Unrealistic Expectations.

[rotrax]

We met a Kiwi sailor in Newlyn in August last year. We had a lot in common and after we told him we were to sell our steel Hartley 32 that we keep in Wellington Harbour, NZ, he showed interest in purchasing it.

We left NZ, by a repatriation flight in April 2020. We arranged for a lift, scrub, new anodes and antifoul which was carried out seven months ago. We obviously had not been aboard or seen the boat since we left and it had not been prepared for sale.

After our arrival and getting over jet lag we met with our Kiwi chum and showed him the boat. He said he was still interested but would like a far closer inspection. This was OK by us.

The next day he and I took the boat in bits, to get close to the inside of the hull. Only one place showed rust, in the bilge sump. The 1986 applied bitumastic coating had failed when water had collected there. The cause was a lack of oil in the Bukh oil filled stern gland, since fixed.

The other fault was three stanchions requiring welding at the base/deck joint.

The boat is fully equipped, liferaft, epirb, inflatable dinghy, outboard,new Garmin plotter and NZ Navionics card, 3 anchors, spinnaker, spare main, genoa plus tools, cordage, lubricants and filters. 60 w of solar, batteries newish and fully charged, the Bukh DV20 fired right up and chucked water out of the exhaust.

He slept on it and declined to buy her, his reason was that 'I cant just get in and sail her to Fiji-there is too much work to do!'

The asking price was 10,000 NZ Dollars, about £5,250.00 at the current exchange rate.

We all know steel boats need close inspection and good internal sealing. Ella is a very dry boat-the rust in the bilge sump is like dust. Some clothes and all the bedding left onboard for almost 3 years was bone dry and has no smell.

What do you think - did he expect too much for his money or was he a tyre kicker?

Would any of you expect to sail a 5K boat to Fiji from Wellington without preparing it properly?

Answers on the back of a 20 NZ Dollar note sent to 'Make Rotrax a rich man fund, Brooklyn, Wellington, NZ.

 

[harvey38]

Yet another failed Youtube wannabe!

I'm no yachtie but that sounds like a lot of boat for not much money and I don't think anyone could even dream of buying a boat, filling up with food and departing without a great deal of preparation and planning.

No matter what though, I wouldn't have let them stay overnight.

 

[rotrax]

Yet another failed Youtube wannabe!

I'm no yachtie but that sounds like a lot of boat for not much money and I don't think anyone could even dream of buying a boat, filling up with food and departing without a great deal of preparation and planning.

No matter what though, I wouldn't have let them stay overnight.

He did not sleep on the boat, he slept on making the decision. He had a camper van nearby.

I was perhaps not clear - oops!

He was, however, an experienced sailor. Concerto also met him when we were stormbound in Newlyn.

You are right, a lot of boat for the money. We are off with the Grandchildren camping. When we get back a week of mornings will have it ready to show anyone interested. I will point out the shortcomings in the stanchion area, that is safety related. An hour making some sleeves and a stick welder will have it sorted quickly.

Due to the cost and length of flights and our increasing age we are unlikely to be visiting NZ as often in the future.

Time for our Hartley to have a new custodian.

 

[penfold]

Anyone expecting to get on board a new-to-them boat and sail into the sunset does not have all their paddles in the water, expecting any £5k boat to not need work is bereft of any paddles at all; he consciously or unconsciously did not actually want to sail to Fiji or buy your boat, a timewaster.

 

[Chiara’s slave]

Some friends of ours bought a Malo in 2021 with the intent of joining the world cruising fraternity. They spent 6 months working on the boat almost full time, even though, to many it was nearly perfect. They sailed around the Solent and south coast for a month or 2, returning to their home port. People were talking about them as dreamers by this time, not me. 6 months ago, they rented their house out, and set off. Somewhere in the Med currently, Turkey I think. No matter what I’d spent on a boat, that’s pretty much what I’d do, if I were wanting to do it.
Best if luck with selling the boat, to someone with realistic expectations.

 

[Stemar]

A dreamer and a timewaster. It's possible he'll have an attack of realism and find a boat to realise his dreams, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

Hope you find a realist.

 

[justanothersailboat]

Look on the bright side. You've probably saved this person (and more importantly the boat) from disaster. There may be a few exceptions but surely the vast majority of people who would buy a new-to-them old boat and immediately sail it on a major ocean voyage with no fettling, prep or shakedown cruising are exactly the people who should never attempt this.

Sounds like she could be an excellent boat for someone a bit wiser. I hope you find that person.

 

[jac]

Firstly the boat sounds a bargain. At the risk of teaching grandmothers have other brokers given an indication on price??

Secondly - the guy sounds like a dreamer. AT the very least surely he's want to service everything before doing anything more than a day sail in sheltered waters? So possibly a lucky escape

My only thought might be on the cosmetic side. Is she looking clean and shiny with good paint / varnish or is 3 years of weathering showing. Whilst it is superficial ( especially at that price point) it goes a long way to create a good first impression and it's a well established fact that buying decisions are often an emotional thing. If so, a day or two with some cleaner then maybe some wet and dry and a brush may pay dividends

 

[doug748]

"Would any of you expect to sail a 5K boat to Fiji from Wellington without preparing it properly?"

No. Your boat should sell in a jiffy to the right experienced steel boater, lots of them in the antipodes.

Have you got any photos for us?

 

[[3889]]

He did not sleep on the boat, he slept on making the decision. He had a camper van nearby.

I think Harvey38 was joking. The perennial problem of whether to use an emoji or not.

 

[dansaskip]

The thing is the price of boats in New Zealand is a lot cheaper than what could be regarded as the inflated prices in the UK. It's a fact that I discovered in my stays in New Zealand and when I made tentative enquiries into selling my boat there. I am not saying that the guy in Rotrax's case is/was not a dreamer or maybe even a bit of a chancer. There are quite a few cruisers who get as far as NZ and for various reasons decide to sell up so I think this helps to lower market prices.
Another point of consideration is that NZ sailors have to jump through many more hoops with the authorities and a boat before they can set off for a long passage offshore (to Fiji for example). We often don't appreciate just how lucky we are in some respects in that we can just jump aboard and head off into the deep blue yonder.
Anyway sorry for your troubles Rotary wish you better times.

 

[Concerto]

He did not sleep on the boat, he slept on making the decision. He had a camper van nearby.

I was perhaps not clear - oops!

He was, however, an experienced sailor. Concerto also met him when we were stormbound in Newlyn.

You are right, a lot of boat for the money. We are off with the Grandchildren camping. When we get back a week of mornings will have it ready to show anyone interested. I will point out the shortcomings in the stanchion area, that is safety related. An hour making some sleeves and a stick welder will have it sorted quickly.

Due to the cost and length of flights and our increasing age we are unlikely to be visiting NZ as often in the future.

Time for our Hartley to have a new custodian.

I am surprised that John did not snap your boat up. He was a very fit and able sailor when I chatted with him. Since his wife died 10 years ago he has taken up a fairly nomadic life. In NZ his camper van is his home. When he visited the UK last summer to see his son, he had planned to cycle everywhere but the cost of accomodation was beyond his budget. Instead he decided to buy a Westerly Konsort and sail round to visit places. That is how we both met John in Newlyn.

Personally I would ask John again as it would depend on whether he had smoked any of his whacky baccy recently. Possibly it might help if the stanchions were fixed and the boat fully cleaned.

 

[RunAgroundHard]

I wouldn't classify him as tire kicker or time waster. Clearly he was interested but decided against it. It comes with the selling territory, you just have to get on with selling it. It is very likely you only have a limited understanding of why he has decided to not buy. Over the years of buying and selling things, bumping into people who have then bought would rank as a negligible method of finding a buyer, compared to actively advertising it. Also, it never surprises me who turns up to buy stuff, they are not always on the face of it, obvious characters.

 

[NormanS]

It seems a bit hard to criticise someone, just because he decided not to buy your boat. ?

 

[rotrax]

It seems a bit hard to criticise someone, just because he decided not to buy your boat. ?

If you look, mark and inwardly digest what I wrote there was no critique of him as a person-he is a good guy and we like him.

Just his expectation of a cheap boat.

We are all different, that is what makes social interaction so interesting.

Ella is a simple boat but in good order, visually as well as mechanicaly. She survived almost three years of no attention by us very well.

We shall be meeting him socially later next week in his home town of Omakoroa in the Bay of Plenty.

I'll try and attach some pics. First Mate has some on her phone.

 

[BobnLesley]

...the price of boats in New Zealand is a lot cheaper than what could be regarded as the inflated prices in the UK....

I'm surprised by that, we thought that the secondhand prices (for decent stuff) were quite high; one of the downsides with selling a non-NZ yacht is that a hefty import duty (>20% IIRC) has to be paid by seller or buyer before the sale can be completed. The reason we heard (and often) was that shipping a boat to NZ is prohibitively expensive unless you're in the market for a big/expensive/new one, so the only source of awb/mob other than 'local' boats are those which are sailed in.
Having offloaded ours remotely when we were locked-out of NZ in 2020 at what we thought was a knockdown price for a quick/easy sale (it was in bits with a long list of work still needed - some of it expensive! - before it could be relaunched) we achieved NZ$10k for that; put the word out on the NZ yottie sites and facebook pages, I suspect that you'll have a more than one potential buyer waiting when you get back from the camping trip.

 

[NormanS]

If you look, mark and inwardly digest what I wrote there was no critique of him as a person-he is a good guy and we like him.

Just his expectation of a cheap boat.

We are all different, that is what makes social interaction so interesting.

Ella is a simple boat but in good order, visually as well as mechanicaly. She survived almost three years of no attention by us very well.

We shall be meeting him socially later next week in his home town of Omakoroa in the Bay of Plenty.

I'll try and attach some pics. First Mate has some on her phone.

Sorry, I should have said that you seemed critical of his decision not to buy your boat. Why else write about it?
Surely that's his right, either to buy or not. But I'm sorry if I have taken the wrong interpretation.

 

[rotrax]

No problem Norman.

In a way it might work out better.

I shall present it in a better light now I am here and perhaps get a better price for it.

It was just the reason given for not going ahead.

If I was in the same situation I would have said 'Sorry, this one is not for me.'

End of.

 

[benjenbav]

No problem Norman.

In a way it might work out better.

I shall present it in a better light now I am here and perhaps get a better price for it.

It was just the reason given for not going ahead.

If I was in the same situation I would have said 'Sorry, this one is not for me.'

End of.

Maybe he just didn’t want to buy it and tried to say something that he thought would cushion the blow rather than admitting to wasting your time, whilst wanting to stay friends with you.

 

[xyachtdave]

I think it’s fair to say sailing does have more than its fair share of interesting characters.

We’ve just sold my partners boat and some of the enquires were hysterical. I had to rewrite some of the email responses she wrote to potential buyers.

Someone wanted to know ‘How do you navigate without a chart plotter?’

Her response was ‘What!? I have paper charts and a compass, I’ve been sailing since I was 3 and never needed one, I suggest you take a navigation course!’

I softened that to something along the lines of ‘We generally sail in familiar waters by day and haven’t needed one...or use navionics on a phone if required...’

If Concerto is correct about the use of weed, sailing round the UK as cheaper etc, your buyer sounds like he was up the interesting end of sailor spectrum.

I’d spend a couple of days cleaning it, advertise at same price and forget him.