimate of how much $$ & work is required to get the boat sailing. That
estimate, doubled, is probably near the lower threshold of what it'll
*really* take.

I do understand this. Let me say that I've seen boats completed to
full sailing spec, except for interiors, which were plywood seats and
soles covered in indoor-outdoor carpeting. Everything else was mint
and very, very well put together. Had the boat been six feet longer, I
would have bought it on the spot, as a weekend with a Sawzall would
have cleared the way for a carpenter and cabinet maker to do a custom
interior to my specs, which would be oriented to workspace, seaberths
and stowage and less to big cushy chairs in the middle of the saloon
G. But you are correct about boat dollars: multiply by two and
banish shock and horror.




True. Actually, home builders may find your attitude ghoulish but IMHO
you're a starry-eyed optimist. Consider another part of the same
equation: the number of perfectly good (or at least, completed) boats
that sit unsailed in marinas everywhere.

Well, I haven't been dubbed optimistic in some time, but as I did just
purchase a new sextant, I'll take it under advisement. And yes, the
other half of the equation is completed, decent, barely sailed boats
that are pre-rotted but priced to move all over the place.

The problem there, of course, is travelling to see what might be a dud
(expensive unless you've lined up 20 boats in Florida, say, and devote
a week to poking around). The other hazard is trying to divine the
type of owner: some guys IMPROVE the boat by judicious retrofitting;
others are ignorant slobs. I would prefer to solve problems of my own
making than paying big bucks for the opportunity to remedy the
negligence of others.

Thanks for your thoughts,
R.