Buying The Perfect Boat
By Valerie Giles, Fri Dec 9th

Why is it, that when you are looking to buy a boat, you cannever find one that suits your needs? This is what happens tomany people every year and in particular to ourselves. It’s justlike buying a house. When you are selling, it is a buyer’smarket and when you are buying it is a seller’s market! Thisyear my husband and I decided that it was time to buy our firstboat.

Now we have been with our friends on their Bayliner formany years. They pay for the boat expenses and we bring the foodand drink in exchange. Not a bad deal we figured, until we gotthe boat bug ourselves. Now we want to own our own boat. Aftersix years of and as many seasons of boat shows, wedecided to take a course. So a couple of winters ago, wesigned up for a rather lengthy course of 16 weeks. Wedecided that firstly we wanted to be safe boaters and secondlywe wanted to protect our very expensive boat investment when thetime came.

Week after week of classes, lesson after lesson of plotting andtying knots came and went and finally it was time to graduateand try our luck at with all this new found knowledge.We decided first to try out our expertise on our friends’ boat,but discovered that was like having two cooks in the samekitchen. Things don’t really run as smoothly as one would like.Tie a knot. Have someone retie it for you! Hang the fenders overthe side. Have someone reposition them! So after severalweekends of unsuccessful attempts, the decision was made to buyour own boat sooner rather than later where we could tie our ownbrand of knot and observe the channel markers the way we hadbeen taught!

So we started to look. What happened to all the “ForSale” signs that we had seen only weeks before in everymarina that we cruised past? Where were all those perfect boatsthat we had seen in every cove and tied up to every dock? Theywere no where to be found. Finally after perusing the yachtingmagazines and journals, talking to several boat brokers

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andsearching many internet boats for sale sites, we found what wethought to be the perfect yacht for us - right in our ownbackyard. Only five minutes from our home there is located amarina with lots of power boats. Last year there were many forsale. But as luck would have it, we were not looking then. Thisyear, there were fewer boats for sale. But on this oneparticular morning as we drove through the marina parking lot,we spied the perfect boat. We hopped out of the car and walkedover to take a closer look. The boat had been pulled out of thewater, so we were able to look it over from all sides includingthe bottom.

The information that was posted beside the boat looked verypromising. Just the right length. Just the right age. We hadalready agreed that this boat make was good quality. Aninflatable dinghy with motor and seawise electric lifting systemwas also included. The boat also had a GPS and all thetrimmings. But the price, could it be correct? It seemed a bitlow for this particular yacht. You guessed it! The twin enginesystem was gas, not diesel. This was the reason for theexcellent price.

We thought that we had found the perfect boat! In fact we hadexcept for one very expensive item. For those of you who ownyour own boat, you can related to the expense of a gas engineyacht. Gas engines are fast and great for skiing and laketouring in small boats, but on the ocean and in a large yacht,the cost can be prohibitive. (Note: Recently diesel pricesand gas prices have moved closer together.)

So once again, our search begins in earnest. And once again,there are no boats for sale. Or is that just our take on thesituation? Surely the boat for us is just out there waiting tobe discovered!

About the author:Valerie Giles owns and operates Boats, Anchors and Morehttp://www.boats-anchors-and-more.com a resourcesite featuring boat accessories, fishing lure manufacturers and inflatable boats. Everything you need for the boatingseason.