Looking for a boat

The friendliest place on the web for anyone who enjoys boating.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
See posts with no answers
If you are looking for boat on the East Coast I would recommend Capt. Bobby Gregory as a Buyer's Broker. He is with Intracoastal Yacht Sales in Charleston, SC. I used him as a seller's broker twice and a buyer's broker once. We found our boat on Yachtworld and he took it from there. The boat was in Florida and he found us excellent hull, engine, and electrical surveyors. He is a stand up guy.

We were in the market for a boat very similar to what you are looking for. I really like the RPH design. We ended up with a boat that is not that design because of other criteria higher on the list, and what was available at the time. Everything is a tradeoff. With the help of a broker you can find out a lot about a boat before ever seeing it. We only got on board two other boats during our search. We ended up with a DeFever and love it.
 
Jeremy,
Yes I had the conversation with Haywood and even though it was an initial chat I was very impressed with his knowledge, particularly on OA and specific issues with specific year models. He explained the fee scale thoroughly and it seemed reasonable to me. It's encouraging to hear your story on the warranty. Thanks very much for sharing that Sir.
We aim to reconnect after the holidays but at this point it's likely we'll engage them.
Cheers
 
Patrick, is that captain Bob that does the videos?
As mentioned, we opened up conversations with Zimmerman's already, but we'll certainly keep the info and appreciate you sharing this. You have a lovely boat and as you say, everything is either a trade off or a compromise. It'll be interesting to see what we end up with! LOL. Cheers, TBW
 
Last year boat buyer here - maybe the market has slowed down since then - we engaged a buyer’s broker because we thought they could help us find the boat we wanted (in PNW and we live in Central Coast CA). Boats in the class we wanted went from on Yachtworld to under contract in less than a week. Buyer’s broker couldn’t keep up - we could find boats faster than he could (we looked multiple times a day!). That said - as others mentioned - some boats don’t even get listed until after they are under contract (we found that out the hard way) - but a random buyer’s broker may not have any better insight than you.
Finally - as for cost - buyer’s brokers are something relatively new to boating - and we found multiple cases where the seller’s broker wouldn’t agree to split the commission at least until the boat hadn’t sold for a while.
If you have no idea of make/model/year of boat - then maybe a BB could help - otherwise get out there - and GO SEE BOATS for sale - you have to get on them and look around - we toured at least 5 before settling - on each one we learned a lot and refined our questions.

Have fun and good luck.
 
Jwag,
Thanks for this.
I think Zimmerman seem to have a pretty unique handle on representing buyers and as they have reps along the east coast, (We want a boat for the loop) and we live in Idaho currently, it could help us sort the wheat from the chaff and eliminate a bunch of unnecessary trips.
Hopefully the market is cooling enough, we aren't impulse buyers so the market of late wasn't good for us.
Cheers! TBW
 
We looked at a boat in Fl that we decided not to buy. The broker said he would split his commission with us if we used him as our buyer's broker for any future boat we decided to place an offer. We did and saved $15k. Now before someone says you get what you pay for, this really worked for us, the broker was competent, friendly and it was a win-win situation for everyone. Since we bought still in Fl but other side, everything worked out. Everything is negotiable.
 
Clive,

You have clearly gotten lots of good advice here already. We bought our Jefferson Rivanna (via the seller’s broker) in April after a very tedious whirlwind process of calling listing brokers around the east coast, often to be told boats were already sold or under contract. The Florida market was crazy at the time so we drove as far north as Virginia to look at boats, ultimately finding one in Savannah.

We are thrilled with our boat but one thing I realized after staying in various marinas from Charleston to Florida this summer is that it would have been smart to go on a marina road trip while shopping, without regard for whether we’d seen online listings for boats in a particular marina. Once we were actually staying in marinas with our boat I couldn’t believe how many “for sale” signs we saw—both private sellers and brokers—that we didn’t ever see online, and how many people we spoke to who said they sold their boat after by being approached by someone at their marina when their boat wasn’t yet for sale. Marinas also usually have for sale/wanted bulletin boards too. Maybe too time consuming but you’ve got the time to do it, I bet you could narrow down a few good marinas to poke around in so supplement using a buyers broker.

Also stand firm with the “no ladders” criteria! We have a big dog too and nearly caved on that criteria but are so glad we didn’t. Carrying a dog up/down ladders would not be fun. If you want a super dog-friendly dinghy, check out Takacat. The open bow makes it very easy for the dog to get on and off the dinghy, and they are very lightweight so you can use a simple davit system to stow it off the swim deck without needing a lift. We paired ours with an electric motor, great for quiet middle of the night shore runs without waking up the whole anchorage with a gas motor.

https://www.takacatamericas.com/lx-series-boats/

Best of luck to you!
 
I've purchased through a seller's broker, buyer's broker and private sale. Best deal I got was a private sale. Suggest you check organizations like owner's sites, MTOA, AGLCA, or just do a search online for a make and model. The advantage I had with the buyer's broker was that he screened out the boats that were claimed to be "Bristol" that were really dogs. Saved me a lot of time. When I personally found a boat I liked on yachtworld, he checked all the claims with the seller's broker and verified their veracity. We bought the boat, he made a nice commission. Another time he found a boat I liked and the seller's broker refused to show the boat unless I delt with only him. That cost the owner a sale.
 
MV, many thanks for the info and support. We actually have looked closely at the Rivanna SE 50, but I'm really hoping for a RPH, super boat though. Does yours have a lower helm? I know many don't.
Cheers! Clive C. TBW
 
Joe, Many thanks, I'll check those out. We are members of the AGLCA.
Like MV said, I'd like tom check out marinas but that would require a trip out East and a long drive up and down the coast but may be necessary living now in Idaho.
I've heard that before when a Selling broker won't show the boat.. Seems like the owner should have the latitude to dictate that..
many thanks Joe,
Clive C. TBW
 
Clivepc said:
MV, many thanks for the info and support. We actually have looked closely at the Rivanna SE 50, but I'm really hoping for a RPH, super boat though. Does yours have a lower helm? I know many don't.
Cheers! Clive C. TBW
Click to expand...

Ours does not have a lower helm but that works well for our particular use—our cruising grounds are almost entirely in the Bahamas where you really benefit from being able to to read the shallow waters from a higher up vantage point so we’d likely favor using the flybridge helm even if we had a lower helm. Plus it’s nice to have the extra space in the salon, which maybe matters more on a 50’s layout than that of a 52 or 56. We’d probably care more about a lower helm if we did any northern cruising in colder climates.

Hope you find what you’re looking for. I bet you’ll know it the second you see it!
 
When we were looking for a trawler in 2021, I reached out to Curtis Stokes. He answered the phone himself and was extremely helpful 6 months prior to us even having the funds for purchase. He suggested joining MTOA to start listening/learning and also using Jon Horton to obtain insurance. Getting insurance when moving up from being ski boat owners to a trawler was complicated. The insurers wanted to limit the length of the vessel we purchased to 40’. Jon Horton helped a lot to allow us to buy a 46’.

When we had the funds, Curtis put us in touch with a broker, and she found a boat for us with her connections as a marina owner. It was a 1990 Grand Banks 46’ Classic that never even went to market. Those are connections you won’t find by searching yacht world and boat trader. She also help us a newbies making the purchase process much easier. We wanted to buy the boat on the east coast but ended up finding it in Chattanooga. We purchased her and transited 1900 miles in 30 days to Georgia as new owners with a captain for 1st 2 weeks. The broker was busy selling her marina towards the end of all this and I can’t say she was very communicative after the purchase. She was great in the beginning but kind of faded out towards the end. Hence, can’t recommend her. But, she got us a beautiful boat the owner hadn’t really considered selling except he knew and trusted her when she said she may have interested buyers. The seller also owned a 55’ Fleming and wasn’t using the Grand Banks (must be nice).

Happy boat hunting.

Sheela
 
Sheela, all good info thanks.
Do you have contact info for Jon Horton ?
Merry Christmas,
TBW
 
Clivepc said:
Sheela, all good info thanks.
Do you have contact info for Jon Horton ?
Merry Christmas,
TBW
Click to expand...



Yes. Jon Horton at Jack Martin Associates.

Jon.Horton@jackmartin.com
Main office: 866-206-8821
Mobile:443-336-6838

We ended up get a better insurance deal with State Farm this year and dropped the Progressive policy we got with him as 1st year owners. New policy had higher value on the boat and unlimited time in the Bahamas.
 
sheelawa said:
Yes. Jon Horton at Jack Martin Associates.

Jon.Horton@jackmartin.com
Main office: 866-206-8821
Mobile:443-336-6838

We ended up get a better insurance deal with State Farm this year and dropped the Progressive policy we got with him as 1st year owners. New policy had higher value on the boat and unlimited time in the Bahamas.
Click to expand...



Merry Christmas too!
 
Clive,
We engaged w/ Zimmerman and so far have been quite pleased. Now if we could only find a boat! We went to survey on our own before hiring Zimmerman, but Haywood was great at discussing pros and cons of the one we were about to survey, and recommended the surveyor they use in FL. Needless to say, we should've had them from the start and it would've likely saved me significantly in time and money as his recommended surveyor found a Pandora's box that would've easily required up to 50% of purchase price to make it a well found boat.

We've since signed on with them. Appreciate the yard credits and guarantees they provide. They came highly recommended by a friend and we're hopeful that this spring proves fruitful.

Best of luck!
Mark
 
Mark,
Thanks for the info. Yes, we are looking forward to working with them.
Once our home actually closes in Jan, we'll make first steps.

Cheers Sir
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Adopo
Lawsuit Rocks the Yacht-Sales World
2
Replies
51
Views
9K
FoxtrotCharlie
FoxtrotCharlie
S
First Boat Confusion - Insurance & Boat Length Help
2
Replies
48
Views
5K
a_real_journey
A
ben2go
Do we have a section for boats found for sale?
Replies
8
Views
1K
Action
Action
J
Good place for a slip in Ga, SC, NC?
Replies
16
Views
2K
henrymei
henrymei
E
Looking for boat PNW
2
Replies
31
Views
5K
danboy
D

Latest posts

Back
Top Bottom