Save $$$$$ in survey fees

Yup.... never book survey until boat has been inspected and gone on a short sea trial

Out of curiosity, what was the boat?
Please don't tell me it was an 80 or bigger.

Happens all the time. Been there.

So advertised as fully serviced then many systems don’t work? The listing broker is a crook....

I always request a"run hard" sea trial 5 days in advance. I tell the broker or owner that we need to find out what is going to break on sea trial and then have time to get it fixed. The broker or owner has to have a good reason to decline this request. If I anticipate a problem with compliance in advance, I will sometimes add it as a contingency to the purchase agreement.

Also, if I haven't pre-inspected the boat, I ask the listing broker when was the last time s/he was aboard, how current is the information in the listing, how old are the pictures, and when was the last time the boat was taken out. The last question is what the broker expects to turn up on survey.

I boycott brokers that lie. Why help the bad guys stay in business.

Judy

Did this happen to be an Offshore 62 Pilothouse?

I appreciate the feedback MAN!

Everything looks good in pictures. When searching for Valhalla I drove 5 hours to check out a Bertram M/Y owned by the broker who was living aboard. He described it as "mint" and of course the pics looked great. From 200' down the dock I could see that it was painted with house paint and a brush and it went down hill from there. Thankfully I made it a stop along my way to a vacation weekend. Out of over a dozen boats that looked good enough on paper to fly around the country to check out only two were worth even considering. It was bad enough wasting our time and the boss' money for flights, etc. No way would I bring a surveyor before checking out the boat in person first. Everybody thinks or at least says their boat is great, and everything looks good in pictures. Valhalla was the best of the bunch and thankfully we negotiated real well, cause you don't even want to know what the boss ended up spending on 3 refits during the first 6 months of shaking her down.

We looked at a 62 Offshore in Lauderdale a few years back listed by a reputable local yacht broker. The broker touted boat as open checkbook maintained. Went through the boat with the broker and owner and turns out everything was way behind on scheduled maintenance. The owner had spare alternator belts laying in front of the engines and bragged that the 14-year-old original belts were still on the engines. LOL The boat looked ok but needed a ton of work on everything. The broker knew absolutely nothing about the boat and I told him so. A waste of time to even be looking. There should be a way to qualify the condition of the boat when listed. No doubt many owners claim their boat is in great condition and the broker is willing to accept that without a basic walk-on survey or any documentation, but will advertise as turn-key.

I wouldn't want to embarrass the owner or subsequent owner.

The only way is to ask pointed questions and then go inspect it yourself and/or have a professional inspect it with an eye towards why you should not buy it, but keep your expenses and enthusiasm down cause the odds are you'll be looking at several.
Keep in mind that it's not necessarily dishonesty. One man's treasure is another's trash. Then there's "puffing".