I guess some peoples idea of 'immaculate' and 'no expense spared' differs...

alt

alt

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After getting in touch with a boat owner yesterday, arranged a viewing. "The boat is immaculate, little use and no expense spared"

Got there and there were gouges of gelcoat taken off the boat, various scrapes, stress cracks . Interior was filthy.

And to top it all off, opened up the engine bay, and what was on the oil filter.... "Changed July 2008"

Christ on a bike! Search continues...
 
alt said:
After getting in touch with a boat owner yesterday, arranged a viewing. "The boat is immaculate, little use and no expense spared"

Got there and there were gouges of gelcoat taken off the boat, various scrapes, stress cracks . Interior was filthy.

And to top it all off, opened up the engine bay, and what was on the oil filter.... "Changed July 2008"

Christ on a bike! Search continues...
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I take it was an "Irish" immaculate boat then Alt : )
 
alt said:
After getting in touch with a boat owner yesterday, arranged a viewing. "The boat is immaculate, little use and no expense
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I am also finding this to the extent that I completly ignore these descriptions, brokers seems to be worse but private owners do it as well.

There are certain words that when used with selling things see to have lost their meanings, luxury in realtion to houses for example, its pretty hard to find a house not described as luxury now.
 
BBL.

"After getting in touch with a boat owner yesterday, arranged a viewing. "The boat is immaculate, little use and no expense spared"


Inverse square Boat Buying Law.
The further you travel and the more "glowing" the boat description.
The greater the disappointment.:)

For every 10 boats you look at ...one will be roughly as described,but your boat is out there !
 
The boat that we bought was described as being immaculate by 2 brokers - it was anything but!
We bought the boat but the "immaculate" interior was completely re-fitted with new carpets and and new upholstery.
 
alt said:
I was hoping to keep the few bob in the country this time, but every boat I view makes me look more and more towards the UK
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I drove from Waterford to the top of the shannon one Sunday to look at an "immaculate" 40 foot flybridge boat , Walked threw the back door to find the carpet soaking wet , And that was on a 2 year old boat from a well known builder !!
In the end i bought from Holland
 
It's been said before but why not ask on the forum if there's someone local to a boat you're interested in that can go and have a look and take some unbiased photos to email to you? I think many people on here are quite happy to be given an excuse to have a nose around a boat.
 
grumpy_o_g said:
It's been said before but why not ask on the forum if there's someone local to a boat you're interested in that can go and have a look and take some unbiased photos to email to you? I think many people on here are quite happy to be given an excuse to have a nose around a boat.
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To be fair it wasn't a long travel (about 1 hour each way) - it was the fact that the seller was boasting about how immaculate and well maintained the boat was, then when I lifted the engine cover there was a 2008 mark on the filter
 
Boat descriptions

Must admit a couple of years ago when looking to purchase I got to the stage of phoning and actually asking what was the condition of the boat. A lot actually went from being immaculate to needing lots of TLC (maybe they just didn't want to sell to me?). But I appreciated the honesty as its not great to travel for hours to find that what you expected does not exist :D
Nick Heath
 
alt said:
To be fair it wasn't a long travel (about 1 hour each way) - it was the fact that the seller was boasting about how immaculate and well maintained the boat was, then when I lifted the engine cover there was a 2008 mark on the filter
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In response to your signature have you seen the 2003 Zafirro 34 for sale with Ancasta Poole. As far as i am aware it is in good condiiton - video camera in the engine bay - and has just been reduced by £10k.
 
It's a right pi55 off, been there and done that with cars motorbikes and boats, in end with cars and motorbikes had to put a cap on the distance travelled due to what you have said, and it's has all ways worked out just in a little longer than expected.
But when it comes to boats that rule goes out of the window and I have decided you just have to go look and look again.

Good luck !
 
Assuming the boats are being sold through a broker, all of this begs the question....... have they (the brokers) even bothered to look at the boats.
There's another thread going on at the moment which questions whether a broker ever looks at a boat prior to sticking it on their website, and if the previous post are anything to go by the answer is a resounding no.
....and before anyone says it the brokers job to up-sell a clients boat and to get the best deal possible, it's also their job to tell the truth, and there's nothing that pi55es me off more than spending time and money travelling to see a boat only to find it's a tub.
 
Living in Denmark we searched locally plus Sweden, Germany, UK, France and Spain. Finally bought a boat in Southampton.

We actually viewed boats in Sweden, Germany and Spain, but not on dedicated travels as we combined it with holiday or work. Must say that descriptions are as different as people - and the understanding of "immaculate" varies greatly between countries, cultures and sellers' knowledge. (Spanish Fairline 35 "in original shape" translated into "no regular maintenance for years, engine symptoms completely ignored"). Many really believe that their boats are top value - some simply because the bloke who initially sold it said so :cool:

What some hope by deliberately tweaking the facts is to attract attention and then talk a buyer into a deal. As the wise fool the stupid, they obviously look for stupid buyers:rolleyes:

Proper homework is a must before travelling and asking for close-up pics of parts not presented in the ad is one way to get closer to the truth. If you look closer, photos often tell more than the seller intended :eek:

Brokers are very different indeed. The one chosen by the seller we bought from did a great job, even after sale.
 
A couple of years ago I entered into discussions with a broker in Plymouth over a boat located there that I was interested in. It wasn't described as immaculate, but the broker did a convincing enough job on how great a buy it would be. So I drove the 230 miles to Plymouth one evening, stayed in a carp hotel (instant coffee, yes INSTANT, in the cups at breakfast) which charged a non-carp price. In the morning made my way to the marina and was met by the broker, who informed me he'd just been on the boat to open her up, and, erm, tidy it up as the owner's daughter was currently living on-board whilst attending Uni :eek::eek: If you imagine the contents a of a 20yr old female's bedroom randomly strewn around a 36' boat that gives you an idea of what awaited. Stuff absolutely everywhere, and how can one objectively view a boat when there are knickers lying on the berth. Almost every piece of woodwork gouged or otherwise damaged, not that half of it could be seen due to all the stuff; depressing in the extreme. Managed to open engine bay to find water, oil and diesel slurping around various areas of the bilge.

What I found really annoying was that the broker knew full well the daughter was living on-board but said nothing, and he knew full well how far I was travelling - I was really livid. Also, I had previously given an indication of the price point I'd be looking at, as the boat was well overpriced, and was told that price was in the ballpark, but when I was there broker said actually the owner wanted more..... Not unsurprisingly the boat is still for sale today, and is still overpriced.
 
beejay190 said:
In response to your signature have you seen the 2003 Zafirro 34 for sale with Ancasta Poole. As far as i am aware it is in good condiiton - video camera in the engine bay - and has just been reduced by £10k.
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Just gotten rid of a Z34, while I like the boat, i'm happy to go for a slight change, but you're in the right ballpark when you say Z34
 
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